Winners Announced For The 2018 PROJECT W THEATRE FESTIVAL

InProximity Theatre Company (Jolie Curtsinger, Laurie Schaefer Fenton, Co-Artistic Directors) is proud to announce this year's selections for the second annual PROJECT W Theatre Festival include Darcy Parker Bruce, Mathilde Dratwa, Christina Gorman, Donna Hoke and Kara Emily Krantz. PROJECT W Theatre Festival will take place at Town Stages (221 West Broadway Street), June 5-9, 2018 with readings starting June 5th nightly at 8 PM. Tickets are FREE to attend but reservations are strongly recommended. More information can be found at www.inproximitytheatre.org.

With over 125 submissions from female playwrights around the world, the selection committee has chosen five scripts to be presented as part of the Project W Theatre Festival.

InProximity Theatre Company's Jolie Curtsinger explains "We are so excited about the amount of amazing submissions we received. This year's selections explore a variety of topics, but its pretty clear what's on everyone's minds: sexism, racism, assault, growing up, growing old, and Trump. These 5 stories are an unpredictable perspective, a way in, through fresh and vital voices. They are funny and moving, but most of all: important. They deserve to be heard and it's a true privilege to present them. We are thrilled to be bringing together a team of dazzling talent, on stage and off, for this year's Project W Festival."

This year's playwrights and directors include:

Darcy Parker Bruce's SOLDIER POET, directed by Maureen Monterubio - June 5 at 8PM

Set in Aleppo, SOLDIER POET follows two American Army Rangers rescue an injured Syrian woman about to give birth. At a nearby hospital, a neonatal nurse with an unwavering sense of duty struggles to save the lives of infants as her hospital is bombed.

Donna Hoke's ELEVATOR GIRL directed by Bryn Boice June 6th at 8PM

Elevator Girl was never meant to be more than an urban legend, a sexual revenge fantasy created by Vanessa and her graphic illustrator boyfriend. But when the comic superhero unleashes her boyfriend's darkest fantasies, as well as a flesh-and-blood copycat, Vanessa must stop EG in her tracks-with the truth.

Mathilde Dratwa's MILK AND GALL, directed by Jen Wineman - June 7 at 8PM

Raising a magnifying glass to the experience of being a new mother under Trump, Milk and Gall? opens as Vera gives birth to a shape-shifting baby on election night. Over the course of one seemingly unending year, tensions mount between Vera and her second-wave feminist mother, she struggles to connect physically with her husband, and her friendship with her Syrian-American best friend Amira falters. A surreal and fragmented play mimicking the experience of sleep-deprived new parents, ?Milk and Gall explores the terror of the mundane: Vera is stuck in the world of diapers, breast pumps and padsicles while everyone else she knows is out marching.

Christina Gorman's ROAN AT THE GATES, directed by Michelle Tattenbaum- June 8 at 8 PM

Would you buy a sofa without consulting your partner? How about a car? Change your job? Could you commit a crime and say nothing? And could you still love your partner if she followed her conscience but kept you in the dark? Nat is an outspoken civil rights attorney. Roan, the quiet one, is an NSA Analyst who isn't even allowed to tell her wife the location of her next business trip. Roan At The Gates is a topical and thought-provoking new play, a long-time couple confronts questions about their marriage they never thought to ask as their personal relationship collides with national security.

Kara Emily Krantz's YOU, ME, AND ENNUI, directed by Diana Canterbury - June 9 at 8PM

When 28-year-old Samantha wakes up with a hangover on 75-year-old Theodore's couch, the only logical way to navigate the situation is to pose as his new caretaker. Through the process of discovering why she is in his house, Sam and Teddy form a quirky yet wonderful bond. In You, Me, and Ennui, sometimes people stumble into your life... and help heal you.

During its inaugural festival Project W featured plays by Sara Bierstock, Barbara Blumenthal-Ehrlich, Amy Fox, Alyson Mead and Danielle Mohlman, directed by Suzanne Agins, Pamela Berlin, Shelley Butler, Maureen Monterubio and Stephanie Sertich.

PROJECT W Theatre Festival is a celebration of women in theatre from both the creative and business aspects. This muliti-day play reading festival features new plays, written, directed, produced and mananged exclusively by professional women in theatre.

PROJECT W Theatre Festival

June 5-9, 2018 at 8 pm

Town Stages is located at 221 West Broadway Street

Tickets are FREE to attend but reservations are strongly recommended

More information can be found www.inproximitytheatre.org

Meet the Playwrights:

DARCY PARKER BRUCE (Playwright SOLDIER POET) holds an MFA in Playwriting from Smith College and was a 2017 Tennessee Williams Scholar at the Sewanee Writers' Conference. Her play SOLDIER POET won the 2018 ATHE award, and her play ALWAYS PLENTY OF LIGHT AT THE STARLIGHT ALL NIGHT DINER will receive its world premiere with Know Theatre of Cincinnati in early 2019. She has been published through Applause/ Hal Leonard's Best American Short Play series. She is currently teaching playwriting at Eastern Connecticut State University.

