New York Theatre Workshop Announces CASEBOOK Series

New York Theatre Workshop (NYTW) Artistic Director James C. Nicola and Managing Director William Russo have announced that NYTW will inaugurate a new public program this season called Casebook. Each season NYTW will designate one of its productions to be a 'case study,' which will allow a general audience unprecedented access to the artists involved in the creation of a new work as it is happening.

This year, the designated production is Food and Fadwa, the final production of NYTW's 2011-2012 season. Food and Fadwa is written by Lameece Issaq and Jacob Kader, and will be directed by Shana Gold.

Casebook sessions will include conversations with the playwrights, director and designers, as well as meetings with NYTW staff members who will lead seminars in topics including casting, marketing, and production. Class participants will engage with the collaborators of Food and Fadwa, as well as multiple guest artists, and will have the opportunity to observe rehearsals throughout the process and take a backstage tour. In culmination, the class will attend an early preview performance of the show and come back for opening night to see the final production and celebrate with the collaborators. This class is appropriate for theatre lovers of all experience levels who want a true insider's view of the life of a theatre artist and the process of realizing a full professional production.

Casebook: The Making of Food and Fadwa
March 27 – May 22
Instructor: James C. Nicola, NYTW Artistic Director with guest artists
Tuition is $300 for NYTW Members / $350 for Non-Members.

Schedule of Sessions (Subject to Change)
March 27 Introduction – Spotlight on OFF-BROADWAY
April 3 Spotlight on PLAYWRITING
April 10 Spotlight on CASTING and the ACTOR
April 17 Spotlight on the FINANCIAL PICTURE
April 24 Spotlight on DIRECTING
May 1 Spotlight on the REHEARSAL ROOM
May 8 Spotlight on DESIGN
May 15 Spotlight on TECHNICAL REHEARSALS
May 22 Attend PREVIEW PERFORMANCE of Food and Fadwa
June 7 Attend OPENING NIGHT Performance and Reception

In addition to Casebook, NYTW is now also offering a range of master classes. NYTW is currently offering a ten-week workshop led by playwright Alex Lewin called Playwriting: The First Draft, February 6 – April 16. Through this class, novice playwrights will be led through writing exercises and instruction on The Common practices of play construction with a goal of completing a first draft of a play. Previous classes have included two weekend-intensive workshops with NYTW company-in-residence Elevator Repair Service on incorporating found choreography and text into group-devised work, and a Shakespeare intensive for professional actors with visiting Royal Shakespeare Company cast members.

For more information on Casebook or master classes, please visit www.nytw.org/master_classes.asp or email classes@nytw.org.

NYTW's Education Initiatives engage artists and audiences in conversations about the work they produce and encounter, with the intention of bringing everyone closer to the creative process. Over the past few years, NYTW has expanded our Education Initiatives significantly, responding to the needs of our community and strengthening our partnerships with three different public schools in order to address their arts-in-education needs. Learning Workshop, our youth education program, allows middle and high school students to gain greater exposure to theatre through performances, classroom residencies and mentoring workshops. Our internship program invites high school and college students and recent graduates to work within every department of the organization. NYTW's Public Programs, our initiative for the entire community, consist of free panel discussions, post-performance talkbacks, ticket discount initiatives and online resources for further learning. Mind the Gap, NYTW's intergenerational theatre workshop, brings teenagers and elders (aged 60 +) together to interview each other and create theatre pieces inspired by each other's life stories. Given the success of this program, we are embarking on an expansion, working with community partners and creating an extensive outreach plan to find ways to bridge other "gaps" in our community.

New York Theatre Workshop, now celebrating its 29th season, is a leading voice in the world of Off-Broadway and within the theatre community in New York and around the world. NYTW has emerged as a premiere incubator of important new theatre, honoring its mission to explore perspectives on our collective history and respond to the events and institutions that shape our lives. In addition, NYTW is known for its innovative adaptations of classic repertory. Each season, from its home in New York's East Village neighborhood, NYTW presents three to five new productions, over 80 readings, and numerous workshop productions, for over 45,000 audience members. Over the past 28 years, NYTW has developed and produced over 100 new, fully staged works, including Jonathan Larson's Rent, Tony Kushner's Slavs! and Homebody/Kabul, Doug Wright's Quills, Claudia Shear's Blown Sideways Through Life and Dirty Blonde, Paul Rudnick's The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told and Valhalla, Caryl Churchill's Mad Forest, Far Away, and A Number, Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen's Aftermath, and Rick Elice's Peter and the Starcatcher. The 2002 remounting of Martha Clarke's seminal work, Vienna: Lusthaus and subsequent American tour was one of the longest-running productions in NYTW's history. NYTW's acclaimed productions of Once and Peter and the Starcatcher are moving to Broadway. Once opens at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre on March 18, 2012.and Peter and the Starcatcher opens at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre on April 15, 2012 NYTW supports artists in all stages of their careers by maintaining a series of workshop programs including work-in-progress readings, summer residencies, and minority artist fellowships. In 1991, NYTW received an OBIE Award for Sustained Achievement and in 2000 was designated to be part of the Leading National Theatres Program by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.