Journalism

For the past eighteen years, PlayGround has been working to promote and support the San Francisco Bay Area's best new playwrights through a unique collection of new play incubator programs, including the celebrated Monday Night PlayGround staged reading series (marking its 10th season at Berkeley Rep this fall) and the Bay Area's largest full-length commissioning program dedicated exclusively to local writers (forty-eight commissions awarded since 2002). Last May, PlayGround launched its newest initiative—the PlayGround Film Festival—featuring new short films adapted from short plays originally developed through PlayGround.

On Monday, September 24, at 8pm PDT / 10pm CDT / 11pm EDT, the inaugural PlayGround Film Festival will be livestreamed in HD on #NEWPLAY TV and simultaneously re-screened at Berkeley’s Rialto Cinemas Elmwood to celebrate the kick-off of PlayGround’s 19th season.

The Film Festival, a joint project of PlayGround and local film company Dances with Light, features five short films by teams of local filmmakers and writers adapted from past Best of PlayGround short plays as well as short interviews with the screenwriters. Featured films include:

Tom Swift's The Beginning (People's Choice Award) Jonathan Luskin's Ecce Homo (shot in Oakland’s historic Paramount Theatre) Daniel Heath's Wednesday Kenn Rabin's Reunion Katie May's The Etymology of Zero (animated feminist fairytale)

Online and live audiences will be able to tweet feedback and questions for the filmmakers and writers using hashtags #newplay and #PlayGroundFilmFest. You can organize watch parties for your own local community using this party organizing tool.

PlayGround recently announced the guidelines and deadline for the second PlayGround Film Festival Competition. To learn more about the PlayGround Film Festival, including a Film Fest trailer, go here.

#NEWPLAY TV is a knowledge commons stewarded by HowlRound.com / Center for the Theater Commons. The channel is at newplaytv.info and is an international, shared-resource for live events and performances relevant to the new works’ theater field. Its mode of production is open-access and open source and its mission is to break geographic isolation, promote resource sharing, and to develop our knowledge commons collectively. Follow and use hashtag #newplay on Twitter to participate in a community of peers revolutionizing the flow of information and knowledge in our field. We’re fans of the Creative Commons License BY-SA. Co-produce with us by contacting @NewPlayTV on Twitter, emailing newplaytv (at) howlround.com or by calling Vijay Mathew at +(1) 917.686.3185. Host a watch party by using this tool and let us know about it.