MATHILDE DRATWA (Playwright MILK AND GALL) is a member of Dorset Theater Festival's Women Artists Write initiative and of New York Foundation for the Arts' Immigrant Artist Program, a former co-leader of the FilmShop collective and a two-time Pulitzer Center Grant recipient. Her theater credits include Milk and Gall (Great Plains Theater Conference, O'Neill National Playwrights Conference Semi-Finalist) and Escape from Garden Grove (Last Frontier Theater Conference, Maxim Mazumdar New Play Competition Finalist). She wrote and directed the narrative short films PETA PAN (starring Independent Spirit Award Nominee Nisreen Faour) and ESCAPE FROM GARDEN GROVE (Sundance Channel Shorts Contest Finalist), as well as the web series ALMOST ANONYMOUS (best original concept, NYC WebFest). A seasoned educator, Mathilde is a Master Teaching Artist for Roundabout Theatre Company, the New Victory, the Shakespeare Society and the School of The New York Times. She is the co-founder of Moms-in-Film (SXSW Community Grant, Wee Wagon Project, Free childcare at SXSW and Sundance). Mathilde holds a masters from Drama Centre London as well as a BA and MA from Cambridge University.

Christina Gorman (playwright ROAN AT THE GATES) Her plays have been produced and/or developed at The Public Theater, Alley Theatre, American Blues Theater, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Geva Theatre Center, Hangar Theatre, Capital Repertory Theatre, Prospect Theatre Company, Samuel French Short Play Festival, New Harmony Project, Troy Foundry Theatre, NYC's Summer Play Festival, Stageworks/Hudson, Playwrights Foundation, Lark Play Development Center, Stella Adler Studios, Berkshire Playwrights Lab, Luna Stage, |the claque|, Theatre Artists Studio, and the University of Notre Dame. Christina is an inaugural member of The Public Theater Emerging Writers Group. She is a former New York Foundation for the Arts Fellow, Ensemble Studio Theatre New Voices Fellow, Stella Adler Studios Harold Clurman Playwright-in-Residence, and Women's Project Playwright Lab member. She is an Artistic Affiliate at American Blues Theater. She is published by Samuel French. christinagormanplaywright.com

DONNA HOKE (Playwright ELEVATOR GIRL) Resident playwright at Road Less Traveled Productions, Donna's work has been seen in 46 states and on five continents. Plays include THE COUPLE NEXT DOOR (Princess Grace semi-finalist), SAFE (winner of the Todd McNerney, Naatak, and Great Gay Play and Musical Contests), BRILLIANT WORKS OF ART (2016 Kilroys List), ELEVATOR GIRL (2017 O'Neill finalist), and TEACH (2018 O'Neill semifinalist, current Ashland/Capital Rep/Headwaters semifinalist); she has also been nominated for both the Primus and Blackburn Prizes. Donna is also a New York Times-published crossword puzzle constructor; author of Neko and the Twiggets, a children's book; and founder/co-curator of BUA Takes 10: GLBT Short Stories. She has received an Individual Artist Award from the New York State Council on the Arts to develop HEARTS OF STONE, as well as an Artie Award for Outstanding New Play (SEEDS). For three consecutive years, she was named Buffalo's Best Writer by Artvoice-the only woman to ever receive the designation. Donna serves on the Dramatists Guild Council and also as Western New York regional representative. In addition, she is a blogger, and moderator of the 11,000+-member Official Playwrights of Facebook. Recent speaking engagements include Citywrights, Kenyon Playwrights Conference, the Dramatists Guild National Conference, Chicago Dramatists, the Austin Film Festival, and a live Dramatists Guild webinar. Her commentary has been seen on #2amt, howlround, The Dramatist, the Official Playwrights of Facebook, Workshopping the New Play (Applause, 2017), and at donnahoke.com.

KARA EMILY KRANTZ (Playwright YOU, ME, AND ENNUI) A poet, photographer, and playwright from Sturbridge, Massachusetts, Kara Emily Krantz is drawn to the broken and abandoned pieces of ourselves - the places of our deepest suffering, beauty, meaning, whimsy, and joy. After years as a Masters-level counselor and English teacher,Kara has returned to her beating heart: scribing poetry and plays. In June 2018, she receives her MFA in Writing for Stage & Screen from New Hampshire Institute of Art, where she studied under thoughtful, successful mentors in the field. That, along with sixteen years in local theater as an actress and director, lends Kara a personal glimpse into the heartbeat of the theater world. She wishes to infuse her words from the page onto the stage, and to collaborate with other artists to make those words come to magical life.