UNLOCKED, RIOT/REBELLION and More Set for Watts Village Theater's 2013 Season

Lynn Manning, the new Artistic Director for Watts Village Theater Company (WVTC) has announced that the company is on-track to meet the high quality bar set by the company's strategic plan and will offer a full season of theater and performance for the first time in years.

Key components of the 2013 season include:

• - Original educational programming - a new musical in partnership with Green Dot Public Schools titled "UNLockeD" starring high school students from Animo Locke and Watts (March 15-17, 2013);

• - The 4th Annual "Meet Me @Metro": Blue Line Home, which will bring the innovative performance show back to Watts (Memorial Day - May 25-26, 2013);

• - The staged reading and mainstage production of the long-awaited "Riot/Rebellion" - an original production by commissioned playwright Donald Jolly (Bonded) based on witness testimonials of the 1965 Watts Riots/Rebellions (staged reading in April; full production from August 3-25, 2013); and

  - An original Second Staged reading in the Fall.

"Watts Village Theater Company is excited to welcome back Lynn Manning, a critically acclaimed artist and community advocate, to help lead the organization into its 20 year anniversary and beyond," said Karen Lascaris, WVTC's Board Chair. "Lynn's vision, leadership, lifetime of accomplishments, and long history with the company make him the perfect choice to lead the organization on this journey of transformation, growth, and improvement. He is simply overflowing with great new ideas for the company and its artistic and educational programming. His life is an incredible example of resilience, and he is a great role model for people of every age and culture."

Manning states: "I am honored to have the support of the strong artists and community advocates that make up the Watts Village Theater Company family. When Quentin Drew and I startEd Watts Village 17 years ago, we wanted a platform to represent the issues and interests of Watts and the South LA community. I can only imagine the huge smile on Quentin's face as he looks down on all that we have been able to do. I know that he will continue to help guide our success as we approach our 20 year anniversary. With this season, I wanted to bring things back home to Watts. We produce such quality art. The people of the community need to see it."

WVTC is gearing up for its upcoming 20 year anniversary by working closely with its advisors, creating new policies that make the organization more effective, building a new website, revitalizing its mission statement and designing a new vision statement. All transitions and policy changes made over the last year and those coming this year, including those made to prevent budget overruns and improve artistic quality, have been made and will continue to be made based on guidance from key founders, staff members, board members, and advisors as well as supporters from the community. These transitions, including the need to transition from a part-time to full-time artistic director, were set several years ago in the company's strategic plan.

On February 1, Watts Village Theater Company (WVTC) welcomed back its co-founder Lynn Manning to lead the organization. Manning replaces former Artistic Director Guillermo Aviles-Rodriguez, who will continue his full-time work as Assistant Professor of Theater and Cinema at Los Angeles Mission College. Aviles-Rodriguez leads the college's relatively new theater program and promises to bring his trademark innovations and insights to the program.

Not without a bit of sadness, the board accepted the former artistic director's resignation with the company's strategic plan and vision for the future in mind as well as the need for a full-time director. The board and staff thank him for his years of hard work and service and wish him well in his future endeavors.

David Mack, WVTC's Managing Director stated, "I am confident that Watts Village will continue to shine brightly as a beacon of hope and possibility for the South Los Angeles community. Under the leadership of Lynn Manning and with this year's line-up, we are sure to grow our supporters like never before."

Manning, a former WVTC Board Chair, holds the unique honor of having served as artist and board for the company, and now serving as the artistic visionary for the future of the innovative Watts-based theater company.

The future certainly looks bright for WVTC! For updates, visit WVTC's website (www.wattsvillagetheatercompany.org) and Facebook page (www.facebook.com/wattsvillage).

In January 2013, Lynn Manning returned to Watts Village Theater Company (WVTC), accepting the position of Interim Artistic Director, and began working on the artistic vision for WVTC's upcoming seasons this year. Manning, an award-winning poet, playwright and actor, is Co-founder and former Board Chair of WVTC.

Born in Fresno and raised in Los Angeles, Lynn considers himself a native Angelino. A product of L.A. County's foster care system, he grew up in both abject poverty in South-central and in suburban security in The South Bay. Lynn graduated from John Marshall High School and Los Angeles City College. He pursued his dream of becoming a freelance artist until he was shot and blinded at age 23. He then turned his creative energies toward literature and, eventually, to playwriting and the theatre arts.

Manning developed his theatre bonafides in the field. He honed his play writing skills in Center Theatre Group's Mentor Playwrights and Blacksmiths workshops (1991-2001, and The Actors' Studio Writers/Directors Unit, West (1998-2004). He fine-tuned his acting chops in membership with The Firehouse Theater Company, Actors' Conservatory Ensemble, and The Wilton Project.

Manning's teaching experience comes from two years with The A.S.K Theatre Project "Playwrights In The Schools" program, and three years as California Arts Council "Artist In Residence" with The Mark Taper Forum's Other Voices Project. In the former, he developed and directed play writing and performance workshops for people with disabilities, and in the latter, taught play writing to students at George Washington Preparatory High School.

In 1996, Lynn Manning co-founded WVTC in partnership with its founding Artistic Director, resident Watts actor and community activist, Quentin Drew. Their dream was to establish a permanent professional theatre arts institution in Watts. Their mission was to produce plays of relevance to the underserved community of Watts and South Los Angeles, as well as promote literacy to the youth through theatre arts education. Manning was a founding board member when WVTC earned its nonprofit status, and served on that board until rotating off in 2012.

From 1998 to 2012, Manning also served as Board Chair for the nonprofit Firehouse Theater Company - dedicated to the inclusion of people with disabilities in all aspects of theatre making. Manning draws his administrative and programming experience from these years of intimate cooperation and teamwork with the boards and staffs of these two socially conscious arts organizations.

Manning has had upwards of a dozen plays produced. His autobiographical, solo play, WEIGHTS, received three NAACP Theater awards in 2001, including Best actor for Lynn. He has since performed WEIGHTS from London to Off Broadway, and from Edinburgh to The Adelaide Fringe. He has written several critically recognized plays, including, WEIGHTS, OCHRE & ONYX (THE Langston Hughes PROJECT), UP FROM THE DOWNS, PRIVATE BATTLE, THE LAST OUTPOST, THE COLORIZED VERSION, SHOOT, and CENTRAL AVE. CHALK CIRCLE. Manning's Dramalog Award winning play, SHOOT, is included in the ground breaking 2007 TCG anthology, BEYOND VICTIMS AND VILLAINS (CONTEMPORARY PLAYS BY DISABLED PLAYWRIGHTS). Lynn both wrote and starred in the short film adaptation of SHOOT, by the same title. It premiered at the 2001 Sundance Film Festival, and was distributed to cable television by HBO.

For more information, visit lynnmanning.com.

Founded in 1996 by actor and Watts community activist Quentin Drew and actor/playwright Lynn Manning as an outgrowth of Cornerstone Theater Company's residency in Watts, Watts Village Theater Company is a multicultural urban company that seeks to inspire its community with an appreciation of all cultures through new works about contemporary social issues. WVTC has been a leader in providing acting and theatrical performance workshops for at-risk youth in Watts and South Los Angeles.

WVTC is proud to have collaborated with Watts Towers Arts Center, LATC, Inside at the Ford and the Matrix Theatre. WVTC's 2003 production of Manning's "Private Battle" won a NAACP Theatre Award. "Up From the Downs" (2005), and "Ochre & Onyx" (2009) received critical acclaim for examining cross-cultural relations between Latinos and African-Americans in Watts.