22nd Annual Young Playwrights Festival
Saturday, May 12, 2018 at 2:00 PM
Pasant Theatre in the Wharton Center
FREE public performance - First come, first served seating
whartoncenter.com
517.432.2000 or 1.800.WHARTON
On Saturday, May 12, 2018, at 2:00 p.m. in Wharton Center’s Pasant Theatre, six of mid-Michigan’s top high school playwrights will be recognized as finalists in this year’s Young Playwrights Festival. Each finalist’s project, after a one-of-a-kind mentoring program with theatre professionals, will be directed and performed live at Wharton Center. The Saturday performance is free and open to the public with first come, first served seating.
The Young Playwrights Festival is a collaboration between MSU Federal Credit Union Institute for Arts & Creativity at Wharton Center and the MSU Department of Theatre. The area’s top student writers submit their one-act scripts to this juried competition in hopes of seeing their work performed live on the Wharton Center stage by MSU Department of Theatre students. Of these entries, six of the top playwrights are chosen to collaborate with professional theatre mentors who will provide creative expertise and guidance as the students workshop their original projects.
Professional theatre mentors include: Joe Zettlemaier, Michigan-based playwright; Pam Sterling, Arizona State University; Joe Giardiana, theatre artist, New York City; Ken LaZebnik, playwright and screenwriter; and Randy Wyatt, Aquinas College.
The 22nd Annual Young Playwrights Festival is made possible in part by Comprehensive Psychological Services, PC, Gannett Foundation; Lansing Sate Journal; University Outreach and Engagement, and Wharton Center Inner Circle.
This year’s YPF entries echo the increased focus on student activism and awareness of social issues prevalent in our society at large today. While there are no guidelines given for content or theme, social commentary runs through many of the plays being presented this year, which seems fitting.
The 2018 Young Playwrights finalists are:
Playwright Teacher/School Script Title
Sabina Carty Alexander Heidtke The Night Before
Dexter High School
A young man and his attorney try to piece together the events that led to the murder of the man’s wife and explain what really happened
Adele Carson Anne Russo Letters to Willow
Holt High School
Explores the tragic death of a child and the effect on her mother
Tyler Scanlan Jennifer Strickland Change of Hearts
Laingsburg High School
Exposes the abuses of harsh and inhumane prison environments in the 1950s
Anneliese Stattleman Jean Eddington-Shipman Sesquipedalian
Williamston High School
Focuses on a middle school student obsessed with spelling
Kathleen Stattleman Jean Eddington-Shipman Totally Wild
Williamston High School
Satirizes reality TV during an Alaskan adventure
Lia Bommarito Jean Eddington-Shipman Ethan
Williamston High School
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