SPACE on Ryder Farm Announces A.C.T. Partnership, Working Farm Reading Series
(© Ahron R. Foster)
SPACE on Ryder Farm has announced its annual Working Farm Reading Series, featuring free full-length readings of new plays written by members of its residents writers’ group, the Working Farm.
The Working Farm, which is fully subsidized and provided at no cost to participants, brings eight playwrights and composer-lyricists to Ryder Farm each year for five nonconsecutive weeks to nurture and inspire the creation of a new work for the theater. The scheduled readings include Charly Evon Simpson's Form of a Girl Unknown (April 23 at 7pm); Questhaven, written and directed by Kevin Armento (April 24 at 7pm); Erin Courtney's Ann, Fran and Mary Ann (April 25 at 7pm); and Emily Feldman's The Best We Could, directed by Joshua Brody (April 26). All readings are free and open to the public (registration is required). To register, click here.
SPACE will additionally serve as this year’s New Strands Residency partner theater company, partnering with San Francisco's American Conservatory Theater. Now in its second year, A.C.T.’s New Strands Residency gives emerging and established American playwrights — through a partnership with a nationally recognized new-work incubator — the opportunity to create and develop new works in residence at A.C.T.’s state-of-the-art Strand Theater.
Two projects developed at SPACE on Ryder Farm will be part of this year’s New Strands Festival lineup: Nike, or, We Don’t Need Another Hero, an Afrofuturistic Greek epic by Ngozi Anyanwu (The Homecoming Queen); and Untitled Tegan and Sara Musical, a queer coming-of-age love story with book by Emily Kaczmarek and music and lyrics by Tegan Quin and Sara Quin, conceived and directed by Kate Sullivan. Over the course of the residency, the playwrights will participate in a reading of their work, develop their works-in-progress with directors and a shared ensemble of actors, and sit on various panel discussions. Following participation in the festival, which runs from May 14-20, the core creatives will have a weeklong residency at SPACE to further develop their projects.
