Contact:
Eric Sloss
412-268-5765

For immediate release:
July 5, 2005

Carnegie Mellon School of Drama Announces 2005 Summer New Play Festival

PITTSBURGH—Carnegie Mellon University's School of Drama will once again host the Summer New Play Festival beginning Thursday, July 21, 2005. Six new plays will be presented at 8 p.m. over two weekends in the Helen Wayne Rauh Theatre at the Purnell Center for the Arts on the Carnegie Mellon campus. Tickets are free to the public and will be available one half-hour prior to curtain at the box office. For tickets contact 412-268-2407. Seating is limited.

The festival has become a crucial step in the development process for writers because they have the chance to see how an audience responds to their new plays. "Carnegie Mellon is an extraordinarily fertile environment for playwrights working on new plays. Since so much of our collaboration involves other members of the School of Drama, it is nice to also take the opportunity to work with other area actors," said David Fields, director of the festival. "These are actors and directors who are involved with local theater and are now collaborating with Carnegie Mellon students. The Summer New Play Festival introduces the plays and playwrights to an audience that draws from the entire Pittsburgh community, and it introduces the Pittsburgh community to these accomplished plays and talented playwrights."

Through moderated feedback sessions following each performance, the audience gets the rare opportunity to share its opinions about the works presented. Carlyn Aquiline, City Theater's dramaturge and literary manager, will lead the feedback at this year's festival.

The 2005 Summer New Play Festival will showcase three new works in progress each weekend by performing the work of the Carnegie Mellon School of Drama dramatic writing program alumni and students. The festival is designed to help writers prepare their scripts for productions in regional theatres around the country.

The featured plays are:

Thursday, July 21
"DOWN ON MEMMINGER"
By Kirby Fields,
Directed by Crystal Manich
"A young man suffering from a debilitating illness returns home to discover that not even the ones he loves the most can make the pain go away."

Friday, July 22
"THE CHIMES"
By Kevin Snipes
Directed by Laura Gross
"At a private boarding school, four boys are united by their love of Shakespeare and torn apart by the approach of World War II."

Saturday, July 23
"THE PURPLE HEART"
By Craig J. Weiner
Directed by Kathryn Moroney
"Chicago, 1968—A Korean War veteran falls in love with a troubled neighbor, but must break free of his own haunted past."

Thursday, July 28
"THE ONLY GIFT"
By Mary F. Unser
Directed by Dan Rigazzi
"If everyone needs salvation, who do you choose?"

Friday, July 29
"BULLDOG WHISKEY"
By James L. McManus
Directed by Laura Konsin
"A family searches for faith and forgiveness as they await the birth of a baby."

Saturday, July 30
"JUDAS JONES"
By Collin Acock
Directed by Kyle Brenton
"A small southern town puts pressure on one young man to be a savior when all he wants to do is leave."

The School of Drama is the nation's oldest degree-granting theatre program and is one of five schools within Carnegie Mellon's College of Fine Arts. The College of Fine Arts is a community of nationally and internationally recognized artists and professionals organized into Architecture, Art, Design, Drama and Music, and their associated centers and programs. For more information on the College of Fine Arts contact Eric Sloss at 412-268-5765 or by email at ecs@andrew.cmu.edu.