Edgerton Foundation New Play Awards Announce Second Round Of 2019 Recipients
By: Julie Musbach Sep. 09, 2019
Theatre Communications Group (TCG), the national organization for theatre, announces the recipients of the second round of the 2019 Edgerton Foundation New Play Awards. The awards, totaling $583,000, allow 15 productions extra time for the development and rehearsal of new plays with the entire creative team, hoping to extend the life of the world premiere play after its first run.
Over the last 13 years, the Edgerton Foundation has awarded over $12,898,000 to 421 productions, enabling many plays to schedule subsequent productions following their world premieres. Thirty-six have made it to Broadway, including: Curtains, 13, Next to Normal, 33 Variations, In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play), Time Stands Still, Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, A Free Man of Color, Good People, Chinglish, Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, Bronx Bombers, Casa Valentina, Outside Mullingar, All the Way, Eclipsed, Bright Star, Hamilton, The Columnist, In Transit, A Doll's House Part 2, Indecent, Dear Evan Hansen, Oslo, Escape to Margaritaville, The Prom, JUNK: The Golden Age of Debt, SUMMER: The Donna Summer Musical, Head Over Heels, Jagged Little Pill, Diana, Grand Horizons, Girl from the North Country, The Great Society, and Sound Inside. Sixteen plays were nominated for Tony Awards, with All the Way, Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, Hamilton, Dear Evan Hansen, and Oslo winning the best play or musical awards. Ten plays were nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, with wins for Cost of Living (2018), Hamilton (2016), The Flick (2014), Water by the Spoonful (2012), and Next to Normal (2010).
"The second round of 2019 Edgerton Foundation New Play Awards manifests the diverse vitality of new play development in the U.S. and beyond," said Teresa Eyring, executive director, TCG. "With the longer rehearsal processes made possible by the Foundation's support, these world premiere productions are more likely to reach their full potential and go on to many subsequent productions."
The second round of the 2019 Edgerton Foundation New Play Awards were presented to:
Right to be Forgotten
at Arena Stage
You Lost Me
at Denver Center for the Performing Arts
Greater Clements
by Samuel D. Hunter
at Lincoln Center Theater
On the Grounds of Belonging
by Ricardo Pérez González
at Long Wharf Theatre
The Perplexed
at Manhattan Theatre Club
The Best We Could (a family tragedy)
at Manhattan Theatre Club
The Welkin
by Lucy Kirkwood
at National Theatre
A Very Expensive Poison
by Lucy Prebble
based on the book by Luke Harding
at The Old Vic
Confederates
by Dominique Morisseau
at Oregon Shakespeare Festival
Coal Country
by Jessica Blank & Erik Jensen
at The Public Theater
Cullud Wattah
by Erika Dickerson-Despenza
at The Public Theater
Rare Earth Mettle
by Al Smith
at Royal Court Theatre
The Underlying Chris
by Will Eno
at Second Stage Theater
Gun & Powder
by Angelica Chéri & Ross Baum
book & lyrics by Angelica Chéri
music by Ross Baum
at Signature Theatre, VA
The Hot Wing King
by Katori Hall
at Signature Theatre, NY
"The Edgerton New Play Award allows for two weeks of preview performances and daytime rehearsals for Right to be Forgotten, rather than Arena Stage's usual one week," said Molly Smith, artistic director, Arena Stage. "For new plays, these additional previews and rehearsals are critically important, allowing the creative team to make adjustments in response to audiences. By more than doubling this working time, all elements - script, design, performance, etc. - are ultimately so much more refined, allowing the production to be the best version of itself."
"Greater Clements requires a two-story set and director Davis McCallum has expressed his interest in staging the play in the round," said André Bishop, producing artistic director, Lincoln Center Theater. "These factors are likely going to result in a protracted tech-rehearsal period to ensure that the actors are given ample time to become acclimated to the set and the audience configuration. An additional week in the rehearsal room before the company moves onto the stage is going to be extremely helpful."
The Edgerton Foundation New Plays Program, directed by Brad and Louise Edgerton, was piloted in 2006 with Center Theatre Group in Los Angeles by offering two musicals in development an extended rehearsal period for the entire creative team, including the playwrights. The Edgertons launched the program nationally in 2007 and have supported 421 plays to date at over 50 different Art Theatres across the country.
Theatre Communications Group (TCG) exists to strengthen, nurture, and promote professional theatre in the U.S. and globally. Since its founding in 1961, TCG's constituency has grown from a handful of groundbreaking theatres to over 700 Member Theatres and affiliate organizations and nearly 10,000 Individual Members. Through its Core Values of Activism, Artistry, Diversity, and Global Citizenship, TCG advances a better world for theatre and a better world because of theatre. TCG offers its members networking and knowledge-building opportunities through research, communications, and events, including the annual TCG National Conference, one of the largest nationwide gatherings of theatre people; awards grants and scholarships, approximately $2 million per year, to theatre companies and individual artists; advocates on the federal level; and through the Global Theater Initiative, TCG's partnership with the Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics, serves as the U.S. Center of the International Theatre Institute. TCG is North America's largest independent trade publisher of dramatic literature, with 17 Pulitzer Prizes for Drama on the TCG booklist. It also publishes the award-winning American Theatre magazine and ARTSEARCH, the essential source for a career in the arts. In all of its endeavors, TCG seeks to increase the organizational efficiency of its Member Theatres, cultivate and celebrate the artistic talent and achievements of the field, and promote a larger public understanding of, and appreciation for, the theatre.www.tcg.org.
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