The production team that produced Better Left Unsaid TV – the first of its kind interactive, live streamed video-play, is seeking script submissions for our next live streamed production. As the first of its kind, professional, live streamed play, Better Left Unsaid had over 50,000 unique viewers, and served as the launching pad for a new production company, Virtual Ovation TV.

Seeking:
Full length video-play* with strong female characters.  (Virtual Ovation TV is committed to moving forward in our work as both actors and producer/directors)

Controversial language, sexuality, violence etc are all perfectly groovy.

Thematically a  strong social issue is a plus, but not required.

We are seeking  video-plays which are reasonably accessible to a broad demographic. As we build an audience for this new medium it is our instinct to present work that veers more towards the linear rather than the experimental.  While we will be thrilled to consider any script you submit, please know that as we launch our production company we are focused first on building a viable business model so that later, with our financial foundation firmly in place, we will have the freedom to produce live streaming video-plays that reflect all genres and tastes of theater**.

Better Left Unsaid was produced with an all volunteer production team and donated equipment (the cast was paid per an AFTRA Experimental New Media Contract).  However we are seeking a viable budget for our next production via sponsorships. Identifying our next video-play is step one in our fund raising process.

Please send submissions to submissions@virtualovation.tv.  Please include a short synopsis and a cast breakdown as well as a production history, if applicable.

About Virtual Ovation TV:
Virtual Ovation TV is taking one of the world’s most primal and universal forms of storytelling and translating it into the most modern of mediums. By combining Theater, Live Streaming and Social Media, Virtual Ovation TV is turning the performing arts into an interactive global experience. We are creating work that is accessible to anyone, anywhere in the world who has access to the internet and enabling artists to build relationships with audiences that transcend geographical boundaries.

With each new project Virtual Ovation TV is committed to creating two very different, but simultaneous experiences: a vibrant traditional theater experience for our in-house audience, and a visually compelling, intimate and authentic video experience for our online viewers.

About Better Left Unsaid TV:

Better Left Unsaid was the first of it’s kind, interactive, live streamed video-play.  Staged in New York City in front of a live New York audience, Better Left Unsaid was simultaneously shot with four cameras, mixed in real time and streamed live to the internet so that anyone, anywhere in the world with a computer could watch the show and interact with it via facebook and twitter.  The final three performances of Better Left Unsaid were watched by over 50,000 unique viewers and received virtual standing ovations from around the US and the world.

(Thanks to 2amtheatre for allowing us to post this announcement on their site first.  We are so grateful for the opportunity to reach out to this theater community that is as excited about technology and the promise it holds for the future of American theater as we are. Thanks guys!)

Please feel free to forward this post. And to stay in touch with Virtual Ovation as we move towards our next live streamed project, sign up for our mailing list at Virtual Ovation TV.

*don’t let the word video-play scare you. For questions about how a video-play differs from a regular play just a shoot kathryn an email. Please include your phone number.

**We are using the word theater by default.  What we are really creating is an entirely new storytelling model, one that feels just like theater to an in-house audience, but in turn feels like interactive online video to a live streaming audience.  The best term we have been able to come up with is a  MCLSNV (Multi-Camera Live Streaming Narrative Video)  umm…  yeah……

This article was first published in the April Issue of Scene4 Magazine

The American theatrical blogosphere has been awash these past few months with responses to Rocco Landesman’s recent speech in which he asserted that the supply of arts in America has outpaced demand. If, as Mr. Landesman believes, attendance at American theater is decreasing while simultaneously the number of theaters is increasing, than clearly we have created an unsustainable business model. There has been both outrage at Mr. Landesman’s comments, and some agreement. Are there too many theaters? Are there too few theatergoers? Is this the wrong time to start a theater company? Whose work is worthy of support in such a competitive atmosphere? Has the American theater community nurtured a business model that is destined to fail?

But perhaps the heart of the issue isn’t that American theater audiences are declining, but rather that American theater isn’t finding its audience. Perhaps the most important question is where are today’s audiences – and how do we reach them?

In a recent article for American Theater Magazine, Susan Miller wrote of the joy she has found as a theater artist discovering that she can write, produce, distribute and have full creative ownership of her projects when she works in online video. Susan writes that working online harnesses all the energy of our younger years when “Lets put on a show!” was a thrilling call to action, be it in a high school auditorium, an out of the way black box, or even a barn – Mickey Rooney style. The key difference? This show has the capacity to be seen by thousands and thousands of people and continues to be seen long past the final curtain.

