TRU and The Playroom Theatre to Host Nov 2015 TRU Panel on 'Funding Fundamentals'

Theater Resources Unlimited (TRU), and The Playroom Theatre, present the November panel, Funding Fundamentals: Opportunities for Not-for-Profits (and Everyone), on Tuesday, November 17, 2015 at 7:30pm at The Playroom Theater, 151 W. 46th Street, 8th floor, NYC 10036. Doors open at 7pm for networking and refreshments; roundtable introductions of everyone in the room will start at 7:30pm.

Navigating the City and State: are you eligible for NYSCA, DCA and City Council money, and how do you go about applying? What are funders looking for, and how do you convince them you have it? ... Individual Givers: finding them and cultivating them through cultivation events and other strategies.... Revenue trends in public, private, and earned income... Now that we're well into the 21st century, how important are crowdsourcing sites like Kickstarter, Indiegogo and Rockethub? Is one better than the others? How do you fit them into an overall fundraising strategy? How do you maximize your online impact? ... How do you get the attention of private foundations? How do you find them? Which ones are open to unsolicited proposals? And are there really corporations still out there?

Panelists: Arian Blanco, program director for theater at NY State Council for the Arts (NYSCA); Gigi Bolt, currently adjunct faculty at Columbia University's School of the Arts, and a theatre and musical theatre program and philanthropy consultant (served formerly as Director of Theatre and Musical Theatre at the NEA, Interim Executive Director at TCG, and Theatre Program Director at NYSCA); Stacey McMath, program director for Department of Cultural Affairs (DCA); Heather Woodfield, Executive Director of One Percent for Culture, a city-wide cultural advocacy organization, and a practicing artist specializing in interactive performance.

Doors open at 7pm for networking and refreshments, roundtable introductions of everyone in the room will start at 7:30pm - come prepared with your best thirty-second summary of who you are, and what you need. Free for TRU members, and free for everyone else this month! Please call at least a day in advance (or much sooner) for reservations: (212)-714-7628; or e-mail TRUStaff1@gmail.com.

The Playroom Theater, a small theater with a purpose on West Forty Sixth Street. Created by longtime theatrical producer Eric Krebs, The Playroom Theater features a 62-seat boutique theater, appropriate for rehearsals, readings, auditions, producers' presentations and workshop productions. Conceived of as an artists' workspace for writers, directors, composers, actors, producers and others committed to the professional theater arts and its industry.

"The idea of The Playroom has grown out of my desire to create a small and financially manageable space in the heart of the theater district," commented Krebs. "I want this to be a place where industry professionals can pop over for a reading, a backer's audition or a small production of a work in progress." The Playroom Theatre is also host to Masterworks Theater Company, (Eric Krebs, Founding Director; Christopher Scott, Artistic Director; Frankie Dailey, Managing Director) a professional not-for-profit Equity theater company, whose repertoire will include the masterworks of the theater (plays, musicals and stage adaptation of novels) that every young person should have an opportunity to experience.

Theater Resources Unlimited (TRU) is a twenty-three year old 501c3 nonprofit organization created to help producers produce, emerging theater companies to emerge healthily and all theater professionals to understand and navigate the business of theater. Membership includes self-producing artists as well as career producers and theater companies.

TRU publishes an email community newsletter of services, goods and productions; presents the TRU VOICES Annual New Play Reading Series and Annual New Musicals Reading Series, two new works series in which TRU underwrites developmental readings to nurture new shows as well as new producers for theater; TRU offers a Producer Development & Mentorship Program whose mentors are among the most prominent producers and general managers in New York Theater, and also presents Producer Boot Camp workshops to help aspirants develop the business skills they need. TRU serves writers through a Writer-Producer Speed Date, a Practical Playwriting Workshop and a Director-Writer Communications Lab; programs for actors include the Annual Combined Audition and quarterly Resource Nights and "Speed Dating" as well as free monthly actor workshops.
Programs of Theater Resources Unlimited are supported in part by public funds awarded through the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, 9th district Council Member Inez Dickens; and with support from the Montage Foundation and the Friars National Association Foundation.

For more information about TRU membership and programs, visit www.truonline.orgor call (212) 714-7628.