Archie comic book characters and ghosts appear in some brand-new, locally written plays presented at the Scripts at Work playwright festival on Friday and Saturday in Red Deer.
Anyone interested in seeing staged readings of some “hot new plays” is invited to the SAW Festival of Plays at the Nickle Studio, upstairs at the Memorial Centre.
These original one-act dramas and comedies will likely not be seen in full production for several years, said Tanya Ryga, who co-chairs the festival with Lynda Adams.
But audience members can get an early-bird preview of the works-in-progress by attending the festival, which for the first time is spread over two evenings.
Staged readings are dramatic presentations in which actors read from scripts without sets or costumes. “It’s so exciting because audiences participate with their imagination,” said Ryga, who believes the plays are boiled down to their essential elements.
“The audience can get in on the ground floor,” she added, and viewers’ reactions will help playwrights tweak scripts. “They’ll be picking up on how the audience responds, and what’s working and what needs strengthening.”
Six short plays that were locally written in SAW’s Circle One workshops led by renowned playwright Gordon Pengilly, will be presented on Friday night.
Ryga said these staged readings, directed by Red Deer native Taylor Chadwick, include flat-out comedies, black comedies and dramas.
Greener Pastures by John Burnham, is about redemption and second chances. Life After Death, By Alida Thomas, involves ghost messages left on a dining room table. The Flip Side of the Comic, by Brooke Dalton, is described as a revisionist look at Archie comic book characters.
Sharon Lightbown’s Where is Gwendolyn Marsh? reveals a hotbed of unrequited love in a community theatre group, while F This House, by Tessa Simpson, is about the cracks that appear when a family is forced to evacuate their home. When White Daffodils Bloom, by Elena Rousseau, is a poetic tale about dissatisfied lives.
Four slightly longer one-acts by local playwrights will be presented on Saturday night. These plays were contest winners, selected by a jury of theatre professionals and later workshopped with guidance from award-winning writers Conni Massing and Trevor Schmidt.
Ryga said professional directors Heather Inglis and Amy DeFelice will oversee these staged readings.
Saturday’s lineup is: Simon Says, by Fran Kimmel, which describes a cable guy romance; Oral Fixations, by Leslie Greentree and Blaine Newton, about the power of food; This is Us Via Video Blog, Alexi Pedneault’s work involving gay students and cyber bullying, and Lee Ann Waines’s The Haunted Springs, a fictionalized rationale for supposed hauntings at the Banff Springs Hotel.
Tickets for each 7:30 p.m. presentation are $12.50 in advance or $15 at the door. Doors open at 7 p.m. Tickets are available by calling 403-347-0800 or on-line from www.ticketcentraloutlet.ca. Seating is limited.
lmichelin@www.reddeeradvocate.com