I love Susan’s notion that online video is the next great frontier for theater artists. And I think there is a specific facet of web video that holds the most promise to those of us who have spent our careers on stage. The natural pairing of theater and online video …live-streaming.

As theater artists who thrive on the spontaneity, danger and electricity of live performance there is no better technological fit than multi-camera live-streaming theater. Live broadcasts of the UK’s National Theater and the US’s Metropolitan Opera have already proven that there is a hunger for the live theater experience that transcends the proscenium. But as opposed to expensive broadcasts to movie theaters and complicated distribution negotiations, live-streaming requires nothing more than a robust internet connection and voila! Your production is now available, live, to anyone anywhere in the world with Internet access. In addition, by streaming theater to the internet we have created the capacity to incorporate the kind of social interactivity that speaks directly to today’s wired audience, thereby generating online conversations around our work that lends our audience a sense of ownership of the production, all while building long term audience loyalty – a great advantage over the more expensive movie theater broadcast.

But even more exciting? Here, Mr. Landesman, is where we find our audience! I have been working in live streaming platforms for almost as long as they have existed, launching the first live, scripted video series in September of 2007. This past January however was when I began to experiment with live streaming theater. On January 21st of this year my company began previews of Better Left Unsaid, the first of its kind, interactive live-streamed play. Better Left Unsaid was performed in front of a live audience in a small theater in New York City. And, Better Left Unsaid was simultaneously shot with four cameras, mixed in real time and streamed live to the Internet so that anyone, anywhere in the world could watch the show. And watch it they did. During our closing weekend Better Left Unsaid had more than 50,000 unique viewers from all over the US and the world. Not only did we “put on a show” – we put on a show that was viewed by more than 50,000 people!. The reason Better Left Unsaid had so many viewers? We took our production to the place where the audience already is…online.

Did the theatrical experience suffer for either our theater audience or our online audience? No. The theater audience experienced a play just as they would in any theater, the only difference being a few cameramen in the wings. The online audience experienced something entirely new – a play that was theatrical in design and structure, but shot and edited with the intimacy and authenticity that an online video experience requires. Over and over again viewers commented that we succeeded in translating the theater experience into a compelling online video experience, and sent us virtual standing ovations from around the U.S., and the world.

So let’s get to the other half of Mr. Landesman’s economic equation…supply. I would argue that with 24 minutes of video being uploaded every hour to YouTube, the online video supply is super saturated. Live-streaming however is a different story. Live platforms have grown by leaps and bounds since the fall of 2007. Last year alone experienced a 648% increase in live streaming viewers with more than 7 million unique viewers tuning into live programming in July 2010 alone. Clearly the audience loves the excitement, community and interactivity of live. But, while live-streamed platforms are jam packed with sporting events, religious events, music events, red carpet events and talk shows, there is no narrative work what so ever. In terms of supply, live streaming is a virtual vacuum of sophisticated, compelling, professional narrative content.

Yes, video adds an entirely new skill set to the theatrical production process, live-streaming still another – however there is an unlimited audience out there in the cloud where the tenets of supply and demand are skewed strongly in the theater artists favor. The skill sets are surmountable and the increased costs far out weighed by the possibility of increasing our audiences indefinitely and without borders. Even more exciting, multi–camera interactive live-streamed theater is an art form in its very infancy. It will no doubt grow and evolve in ways I can’t even conceive of today and in ways that are sure to surprise and inspire us. Imagine if we begin to create a strong, varied and expansive online theatrical community. We have the potential to generate an entirely new revenue stream for the arts, one with strong supply and demand ratios that would satisfy Mr. Landesman’s desire for an economically sustainable arts culture in America, and we will have created more jobs for actors, writers, directors and designers alike.

What a brave new world! I can’t wait to put on my next show!

This post was originally published on the 2AMt blog. It summarizes the history, the reasons behind,  metrics, the technical and aesthetic requirements of and the successes of our production of Better Left Unsaid TV,  the first of it’s kind interactive live streamed play. To skip to the section that most interests you click the appropriate word in the previous sentence.

