Weston Playhouse Announces New Musical Award Winner

The Writing/Composing team of Aryanna Garber and Benjamin Velez are the winners of the Weston Playhouse Theatre's 12th Annual New Musical Award for their musical BORDERLINE. The only award of its kind in the country, the Weston New Musical Award brings the creator or creators of a promising new project together with a small ensemble of actors to rehearse and record selections from the winning score with Grammy winner Kurt Deutsch of Sh-K-Boom Records.

Nominated for the award by Di Glazer of International Creative Management Partners, BORDERLINE is a musical about Anna, a young woman living with Borderline Personality Disorder who struggles to find a semblance of normalcy and intimacy amidst a revolving door of therapists, medications, and dysfunctional relationships. Glazer writes that "Garber's book challenges the stigma of BPD, Velez's lyrics capture the protagonist's inner turmoil and the frustrations of the people she surrounds herself with, and his music works as a form of therapy for all the characters. Though seen through the lens of a specific disease, BORDERLINE expresses a universal search for honest connections that will resonate with all audiences." BORDERLINE was developed, in part, at the Advanced BMI Musical Theater Workshop.

Weston Associate Artistic Director Michael Berresse will direct the project with Music Director Daniel Green. The cast includes Margo Seibert (Boardwalk Empire, Broadway's ROCKY) as Anna, Derrick Baskin (25th ANNUAL PUTNAM COUNTY SPELLING BEE, MEMPHIS), Stephen Bogardus (BRIGHT STAR, WHITE CHRISTMAS), Leo Ash Evens (SCHOOL OF ROCK), and Katie Thompson (City Center's PUMP BOYS AND DINETTES). Two free public concerts of selections from BORDERLINE are scheduled for Saturday, March 3 at 4 PM and 7 PM at Weston's new Second Stage, Weston Playhouse at Walker Farm. To reserve your free tickets (general admission) visit westonplayhouse.org.

Support for Weston New Works Programs has come from the Dramatists Play Service; the Frederick Loewe Foundation; Stacey Mindich Productions; Music Theatre International; the Rodgers and Hammerstein Foundation; and generous individual donors.

Photo; BORDERLINE's writing/composing team, Aryanna Garber and Benjamin Velez.