@dramatistsguild @duanekelly 

           Last year Seattle saw academia emerging – at least partially – from its ivory tower and becoming more engaged with our busy, multifaceted theatre scene. The two institutions with the largest theatre programs here are Cornish College of the Arts and the University of Washington. While both programs are centered on performance, they also address playwriting in various ways. Cornish has a history of deeper engagement, due largely to its tradition of hiring faculty who are local practicing artists. When the Guild’s Executive Director for Business Affairs, Ralph Sevush, visited Seattle last year, he met with students at Cornish to explain the Guild’s mission and the challenges facing playwrights today.

           Since Todd London moved to Seattle in 2014 from New Dramatists in New York to lead the School of Drama at the University of Washington, he has been building more connections between UW (as it’s known here) and our larger theatre scene. In November, Todd’s department convened a symposium that examined the founding visions of Seattle theatre companies. Misha Berson, longtime theatre critic for the Seattle Times, served as moderator.

           Cornish, under the leadership of Theatre Chair Richard E.T. White (himself a UW alum), has been increasing its involvement with new plays and local playwrights. The fall (October-December) season at Cornish consisted of six plays organized around the theme of adaptation. Three of the plays were by Guild members Octavio Solis (Quixote: Book One, adapted from Cervantes), Edward Mast (Jungalbook, adapted from Kipling) and Karen Hartman (Wild Kate: A Tale of Revenge at Sea, adapted from Moby Dick). Jungalbook and Wild Kate were new plays, and Solis was doing some rejiggering on Quixote, which premiered in 2009 at Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon, where he lives. All three writers met with Cornish students so as to expose them to real work of writing scripts and then getting them up on stage. Cornish’s mission is to train its students to be artists, citizens and innovators. Chair White sees this engagement with local writers and their play development processes as making an important contribution to that mission. White also recently instituted a gender parity policy whereby at least half of the plays Cornish students perform will be written by women.

           Another recent development in Seattle region was the appointment of Braden Abraham as Artistic Director at Seattle Repertory Theatre. He was given a four-year contract. Abraham has spent his entire career at the Rep, where he’s worked since 2003 in several artistic capacities. Most recently he served as acting artistic director, following the sudden death in 2014 of Artistic Manager Jerry Manning. Abraham’s appointment is good news for Seattle playwrights as he has been a champion of local writers and new plays. In 2012, he launched the Rep’s “Writers Group” residency program, modeling it after initiatives at Public Theatre, Huntington, Ars Nova and Playwrights Center. When he was named Artistic Director, Abraham reaffirmed his commitment to producing new work at Seattle Rep. He plans to further expand what the Rep is already doing in that area, including launching a program of new play readings and workshops, to be titled “The Other Season.”  

dkelly@dramatistsguild.com