On January 21st of this year, my producing partners and I began previews of the first of its kind, interactive live streamed play. This was a full length production of Joey Brenneman’s Better Left Unsaid, cast with professional New York actors, staged in a small off-off broadway house in front of a live audience for a three week run. AND…simultaneously Better Left Unsaid was shot with four cameras, mixed in real time and streamed live to the internet so that anyone, anywhere in the world could  see the show. The bonus for online viewers was that they could interact with the live streamed theater experience via Facebook, Twitter and chat rooms.

Producing a play is complicated. Producing a live streamed play incorporates everything it takes to produce a play and adds to that everything you need to do to produce a live television shown- with the always wavering unknowns of live streaming technology thrown in to the mix. We climbed a lot of hurdles to reach opening night, almost as many to arrive at our final performance and ended our nine month journey on the highest of notes. We had over 50,000 unique viewers join us for the final three performances of Better Left Unsaid. We received virtual standing ovations from people all over the world. We proved that people will in fact pay for online video, at least if it is positioned as theater. Finally, we had the great honor, joy and sometimes nervous breakdown of launching a brand new theatrical paradigm, born of today’s technology.

Why live stream a play? Honestly there are a million reasons- the most obvious are…

- Live streaming gives theater artists the opportunity to present our work to an unlimited global audience. Today, as off-broadway and regional theaters are struggling to stay alive, the opportunity to expand our audiences beyond our local communities and across the globe could be invaluable and indispensable

-Live streaming is inherently community building. When you live stream a play you combine the excitement of live theater with the community of live streamed video events, nurturing the strong community that is the cornerstone of building a long term audience.

- Live streaming more deeply engages a wired audience in theater, without alienating theater goers who prefer the more traditional play going experience.

- Conversation goes hand in hand with online communities. People come to live streamed events to both participate in the event and to see their friends in the chat rooms, and often come back more than once. These conversations are simultaneously broadcast to Twitter and Facebook, increasing word of mouth and interest in your work.

- Live streaming platforms have a dirth of compelling quality content. Live streaming theater is a natural to fill that vacuum.

For an inaugural live streamed play, Better Left Unsaid was a perfect fit… (short, two person scenes, complex but linear storytelling which would limit the technical challenges of an already very difficult project, the play’s exploration of how our lives are all connected – the perfect internet metaphor). How the project evolved from two women in a coffee shop to opening night nine months later is a story unto itself which involves a video, a Kickstarter campaign, a theater eviction, hundreds of hours or preparation, incredibly supportive families  and a cast and crew of more than 25 people. I am so incredibly grateful to each and every one of them.

More pertinent perhaps to anyone who may be thinking of live streaming their own production are some of the technical challenges we faced, the stylistic choices we made and how we measured our success.

Technically, live streaming is hard. There are hundreds of individual elements that can go wrong on any given night, from mics, to cameras, to cables, to projectors to audio cues to bit rates to streaming platforms to ticketing to servers . Even when all those elements are in place and with a perfect connection sometimes the stream is jumpy, or even fails altogether. Our first weekend of previews was tricky. Slowly but surely though our stream became smoother, our sound became almost flawless, and, as our run continued, we were able to layer in additional interactive elements to our stream.

An equally challenging technical issue was how to bring our various theater, film and TV personnel together and get us all to speak the same language. An identical job title or technical term often means entirely different things in different mediums and it would sometimes take us days to realize that we were having two completely different conversations.

Shooting style is also incredibly important when translating theater to video. I have worked in online video for years and have very strong opinions as to what creates a compelling experience to an online audience. Shooting for online video is very different than shooting a film, and very different from shooting a play- which most people will agree is almost always unwatchable. We were determined that the online experience of watching Better Left Unsaid would always feel theatrical but be shot in a way that felt intimate and powerful on a small screen.

We also felt that it was integral to the audience experience that both the live theater audience and the online audience be aware of one another and of the global event that they were each a part of.  So, we had a Director of Digital whose sole purpose was to facilitate communication both online and in the theater, we began every show with a shot of our live audience, streamed live interviews with our theater audience during intermission, and projected comments from our online audience into the theater during scene changes and intermissions. It was thrilling to hear our theater audience exclaim about a comment from a viewer in Barcelona or Australia, and equally thrilling when someone online twittered that they had just seen a friend or family member on their computer screen.

A few weeks ago Josh Cohen in an interview for Tubefilter asked me how I would evaluate whether we were successful. There are so many ways in which I can say unequivocally yes!

