Leigh Fondakowski News

ENSEMBLE STUDIO THEATRE (EST) (William Carden, Artistic Director) and The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (Doron Weber, Vice-President, Programs) have announced details for the 2020 First Light Festival, part of the EST/Sloan Project to develop plays exploring science and technology.

In May 2019, Taiwan became the first Asian country to legalize same-sex marriage. Join us for an evening with Taiwanese playwrights Chao Chi-Yun (e??a??e??), Lin Meng-Huan (ae?-a??a??), and Liu Chien-Kuo (a??a??a?-) who have created new works embracing the achievements and struggles of this historic moment. This evening will feature three staged readings performed by a stellar cast of New York-based actors and directed by Michael Leibenluft of Gung Ho Projects. The readings will be followed by a discussion with the playwrights, curators, director, and translator Jeremy Tiang, moderated by Linnea Valdivia, Literary Manager for the National Queer Theater.

On Thursday July 25th, 2019 at 8 p.m., TheatreWorks New Milford's Page 2 Stage series presents a special free staged reading of 'The Laramie Project: Ten Years Later', featuring many members of TheatreWorks' 2003 production of it's predecessor 'The Laramie Project' reprising their roles and is directed by the production's original director, Jane Farnol. 

Yaddo, America's first artist colony, will commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising with "Yaddo Inspirations: A Queer Look Through The Generations". The celebration will highlight queer artists as they discuss their individual ownership of queerness and queer liberation through the arts.

Columbia University School of the Arts is proud to present Daniel Adams' (Columbia MFA Directing Candidate 2019) production of The Historical Range of Ursus Americanus.

Ensemble Studio Theatre (EST) (William Carden, Artistic Director, Sarah McLellan, Executive Director) and The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (Doron Weber, Vice-President, Programs) announced today a second extension for the World Premiere of Behind the Sheet, written by Charly Evon Simpson (Jump) and directed by Colette Robert (Mary's Wedding). Part of the EST/Sloan Science & Technology Project (Graeme Gillis, Program Director; Linsay Firman, Associate Director), Behind the Sheet began previews at EST's Curt Dempster Theatre (549 W. 52nd Street, New York, NY 10019) on January 9, 2019, and opened January 17. Originally set to close on February 3, the play will now run through February 17, 2019.

A riveting production of THE LARAMIE PROJECT: 10 YEARS LATER will be performed in the Warner's Nancy Marine Studio Theatre February 1-3, featuring the students of the Warner Theatre Center for Arts Education Performance Lab. On October 6, 1998, gay University of Wyoming student Matthew Shepard left the Fireside Bar with Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson. The following day he was discovered on a prairie at the edge of town, tied to a fence, brutally beaten, and close to death. Six days later Matthew Shepard died at Poudre Valley Hospital in Ft. Collins, Colorado. On November 14th, 1998, ten members of Tectonic Theatre Project traveled to Laramie, Wyoming and conducted interviews with the people of the town. Over the next year, the company returned to Laramie six times and conducted over 200 interviews. These texts became the basis for the play The Laramie Project.

A riveting production of THE LARAMIE PROJECT: 10 YEARS LATER will be performed in the Warner's Nancy Marine Studio Theatre February 1-3, featuring the students of the Warner Theatre Center for Arts Education Performance Lab.

New theatre group Theatre Travels takes on the ambitious task of retelling THE LARAMIE PROJECT and THE LARAMIE PROJECT:10 YEARS LATER two decades on from Matthew Shepard's brutal murder.

Ensemble Studio Theatre, along with The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (Doron Weber, Vice-President, Programs), announced today the 2018 Fall Artist Cultivation Event, marking the 20th anniversary of the EST/Sloan Project, to take place on Monday, November 19 at 8pm with a reception beginning at 7:30pm.

The Players Club of Swarthmore presents The Laramie Project: Ten Years Later, by Moises Kaufmann, Leigh Fondakowski, Greg Pierotti, Andy Paris, and Stephen Belber, directed by Tim Oskin of Swarthmore.  Performances are Friday through Sunday November 9-11 and Thursday through Saturday November 15-17.

In conjunction with the 20th anniversary production of The Laramie Project at the Provincetown Theater (running thru Oct 28th at 238 Bradford St. in Provincetown, MA), our free post-show series of "Community Conversations" concludes on Sunday, Oct 28st at 4:30pm, immediately following the 2pm matinee.

In conjunction with the 20th anniversary production of The Laramie Project at the Provincetown Theater (running now thru Oct 28th at 238 Bradford St. in Provincetown, MA), our free series of "Community Conversations" continues on Sunday, Oct 21st at 4:30pm, immediately following the 2pm matinee. As the series pertains to socially relevant themes which course through the veins of this modern American classic - revealing a community's response to the brutal murder of the openly gay college student Matthew Shepard in Laramie, Wyoming in 1998 -- the "Community Conversations" topic on Oct 21st will focus on creating and maintaining "Safe Spaces" for LGBTQ people.

As the Provincetown Theater's 20th anniversary production of The Laramie Project opens tonight, October 11, 2018 at the Birthplace of American Theater, it was announced that the ashes of Matthew Shepard will find their final resting place at the Washington National Cathedral.

In conjunction with our 20th anniversary production of The Laramie Project, the Provincetown Theater at 238 Bradford Street in Provincetown, MA will sponsor a series of post-performance "Community Conversations" following matinee performances during the show's three-week run (October 11-28, performs Thursdays - Saturdays at 7pm, Sundays at 2pm). The first in the series will begin at 4:15pm, Sunday, Oct 14. Throughout the series, topics will pertain to socially relevant themes coursing through the veins of this modern American classic -- which reveals a community's response to the brutal murder of the openly gay college student Matthew Shepard in Laramie, Wyoming in 1998. Free of charge, open to the public, each of the "Community Conversations" focuses on a different theme relevant to the play, lead by a moderator and host of panelists in the field.

Celebrate Off-Off Broadway with the Innovative Theatre Foundation, by joining them when they present the 2018 New York Innovative Theatre Awards on Monday, September 24, 2018. The ceremony will take place at the Centennial Memorial Theatre at 120 West 14th Street, NYC. Tickets to the ceremony are $29 each and can be purchased at www.nyitawards.com/shop.

Hailed by The New York Times as one of the "25 Best American Plays since Angels in America," The Laramie Project will open on October 11, 2018 at the Birthplace of American Theater, the Provincetown Theater in Provincetown, MA helmed by one of its creators, Leigh Fondakowski, Head Writer of Moises Kaufman's Tectonic Theater Project.

Out on Film in association with The Robert Mello Studio will present Moises Kaufman and Members of the Tectonic Theatre Company's THE LARAMIE PROJECT as a one-night benefit for The Matthew Shepard Foundation on Sunday, September 30, 2018 at 7:00 PM.

Tectonic Theater Project announced today that Michael Emerson, Danny Burstein, Purva Bedi and Andrew Keenan-Bolger have joined the cast of LARAMIE: A LEGACY, a reading of The Laramie Project honoring the life and legacy of Matthew Shepard

ENSEMBLE STUDIO THEATRE (EST) (William Carden, Artistic Director, Sarah McLellan, Executive Director) is proud to announce its 50th Anniversary season. The season will commence in October 2018 with the world premiere of TRAVISVILLE a new play by William Jackson Harper ("The Good Place") and directed by Steve H. Broadnax III (The Hip-Hop Project). This marks the playwriting debut of Harper, who has been developing the piece with EST over the past 8 years.