NAMT Awards Grants to Goodspeed Musicals, The Public Theater, 5th Avenue Theatre and More

The National Alliance for Musical Theatre (NAMT) announces nine awards granted from their National Fund for New Musicals, a major funding program to support NAMT member not-for-profit theatres in their collaborations with writers to create, develop and produce new musicals. Now in its sixth year, the Fund will provide grants totaling $35,500 to nine organizations across the country.

NAMT Executive Director Betsy King Militello stated, "We are honored and excited to support our member theatres as they work with this inspiring group of writers to develop these innovative and provocative new musicals. With these grants, we have now awarded 66 grants totaling $269,500, all made possible by our generous funders including Stacey Mindich Productions, The Alhadeff Family Charitable Foundation, The ASCAP Foundation and Kathryn and Raymond Harbert. These projects will join a growing list of important new musicals added to the canon with support from our National Fund for New Musicals."

National Fund grants of $10,000 to support full productions have been awarded to:

Goodspeed Musicals (East Haddam, CT) for The Circus in Winter by Ben Clark, Hunter Foster and Beth Turcottte with support from Stacey Mindich Productions. This project was presented in NAMT's 2012 Festival of New Musicals. Foster is also a Festival alumnus writer for his musical Summer of '42 presented in NAMT's Festival in 1999.

The Public Theater (New York, NY) for The Fortress of Solitude by Itamar Moses and Michael Friedman with support from Stacey Mindich Productions. This project was previously supported by the National Fund for New Musicals through Dallas Theater Center for the workshop at that theatre. Moses is an alumnus from NAMT's 2012 Festival for Nobody Loves You

National Fund grants of $4,000 to support a workshop or reading have been awarded to:

The 5th Avenue Theatre (Seattle, WA) for Beautiful Poison by Brendan Milburn, Duane Poole and Valerie Vigoda with support from The ASCAP Foundation Irving Caesar Fund. Milburn and Vigoda are both alumni from NAMT's 2004 Festival for Striking 12 and 2012 Festival for Sleeping Beauty Wakes. Milburn is also an alumnus from NAMT's 2011 Festival for Watt?!?.

Chicago Shakespeare Theater (Chicago, IL) for Hansel & Gretl & Heidi & Gunter by Will Aronson, Hannah Kohl and Daniel Maté with support from The Alhadeff Family Charitable Foundation. Aronson and Maté are alumni from NAMT's 2010 Festival for The Trouble with Doug.

Village Theatre (Issaquah, WA) for Jesus in My Bedroom by Melanie Burgess, Tim Symons and Brian Yorkey with support from Kathryn & Raymond Harbert. Yorkey is also a Festival alumnus writer for his musical Making Tracks presented in NAMT's Festival in 2001.

This is the sixth year of grants awarded from the National Fund of New Musicals, a fund created by NAMT to help support every stage of development for new musicals. The recipients were selected by a distinguished panel, moderated by Gigi Bolt, the former Director of Theater and Musical Theater at the National Endowment for the Arts. The panelists were Jane Abramson from Disney Theatricals; NAMT Honorary Member and past Board President Judith Allen; Kate Galvin from 11th Hour Theatre Company; Brad Lohrenz from Samuel French, Inc.; Michael Rubinoff from The Canadian Music Theatre Project at Sheridan College; and Michael Dinwiddie from New York University.

Additionally, the National Fund for New Musicals has awarded $500 to $1,000 in Writers Residency Grants over the past year to the following organizations:

Ars Nova (New York, NY) for Robin by Jen Silverman and Shaina Taub.
CAP21 (New York, NY) for LIVE! NUDE! GIRL! by Donna Kaz and Ionel Petroi.
Playwrights Horizons (New York, NY) for Alice Bliss by Jenny Giering, Adam Gwon and Laura Harrington. All three are alumni of the NAMT Festival for Bernice Bobs Her Hair (2011- Gwon), Ordinary Days (2008- Gwon), The Perfect 36 (1996- Harrington) and Princess Caraboo (2005- Giering).
Theatre Latté Da (Minneapolis, MN) for C. by Robert Elhai and Bradley Greenwald.

The National Fund for New Musicals has supported the development of many musicals over the last 6 years, including Giant by Michael John LaChiusa and Sybille Pearson at Dallas Theater Center, which was performed at The Public Theater in New York last season; Ordinary Days by Adam Gwon which is now licensed through Rodgers & Hammerstein after an Off Broadway run at Roundabout Theatre Co., Far From Heaven by Michael Korie, Scott Frankel and Richard Greenberg at Playwrights Horizons in New York; The Memory Show by Sara Cooper and Zach Redler which recently ran Off Broadway at The Transport Group; among many others.

The National Alliance for Musical Theatre, founded in 1985, is a national service organization dedicated exclusively to musical theatre. Their mission is to advance musical theatre by nurturing the creation, development, production and presentation of new musicals, and to provide a forum for musical theatre professionals to share resources and exchange information. Their 200 members, located throughout 34 states and abroad, are some of the leading producers of musical theatre in the world and include theatres, presenting organizations, higher education programs and individual producers. Among the over 200 musicals launched by NAMT's annual Festival of New Musicals are Thoroughly Modern Millie, Children of Eden, Honk!, The Drowsy Chaperone, Songs for a New World, I Love You Because, Striking 12, Vanities, Ordinary Days and many others, representing over 400 writers.

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