-We succeeded in engaging viewers from all over the world in New York theater.

- 50,000 is a pretty exciting number and paves the way for a viable business model.

- Our chat rooms were booming and many viewers came back to see the show and participate in the chat room for a second, even a third time

- Online viewers repeatedly remarked on how riveted they were and how surprised they were by how well we had translated theater to video

- We proved that people will pay for online video if it is positioned as theater, and will pay higher ticket prices than we had expected.

- We were able to produce Better Left Unsaid on half the budget of a New York Showcase, and paid our actors- a small amount- but we paid them! In addition our actors and crew each own a piece of the show, indie film style, so if we make additional money, so do they.

Most importantly, we created a whole new idea of what theater can be, and it is just the start. The possibilities of live theater and streaming are endless, from allowing your audience to dictate plot turns, to shooting different scenes in different locations, to expanding the theatrical experience across multiple interactive platforms, the list is endless (Leigh Hile started her own fantastic list in her post  Connectivity and Possibilities)

I know we are on to something here and I can’t wait to see where it leads. Is live streaming a replacement for live theater? Absolutely not. But it is a wonderful AND. The opportunities for small theaters to expand their audiences and generate new revenue is almost boundless. The chance to create more work and more money for actors is equally thrilling- and we get to invent a whole new art form along the way. Perhaps one day live streaming theater will even have a name all of it’s own, but no matter what we one day call it, it’s roots are unequivocally deeply embedded in the soil of live theater.

The final saturday night performance of Better Left Unsaid is currently available at at BetterLeftUnsaid.tv for a micropayment of $2.99.
Kathryn and her partners are currently developing their next live streamed project.

Thank you so much to NYTheatre.com’s Robert Attenweiler who took the time to review Better Left Unsaid both in person and online. …

Better Left Unsaid
nytheatre.com review

Robert Attenweiler · January 30, 2011

Pictured: A scene from Better Left Unsaid (photo © JP Yim)

When is watching a play not like watching a play? Well, when the play is, by its own admission, “a first of its kind, interactive, live-streamed play.” Better Left Unsaid, written and directed by Joey Brenneman, takes the story of eight lives intersecting in New York City not just from the page to the stage, but now to the internet, for people around the world to see in real time.

First off, this project is very ambitious. Over the last few years, live theatre has been embracing the ways in which new media can help deliver samples of their work to audiences beyond those who show up and sit in the seats. Companies have been experimenting with podcasts, web series, web comics, and animation as ways to expand the story world of their projects and, if done in an exciting and engaging way, create valuable marketing tools. The creators of Better Left Unsaid take all this a step further, attempting to recreate the experience of watching a unique live show—the claim theatre has always made in its defense—while finding ways to make a live show’s presence on the internet both economically and creatively viable.

Better Left Unsaid is basically two different experiences—the live play and Better Left Unsaid TV, the online experience of it.

The live play is almost shockingly conventional for any play attaching “first of its kind” to itself in any way, but it’s also largely well acted and, overall, a story told with sensitivity and some insight. Eight people paired off, generally, into two-character scenes and storylines wade through the secrets and tensions of their group. Maggie has a secret about William to tell her daughter, Lennie, while Lennie’s planned adoption of a baby brings to light things about Nick that Carla would rather not know about her brother-in-law and feels conflicted about hiding from her sister, Luisa. It’s one of those web-of-association stories that is genuinely fun to see unfold.

Brenneman’s writing is clean, clearly identifying the conflicts in the individual scenes, and sees some of its greatest moments when Luisa is describing the effects that child-bearing has had on her and subsequently on her relationships with her husband and friends. Her direction of the piece is generally still and lets her words and the actors tell the story.

The acting is believable and well suited for the space. Jennifer Dorr White as Maggie brings a great frankness and understatement to scenes that have moments that can be emotionally on-the-nose. Kathryn Velvel Jones and Craig Waletzko, as the married couple, Luisa and Nick, dealing with infidelity, do a fine job conveying the Everyperson-ness of the couple’s situation, while also not letting that take away from its importance to these particular characters.

Better Left Unsaid TV is a bit different. You still get the play I just described, filmed by three camera operators, mixed on site and then streamed in real time, while also getting some backstage interviews with the actors and producers during the intermission. The online community is also encouraged to use Twitter to post messages about the show that are then projected onto a screen in the theatre during scene transitions so that the theatre audience can get a sense of how the online audience is responding to it.

