Richmond Triangle Players Announces SO.QUEER Playwrights Festival

Richmond Triangle Players announces the launch of a new signature program - the So.Queer Playwrights Festival. The Festival encourages the creation and development of works with an emphasis on southern LGBTQ+ writers and stories.

"The So.Queer Playwrights Festival brings RTP to the forefront in the region to inspire and develop of new LGBTQ+ musical and non-musical works," says RTP artistic director Lucian Restivo, "using a unique process of radical collaboration and supportive engagement with playwrights, actors, and audiences."

The competitive, biennial festival of LGBTQ+ works will lead to the selection of one work by a playwright -- a work that RTP will develop further in close collaboration with the chosen playwright -- through a series of salon readings, staged readings, and minimalized productions, as well as consultations with local artists, mentorship from theatre experts, and the provision of other creative supports.

"What really makes this Festival different is the approach we are taking," Restivo continued. "In addition to being one of the few initiatives of its kind in the country, we are committing to developing the work of a new playwright every two years, and to a process that is based on affirmations, dignity, and loving but direct truth-telling. And we hope to find stories rooted in our region, and those that reflect the diversity within the LGBTQ+ community."

The idea for the Festival sprung from an endowed fund created by former RTP artistic director John Knapp and his husband Tom Gillham, dedicated to the creation and development of new musical and non-musical work. RTP convened a committee that spent more than a year researching other competitions and festivals across the country, and defining how RTP's could distinguish itself.

"Our committee, which was made up of Board members and artists with a longstanding commitment to RTP, was integral to the creation of the process and the standards for the Festival," Restivo continued. "We could not have gotten to this point without their hard work, diligence and devotion to this idea."

RTP audiences saw a pilot program of what will become the Festival in the development of award-winning playwright Chandler Hubbard's play Molly House. The play went through multiple readings and iterations, and was performed in fully staged reading last January. Hubbard recently won a 2020 Steinberg/American Theatre Critics Association Citation for his play Animal Control.

"Working with Triangle Players was a dream come true," Hubbard said of his experience. "These are people who work tirelessly and give their all to both the LGBTQ+ community and the community at large, with little compensation or recognition."

"Playwriting is a messy, living-and-breathing process of creating a world for an audience for two hours every night," he continued, "and RTP gave me room to grow and change and try and fail and try again and make bad jokes and make slightly less bad jokes all in the spirit of creating something bigger than myself, than ourselves. Theatre has the power to save lives; my mantra as a theatre artist is that if I can change even just one person, maybe someone sitting alone in the back of the room, it will all have been worth it. RTP allowed me that chance."

About the Submission Process

Richmond Triangle Players mission is to change the community's conversation about diversity, equity and inclusion through the production of LGBTQ-themed works. A nonprofit, professional theatre company organized in 1993, RTP delivers adventurous and entertaining theater as the leading voice in the community's explorations of equality, identity, affection and family, across sexual orientation and gender spectrums.

As RTP begins the submission process to find a playwright to develop a musical and/or non-musical full-length work, we are strictly looking for material that falls into our stated mission. For purposes of the Festival, preference will be given to southern playwrights and themes.

· Submissions will be accepted online only at www.soqueer.org.

· Richmond Triangle Players is looking for musical and non-musical full-length works that average a runtime of 60 to 120 minutes with no more than 7 performers featured.

· While we produce a variety of styles and genres, please keep in mind our spatial restrictions: our stage is 28' by 20' without wings or fly space.

· We remain open to a large spectrum of musical and non-musical works for the submission process and appreciate everything from avant-garde to traditional approaches that a playwright might take. We are ultimately looking for a voice rather than a perfect script.

· Submissions are limited to one work per playwright; we will not consider resubmissions.

· Plays/Musicals must be unpublished and unproduced at the time of submission. This does not include workshops, staged readings, or developmental productions. All entries must be withheld from production during the period of the competition, reserving the premiere production for Richmond Triangle Players at a later date.

A PDF submission packet must include the following items, in this order:

· Page 1: Title page with author name and contact information

· Page 2: One-page Cover Letter that discusses your artistic point of view, and detailing why your play fits with the mission of Richmond Triangle Players

· Page 3: One page, including a synopsis of your play, and a character breakdown.

· Page 4: One-page biography of the playwright

· Page 5+: 10 to 15-page excerpt from your script

· If submitting a musical, please include an URL link on page 3 of your PDF packet that directs us to the audio files on a separate website.

All completed submissions will be sent a receipt upon arrival. Due to the amount of submissions, we will not be able to respond to all entries with feedback. However, all entries will be read by a committee and evaluated. Please do not call or email a follow up message in regards to the status of your script. RTP does not accept hard-copy script submissions. Any submissions sent via mail will not be eligible, acknowledged, or returned.

Five finalists will be notified on November 6th and announced publicly on November 12th, 2020. Finalists will then be asked to present a 45-minute excerpt of the play on January 8th and 9th, 2021. One finalist will be picked to start the yearlong development process with the promise of a mainstage spot once the playwright and organization believe that the work is ready.

About Richmond Triangle Players

Richmond Triangle Players, a nonprofit, professional theatre company organized in 1993, impacts and enhances community conversation about diversity, equity and inclusion through the production of dynamic LGBTQ+ themed plays. RTP delivers adventurous and entertaining theatre as the leading voice in the community's explorations of equality, identity, affection and family, across sexual orientation and gender spectrums.

RTP's work has been acclaimed not only by it ever-growing audience, but by the Richmond Theatre Critics Circle, with over 100 "Best" nominations, including awards for Best Play and Best Musical multiple times - most recently for its fall 2018 production of The Laramie Project, which won awards for Best Play, Best Director and Outstanding Acting Ensemble.

Additional plaudits have come from the national publication Playbill.com, which named RTP as one of the 15 most important theaters of its kind in the nation, and in an editorial from the Richmond Times-Dispatch which said, in part: "RTP has been consistently willing to explore tough issues involving people who are gay in America and the challenges - and triumphs - they experience ... Their dramatic success here has opened doors and opened minds the old-fashioned way - through laughter, tears, and telling truth."

Richmond Triangle Players has maintained its commitment to diversity not only by producing an annual series of plays, but also in collaborating on new events, in showcasing some of the country's most celebrated cabaret artists on its stage, and in opening its doors to support and incubate other theaters. Our programming encompasses over 160 events performed annually to the delight of over 10,000 enthusiastic patrons.

Richmond Triangle Players was honored at the 2018 statewide Equality Virginia dinner as one of the year's "OUTstanding Virginians," and last year was privileged to be named a 2019 "Richmond History Maker" by the Valentine Museum and Capital Region Collaborative.

RTP's Robert B. Moss Theatre is a 4000-square foot performing arts facility accommodating flexible seating arrangements for up to 90 patrons. A graceful lobby, which includes a generous bar, catering capability and box office, adjoins the theatre, which features both traditional and cabaret-style seating. The building has fully ADA-compliant access, parking and comfortable restrooms. The company is currently developing plans for a late fall re-opening, with new procedures to ensure the health and safety of its artists and its guests.

For more information, please contact Lucian Restivo at lrestivo@rtriangle.org.

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