Theater Resources Unlimited and The Players Theatre present the April TRU Panel, Nurturing New Works: What Producers Can Learn from the National Playwrights Conference Wednesday, April 30, 2014 at 7:30pm

Theater Resources Unlimited and The Players Theatre
present the April TRU Panel,

Nurturing New Works:

What Producers Can Learn from the National Playwrights Conference

Theater Resources Unlimited (TRU) celebrates the 50^th anniversary of the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center with their April panel, Nurturing New Works: What Producers Can Learn from the National Playwrights Conference on Wednesday, April 30, 2014 at 7:30pm at The Players Theatre, 115 MacDougal Street, Mainstage Theatre, NYC.  Doors open at 7pm for networking and refreshments, presentations and roundtable introductions start at 7:30pm (come prepared with your best half-minute summary of who you are, and what you need).

Guests will include Jeffrey Sweet playwright (The Value of Names, Kunstler, Flyovers, Bluff, Court-Martial at Fort Devens, You Only Shoot the Ones You Love) and author of the upcoming book “The O’Neill: The Transformation of Modern American Theater” on the 50th anniversary of the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center; Tom Viertel, Board Chairman of the O’Neill Center, commercial producer (Hairspray, The Producers, A Little Night Music, Young Frankenstein, Leap of Faith, The Norman Conquests, Gypsy, Sweeney Todd, Company, Little Shop of Horrors, The Weir, The Sound of Music, Smokey Joe’s Café, Angels in America, Oleanna, Love Letters, Driving Miss Daisy, Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune, Penn and Teller and many others); Linda Winer, chief theater critic and arts columnist for Newsday, frequent teacher at the National Critics Institute of the O’Neill.

For nearly 50 years, the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center has been a pioneer in the development of new work and new artists for American theater. The National Playwrights Conference and National Music Theater Conference were founded on the concept that there is a critically important step between when a work is written and when it advances into production. This step became known as “the O’Neill process.” This panel will investigate how this process evolved over the years, how it set the pattern for other developmental programs, and how it influences the way writers develop their work.

Admission is $12 (free for TRU members).  Please RSVP at least a day in advance (or much sooner) for reservations: 212/714-7628; or e-mail [email protected]. 

Theater Resources Unlimited (TRU) is a twenty-two year old 501c3 nonprofit organization created to help producers produce, emerging theater companies to emerge healthily and all theater professionals to understand and navigate the business of theater. Membership includes self-producing artists as well as career producers and theater companies.

TRU publishes an email community newsletter of services, goods and productions; presents the TRU VOICES Annual New Play Reading Series and Annual New Musicals Reading Series, two new works series in which TRU underwrites developmental readings to nurture new shows as well as new producers for theater; TRU offers a Producer Development & Mentorship Program whose mentors are among the most prominent producers and general managers in New York Theater, and also presents Producer Boot Camp workshops to help aspirants develop the business skills they need. TRU serves writers through a Writer-Producer Speed Date, a Practical Playwriting Workshop and a Director-Writer Communications Lab; programs for actors include an Annual Combined Audition, scheduled for April 5^th and 6^th this year, and quarterly Resource Nights and “Speed Dating” as well as free monthly actor workshops, in partnership with Weist-Barron Studios.

Built in 1907 and converted into a theatre in the late 1940’s, the Players Theatre, host of the monthly TRU panels, has been a jewel in the midst of beautiful Greenwich Village, serving as a magnet for performing artists and their audiences.  The mainstage theatre has been home to such long run productions as An Evening with Quentin Crisp, Psycho Beach Party  and Ruthless starring an 8 year old Brittany Spears, Natalie Portman and Legally Blonde the Musical’s Laura Bell Bundy.  The Steve & Marie Sgouros Theatre, a 60-seat loft space on the 3^rd floor offers an intimate home for TRU’s panels, as well as a range of new works. For more information, please visit www.theplayerstheatre.com.

Programs of Theater Resources Unlimited are supported in part by public funds awarded through the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, 9^th district Council Member Inez Dickens and Council Member Christine Quinn; The Montage Foundation, as well as support from the Friar’s National Foundation Association.

For more information about TRU membership and programs, visit www.truonline.org or call (212) 714-7628.