The filmed version is where some of the challenges of working simultaneously in different media become apparent. Earlier, I described the live acting as “well suited for the space,” which is true. It is good stage acting. However, stage acting and on-screen acting are not the exact same thing—or, at least, they are not the same thing at the same time. The actors are miked and the picture quality of the stream is fantastic. But the translation of acting from stage to screen makes the streamed version seem … well … a little stagy, a little bigger than it needs to be.

Also, it was a little strange that the producers—Erin Bigelow, along with Jones and Brenneman—chose a play so far in subject matter from riding a wave of technical innovation. Presentation doesn’t match up with content, as becomes apparent when many of the online comments are less interacting than they are making observations about, say, what the set looks like or which character they like best. We are being invited to interact with something that we don’t actually have any active control over. While Better Left Unsaid tries to bring live theatre to an audience watching on-screen, it ends up stuck between a play and a television show filmed before a live studio audience.

These criticisms of the execution, though, really do show how much the idea behind this play’s presentation got me thinking. There is something here. There is, already, a very watchable live play—and then there are a bunch of really interesting possibilities. I hope the producers continue working with this concept and we can see even more effective innovation from them in the future.

Opened: January 28, 2011
Closes: February 6, 2011

What an exhilarating two weeks. Joey and Erin and I, three people with a tiny budget and a huge vision have overcome some incredible hurdles and succeeded in bringing live, professional New York theater to anyone, anywhere in the world with a computer.  We have had live audiences in the theater in the heart of NYC- and for our first 6  performances we have had viewers from more than half of the United States – and the support and excitement has been overwhelming, from LA to Boulder To Texas to Connecticut!

A little taste of what it’s like to create Better Left Unsaid every night with our incredible cast and crew of 28 people- and what the audiences response has been so far in the video below (only a minute and a half)

Better Left Unsaid Tv’s Director of Digital, Selina McCusker interviews BLU actors Craig Waletzko and Marcus Ho about what it’s like to act online, on film and on stage- and tries to get them to reveal some of their secrets in this post show interview on the set of Better Left Unsaid TV.

Or… how we overcame an almost eviction less than a month before opening with the help of the incredible New York Theater Community….

THE COUNTDOWN
235 days since Joey and I launched our production of Better Left Unsaid
180 days since we shot our Kickstarter video
127 Days since we launched our Kickstarter campaign
85 Days since the close of our successful Kickstarter campaign
30+ cast and crew members
12 days since rehearsals began
5 days since our tickets went on sale
4 days since our first press release went out…
December 26th, 2010 – the Sunday after Christmas
Only 26 days until opening night…

RING…… (the telephone- you know…)

It’s Joey… “umm Kathryn… i just got a really disturbing call… it seems that our theater has been evicted for non-payment of rent and umm.. it seems that our rental fee is tied up in the proceedings”… (more than 20% of our already too small budget).

I will tell you right off that this story has a happy ending.  10 days later Jill DeArmon of Center Stage NY did what seemed impossible, and raised the $17,000 in back rent that she needed to stay open for at least a few more months.

But oh those ten days….

Not opening on January 21st wasn’t an option. We were already in rehearsals, the creative energy was flowing, on February 7th we lose both our DP and some of our actors, and 161 friends, family and strangers had expressed their belief in us by backing us in our Kickstarter campaign.  Those ten days were spent primarily on the phone to theater companies of all sorts and sizes searching for an alternative venue that we could possibly afford on our now much smaller funds…

This is a love letter to the New York Theater Community.  It is mindboggling how they came out in spades to express their support, to offer solutions and to support a brand new theater company with a brand new mission which they knew nothing about.

The first person I called was Elena Holy of FringeNYC. Elena is a new friend (BLU is producing FringeTALK a live streamed town hall about FringeNYC this weekend) and I knew if anyone had ideas for venues it would be her.  Elena of course got back to me immediately and she referred me to…

FAB- Wow!! I can not say enough about Lauren Parrish and FAB (Fourth Arts Block). Lauren heard my story and immediately jumped in with so many wonderful ideas and referrals…thanks to Lauren we were off and running….

