It was nearly ten years ago that Palm Beach Dramaworks’ Producing Artistic Director, Bill Hayes, implemented their visionary Dramaworkshop, dedicated to providing resources and support for playwrights to develop scripts. The logic was if not-for-profit theatres don’t do it, who will? Broadway no longer takes such chances. It was a bold move as regional theatres typically suffer under some economic adversity and Dramaworks had just settled into their new theatre on Clematis Street in West Palm Beach.
Then came Covid, yet another strong headwind. Fortunately, PBD had the financial reserves to wait out the storm, and has come back stronger than ever and, with an endowment gift from Diane and Mark Perlberg, their commitment to new plays has been secured for years to come. The Dramaworkshop is under direction of PBD’s Bruce Linser, a gifted actor and director, and his enthusiasm for the program is infectious. He and his committee sift through hundreds of submissions each year, winnow them down to five, workshop them, and those become dramatic readings as part of the renamed Perlberg Festival of New Plays.
It is hoped that one or two of the plays presented in the festival will make it to the main stage to join the classic plays presented each season. Last month’s production of the highly acclaimed The Messenger by Jenny Connell Davis emerged from last year’s festival. 2024’s festival just successfully concluded and because of the Perlbergs’ gift the five new plays were also prefaced by interviews with two theatre luminaries, actor Estelle Parsons and playwright Mark St. Germain.
Parsons appeared at PBD in My Old Lady (2014) and has originated numerous roles in new plays over her decades-long career. PBD helped develop St. Germain’s script for Freud’s Last Session and produced its Southeastern premiere (2011). A feature film based on the play, starring Anthony Hopkins, was recently released.
Parsons was interviewed by Bill Hayes on Jan 3, a great kick off to the festival. They are not only theatre colleagues, but are now old friends and it was amusing to watch how Parsons, a veteran of six decades in the theatre, now 96 years old but feisty, sharp, and a take charge kind of person, just go her way with the interview, while Hayes was left holding his interview outline (although he did manage to hit his high points). It was a friendly, even loving, give and take. Parsons is also a director and when asked the question of what is the main role of the director, it was “to find the truth.” Hopefully the video that was being taken of the interview will be made available in the future. It was a “don’t miss” beginning to the festival and Parsons attended each and every performance in the ensuing days.
The following day Hayes interviewed Mark St. Germain. Again, both have a long association. This time, Hayes was on script and like his plays, St. Germain was thoughtful and passionate about ideas. Many of his plays are a form of historical fiction and focus on single characters, or small casts. They are intimate and cerebral. He talked to an extent about bringing his material to film but with some regret because of the loss of control. It was a memorable interview and St. Germain was also in attendance for all the new plays that followed.
So the first two days were these landmark interviews, then five new plays in three days (brief descriptions provided by PBD):
PROXIMITY
Newly divorced and sheltering at home with her two children at the height of the pandemic, Ezra hasn't been touched by another adult in eight months. At a virtual PTA meeting, she is introduced to the charismatic Irie, another single parent, and their immediate attraction causes Ezra to reconsider the limits of her Covid bubble.
STOCKADE
Five years after the end of WWII, a group of gay soldiers gathers for a reunion on Fire Island. They are met by an outsider with a surprise that will cause them to question whether history is best left in the past. At a time when “security risk” is government code for “homosexual,” it will take courage for them to step out of the shadows and confront their present and future.
COLOR BLIND
by Oren Safdie
In 2009, a jury was tasked with selecting an architect to design the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C. This play is a fictionalized account of how that panel of diverse people and ideas may have come together – or been pulled apart – in making its decision, and in so doing, challenges the audience to consider the state of our current civil discord.
EVERYTHING BEAUTIFUL HAPPENS AT NIGHT
Ezra is a successful children’s book writer. Nancy is his longtime editor. They are always on the same page, until someone new threatens to disrupt their friendship and influence Ezra’s next book. Set in 1980s Manhattan, this play explores the legacy of an artist, the meaning of intimacy, and the stories we tell ourselves to survive.
LITTLE ROW BOAT
When 14-year-old Sally Hemings travels to Paris as nursemaid to her half-sister’s young daughter, the world appears to have opened much wider than Thomas Jefferson’s post-revolutionary Virginia plantation on which she was born. It is not until Sally’s brother James, also in France as he trains to be a chef de cuisine, points out the peculiarities of their circumstances that Sally begins to question the kindnesses their “master” has extended to them.
These are rehearsed presentations by professional actors, most Actors Equity members. Although they have a podium for their scripts, there is no scenery, special lighting, movement, all the elements endemic to theatre. Yet, the actors are emotive and draw the audience into the production; we, in our imagination, supply the rest. While we are watching the playwrights’ work, they are watching the audience as these readings provide valuable clues as to what further developmental work might be needed, clarity, cutting, or maybe more humor, or laughter at the wrong spot? After the play, there is a Q&A skillfully managed by Linser, encouraging the audience to give their true reactions.
No doubt one of these, at least, will appear on a fully developed main stage production in the future. I would hate to be on the “jury” to make those decisions as all have merit and as their descriptions indicate a special relevancy to our present times. The arts are not a competition and to make such decisions more difficult is the fact that a reading is threadbare of staging.
Each of the plays presented touched me in some way but I’ll mention a few; and these are very personal observations, unique to my own theatre experiences and background. So no intended judgment of the ones I fail to mention.
Color Blind reminded me in some ways of Tracey Letts’ The Minutes. Although the latter is about a bickering City Council meeting turning into something very ugly about the town secret, Oren Safdie’s Color Blind uses a similar technique, projecting architectural designs as kind of Rorschach test for bringing out societal issues and the personalities of the jury.
Because I have a background in publishing, the relationship between editor and author as portrayed in Everything Beautiful Happens at Night rang true, playwright Ted Malawer exploring larger themes of loneliness, shame, and love. That reading had two of South Florida’s premier actors, Tom Wahl and Laura Turnbull, which helped make it especially touching.
Although entitled “Little” Row Boat, it made a big impression on me because it was so challenging, with lots of symbolism and dramatic contrivances that could be highly effective in a fully realized stage production. In a narrow sense the story is about Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, but the macrocosm is about slavery leaving an indelible imprint on our nation. I can imagine if Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia was workshopped, there would have been similar difficulties (in my mind, Kirsten Greenidge’s Little Row Boat has a similar feeling and complexity). It is certainly theatre to think about.
After the festival there was a Champagne toast to all who made the festival possible. The collective energy that goes into staging this festival is monumental by very talented people. Hopefully, it’s success represents an emphatic statement that theatre is back! And maybe some mighty oaks will grow from these readings.
