For Immediate Release
June 1, 2017
Contact:
Susan Goes, Executive Director, 541-942-8001
Cottage Theatre announces world premiere selected for 2018 season
Cottage Grove, OR -- Cottage Theatre is one of six community theatres nationwide chosen to present one of the winning scripts of the American Association of Community Theatre's 2018 NewPlayFest. Approximately 300 scripts from playwrights around the country were submitted for consideration in this bi-annual national festival. The scripts were vetted through a four-tiered review process and each producing theatre was involved in the final selection of the winning plays.
Cottage Theatre will present the world premiere of Treehouse, by Alabama playwright Joe Musso, as part of the theatre's 2018 season. Treehouse will run for three weekends from August 10 - 26, 2018, and will serve as the 4th production in Cottage Theatre's 2018 season.
Treehouse is an intriguing contemporary drama revolving around Shakespeare's famous existential line, "To be or not to be, that is the question." Johnny and his pals Oliver and Ben could be typical 17-year-old boys, hanging out in Johnny’s treehouse and dreaming of talking to the beautiful Alana, were it not for Johnny's insistence that he has the mind of a 53-year-old. Johnny’s mom is a little worried. Out-of-the-blue her son is suddenly pulling straight A's, keeping his room immaculate, and reading Shakespeare. As Johnny persists in his claim that he’s an old man in a teenager’s body, and conversations in the treehouse become increasingly peppered by the words of the Bard, Johnny grapples simultaneously with adolescence, love, and the mind's ability to heal from great loss. Through his budding friendship with Alana, Johnny comes to realize the life-affirming power of “the eternal summer that shall not fade.”
Playwright Joe Musso lives in Birmingham, Alabama. His plays have been presented in numerous theatres and have won several awards, including the Great Plains Theatre Conference Holland New Voices Award, the MTWorks Excellence in Playwriting Award, the HRC Showcase Theatre W. Keith Hedrick Playwriting Award, and the Gloria Ann Barnell Peter Playwright Competition. Most recently, his full-length play Absinthe was produced at the Morgan Opera House in Aurora, New York, in April 2017. His full-length play Conk and Bone was published in the 2012 Great Plains Theatre Conference Reader, and his ten-minute play The Rollercoaster of Love was published in Smith & Kraus' The Best 10-Minute Plays 2012. Many of his plays for young actors are published through Heuer Publishing and Brooklyn Publishers, and Applause Theatre & Cinema Books included his play Bam! Ka-Pow! in its anthology 25 Ten-Minute Plays for Teens. In addition to being one of the 2018 American Association of Community Theatre's NewPlayFest scripts, Treehouse has recently been named the winner of the 2017 Todd McNerney National Playwriting Award sponsored by the College of Charleston Department of Theatre and Dance.
The other 2018 NewPlayFest producing theatres and winning scripts are as follows: County Seat Theatre Company in Cloquet, Minnesota, will produce Sweet by Denise Hinson; Elkhart Civic Theatre in Bristol, Indiana, will produce Finishing School by Elaine Liner; Lincoln Community Playhouse in Lincoln, Nebraska, will produce TBD (To Be Determined) by Paul Elliott; Stage III Community Theatre in Casper, Wyoming, will produce Eternity by Michael Cochran; and The Vortex Theatre in Albuquerque, New Mexico, will produce Mynx and Savage by Rebecca Gorman O'Neill. Additional information about the winning plays is available at www.aact.org/newplayfest-playwrights-2018.
Cottage Theatre's world premiere of Treehouse will be one of six productions in the theatre's 36th season. The rest of the theatre's 2018 season will be announced in late August.
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June 1, 2017
Contact:
Susan Goes, Executive Director, 541-942-8001
Cottage Theatre announces world premiere selected for 2018 season
Cottage Grove, OR -- Cottage Theatre is one of six community theatres nationwide chosen to present one of the winning scripts of the American Association of Community Theatre's 2018 NewPlayFest. Approximately 300 scripts from playwrights around the country were submitted for consideration in this bi-annual national festival. The scripts were vetted through a four-tiered review process and each producing theatre was involved in the final selection of the winning plays.
Cottage Theatre will present the world premiere of Treehouse, by Alabama playwright Joe Musso, as part of the theatre's 2018 season. Treehouse will run for three weekends from August 10 - 26, 2018, and will serve as the 4th production in Cottage Theatre's 2018 season.
Treehouse is an intriguing contemporary drama revolving around Shakespeare's famous existential line, "To be or not to be, that is the question." Johnny and his pals Oliver and Ben could be typical 17-year-old boys, hanging out in Johnny’s treehouse and dreaming of talking to the beautiful Alana, were it not for Johnny's insistence that he has the mind of a 53-year-old. Johnny’s mom is a little worried. Out-of-the-blue her son is suddenly pulling straight A's, keeping his room immaculate, and reading Shakespeare. As Johnny persists in his claim that he’s an old man in a teenager’s body, and conversations in the treehouse become increasingly peppered by the words of the Bard, Johnny grapples simultaneously with adolescence, love, and the mind's ability to heal from great loss. Through his budding friendship with Alana, Johnny comes to realize the life-affirming power of “the eternal summer that shall not fade.”
Playwright Joe Musso lives in Birmingham, Alabama. His plays have been presented in numerous theatres and have won several awards, including the Great Plains Theatre Conference Holland New Voices Award, the MTWorks Excellence in Playwriting Award, the HRC Showcase Theatre W. Keith Hedrick Playwriting Award, and the Gloria Ann Barnell Peter Playwright Competition. Most recently, his full-length play Absinthe was produced at the Morgan Opera House in Aurora, New York, in April 2017. His full-length play Conk and Bone was published in the 2012 Great Plains Theatre Conference Reader, and his ten-minute play The Rollercoaster of Love was published in Smith & Kraus' The Best 10-Minute Plays 2012. Many of his plays for young actors are published through Heuer Publishing and Brooklyn Publishers, and Applause Theatre & Cinema Books included his play Bam! Ka-Pow! in its anthology 25 Ten-Minute Plays for Teens. In addition to being one of the 2018 American Association of Community Theatre's NewPlayFest scripts, Treehouse has recently been named the winner of the 2017 Todd McNerney National Playwriting Award sponsored by the College of Charleston Department of Theatre and Dance.
The other 2018 NewPlayFest producing theatres and winning scripts are as follows: County Seat Theatre Company in Cloquet, Minnesota, will produce Sweet by Denise Hinson; Elkhart Civic Theatre in Bristol, Indiana, will produce Finishing School by Elaine Liner; Lincoln Community Playhouse in Lincoln, Nebraska, will produce TBD (To Be Determined) by Paul Elliott; Stage III Community Theatre in Casper, Wyoming, will produce Eternity by Michael Cochran; and The Vortex Theatre in Albuquerque, New Mexico, will produce Mynx and Savage by Rebecca Gorman O'Neill. Additional information about the winning plays is available at www.aact.org/newplayfest-playwrights-2018.
Cottage Theatre's world premiere of Treehouse will be one of six productions in the theatre's 36th season. The rest of the theatre's 2018 season will be announced in late August.
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