Saturday, December 12, 2015

More TheatreFest Special Guests

Two more Special Guests for TheatreFest 2016…and there are more to come!

Special Thanks to Cindy SoRelle for her efforts in securing these special guests and for writing this submission!

TheatreFest 2016 in Dallas is turning out to be an incredible opportunity for teachers and students who want to learn more about the blue-collar work behind the written word.  If you will be in Dallas for the 2016 TETA TheatreFest convention, here are some guests artists we will have the privilege of getting to know.
  

Ken Cerniglia, Disney Theatrical Group

KEN CERNIGLIA is joining us to talk not only about his work in professional theatre but also about his important initiative to preserve the archives of our American theatres, and you will want to meet this person who has done so much for audiences of all ages.  He is Dramaturg and Literary Manager for Disney Theatrical Group in New York City, where since 2003 he has developed over fifty shows for professional, amateur, and school productions, including The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Aladdin, The Little Mermaid, Tarzan, Beauty and the Beast jr., and The Lion King Kids. For Disney Editions, he edited Newsies: Stories of The Unlikely Broadway Hit and Peter and the Starcatcher: The Annotated Script of the Broadway Play. 

In addition to his Disney catalog, Ken’s recent freelance dramaturgy projects include Oliverio: a Brazilian Twist on Dickens (Kennedy Center), Bridges (Berkeley Playhouse) and Hadestown (New York Theatre Workshop). Ken is also resident dramaturg for Seattle’s Fisher Ensemble, artistic director of Two Turns Theatre Company, co-founder of the American Theatre Archive Project, and President-Elect of Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas (LMDA). He holds a Ph.D. in theater history and criticism from the University of Washington and presents and publishes his scholarship internationally.  FYI, his name is pronounced “chairneelia.”  Welcome to Texas, Ken!



Gary Garrison, Dramatists Guild of America

We are in for a fabulous time with Texas native GARY GARRISON, who is Executive Director of the Dramatists Guild of America, the national organization for playwrights, lyricists, and composers headed by our most honored dramatists.  Prior to Gary’s work for the Guild, this accomplished playwright served as Artistic Director/Producer/fulltime faculty member at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts-Goldberg Department of Dramatic Writing.  AT NYU, Gary produced more than 45 festivals of new work in collaboration with literally hundreds of playwrights, actors, and directors.  Many of you know him as the author of some of the best playwriting books for students at the graduate, undergraduate and even high school level, and his collection of short plays, Verticals and Horizontals, was published in 2014.

Gary is the best-known short-play authority and festival adjudicator in the US and is known to universities as the leading critic respondent both at ATHE’s yearly conference short-play festival and the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival.  In 2014, the Kennedy Center honored him by instituting the “National Gary Garrison Ten-minute Play Award” given to the best ten-minute play written by a dramatist each year.  Gary is truly a Master Teacher in every way. Welcome home, Gary!

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