Moving Arts' MADlabs program is set to live-stream five new plays this weekend as part of their first look reading series
This year for MADlab, the Moving Arts New Play Development Program, local playwrights
were asked to submit their idea for the Los Angeles play they wanted to write - now.
After reading through many intriguing responses from an abundance of local talent, five playwrights were chosen to make up the MADlab 2021 Cohort: Peppur Chambers, Sarah Cho, Julianne Jigour, Sophie Brion Neely, and Matthew Paul Olmos.
For nine months, the MADlab team at Moving Arts has worked with these
playwrights to help them create and curate a new play with the support and insight of
actors, directors, respondents, and their fellow playwrights. Now Moving Arts is proud to
present the Eighth Annual First Look Reading Series to a vital component of the new
play making process: the audience. Over this weekend they will present these five very
different, engaging, challenging, and bold new plays. The first look series schedule is below:
Saturday, October 9, 2021, 12:00 PM PT
Playwright: Julianne Jigour
Director: Gabrieal Griego
With: Jenny Soo, Alina Phelan, Laura Buckles, Karen Huie, Feodor Chin, Tim Fannon
After a traumatic event throws her off course, a lost young actor abandons New York dreams to navigate the sprawling streets of LA in search of her estranged, starry-eyed mother.
Saturday, October 9, 2021, 3:00 PM PT
Playwright: Peppur Chambers
Director: Bernadette Speakes
With: Wendy Elizabeth Abraham, Freddy Ramsey Jr., Geri-Nikole Love, Aries Sanders, ReSheda D. Terry, Marlow Wyatt, William L. Warren
Meridian, a young black woman on the edge, drowns in her desire to be validated by her art. Despite the love and support of her beau, she succumbs to dancing demons and the complicated simplicity of letting go.
Saturday, October 9, 2021, 6:00 PM PT
Playwright: Sarah Cho
Director: Jully Lee
With: Jessica Ko, Janet Song, Jenapher Zheng, Caitlin Crawley
An impoverished Korean-American teenager struggles through her first period, with the help of an imaginary friend... who happens to resemble a wisecracking witch from a popular '90s sitcom.
Sunday, October 10, 2021, 12:00 PM PT
Playwright: Matthew Pail Olmos
Director: Rose Portillo
With: Cristina Frías, Peter Mendoza, Natalie Camunas, Peter Howard, Rose Portillo, Chuma Gault
After The Vargas Family is displaced from their home, the parents try to live off the land, but the fear of the outside is like a never ending nightmare. Meanwhile, their daughter attempts to fight their fight legally, against the gears of progress.
Sunday, October 10, 2021, 3:00 PM PT
Playwright: Sophie Brion Neely
Director: Justin Huen
With: Alexis Camins, Anne Yatco, Luis Kelly-Duarte, Keyla Monterroso Mejia, Oscar Alberto Dominguez, Juan Parada, Blanca Isabella, Sabina Zúñiga Varela
After the worst cruise of 1781, nine hundred miles of trekking through the desert, and street-taco-level food poisoning, an awkward country boy from the Philippines must overcome one last hurdle: his first-ever house party in the not-yet-city of Los Angeles.
Each play will be presented just once over the weekend during the live-streamed event. All readings are presented live online and free of charge as a service to the community, but advance reservations will be required at the
Moving Arts website.
Videos