The first people Lauren sent me to was the Horse Trade Theater Group. Erez picked up in the middle of my voice message and immediately had a solution for me.  Had Center Stage not come thru we would very likely have been proud and grateful to call Under St. Marks our home.  Erez and Heidi were both incredibly helpful and accommodating and it is impossible not to admire their 12+ years of providing a home  for independent theater artists.

Lauren also sent me to The Cell Theater - Kira called me back immediately.  While The Cell was booked and couldn’t accommodate us Kira was also a font of ideas and I so hope to have the chance to meet her in person.

Erika from the Beckett theater was also incredibly kind and accommodating.  While ultimately we couldn’t afford their rent – it is Theater Row!  - Erika was warm and helpful and hey… it’s free this winter so if have a show that needs a beautiful home, call Erika at the Beckett!!

The wonderful Dixon Place… again they were totally booked, but that didn’t stop them from calling me and offering all sorts of ideas and solutions.

Anita Durst of Chashama called me back within five minutes of receiving my email.  She too had an immediate idea of how Chashama could help and were looking at a venue the next business day… I so  hope to have  the chance to work with Chashama in the future.

Kevin Cunningham of 3LD interrupted his vacation to exchange multiple phone calls and emails with me and very very generously offered to consider us for a March spot  - thank you Kevin.  And Kristin Marting of HERE also got back to me immediately with the possibility of a March date.  Thank you Kristen!

Joria Productions were so warm and helpful on the phone and came up with a number of possible scenarious in their space and also referred me to the Roy Arias  Studios…  Roy was simply amazing and incredibly patient with us… If you haven’t seen his off-broadway house you should… its a great space in a perfect location and Roy is simply wonderful to work with.

We talked to a ton more people during those 10 days, from The Connelly to CSV to Duo to Henry Street.. the list goes on and on- and one after another the people we spoke to were warm, helpful, understanding and encouraging.  We may have lost 10 days of pre-production work (ouch ouch ouch), but there are so many silver linings to this cloud that in many ways I’m almost happy it happened.

So, with Center Stage NY having achieved what seemed impossible, the incredible New York Theater community behind us and our wonderful cast and crew… off we go!  Better Left Unsaid will indeed be opening two weeks from today as the first of its kind interactive live-streamed play!

I can not wait!

And thank you, New York, from the bottom of my heart.

and  PS  - a million thank yous to my dear friend Geo Geller who never stopped thinking of alternative ideas… Geo.. i love you!

and PPS- and oh Leonard Jacobs - a new friend  whom I met when he wrote a simply marvelous article about Better Left Unsaid and who I am now proud to call a collaborater- your suggestions and help were invaluable and always spot on as were those of the wonderful Cat Parker.

and PPPS to all of you who have been so supportive, especially all you #2amt folks… I am embarrassed at how deeply I have fallen off the social media radar.  It’s always surprising how producing begins to envelop your whole life, and I can’t believe how much of your work these past two months I have missed… I so look forward to February when I can jump back in and support all of you right back!

As we gear up to go live with Better Left Unsaid (two weeks and counting folks!) we are taking a little time out to co-produce FringeTALK, an interactive live-streamed Town Hall on the occasion of the 15th Anniversary of The New York International Fringe Festival.

This is a chance for anyone and everyone who has ever produced or performed in – or who is thinking about producing or performing in – the NYC Fringe to personally ask Fringe Producing Artistic Director Elena Holy any and all questions you have. The truth is a lot of people have a love/hate relationship with the NYC Fringe-and this will be your chance to let it all out! It will be moderated by Leonard Jacobs- a two time Fringe Director and noted blogger who himself has a lot of mixed emotions about the NYC Fringe.

We expect this to be a frank, candid and totally fun, interactive hour with Elena- so come! join us! You can submit your questions beforehand to FringeTALK@gmail.com – or ask us during the show…just use the hashtag #FringeTALK!

You can watch the show right hear at betterleftunsaid.tv/FringeTALK. See you Sunday Night!

Joey and I had our first meeting at the Dean and Deluca in Times Square. Photo by swifrancis

I can’t believe it!  Better Left Unsaid, the first of its kind,  interactive live streamed play (!) begins rehearsals today!

It has been a long and winding and incredibly rewarding haul since Joey and I first hatched this crazy and wonderful idea last May 5th  (in the Times Square Dean and Deluca prior to our bi-weekly Playwrights Gallery)

Since that day we have launched a web site, wrote, shot and edited a video, launched and concluded a successful Kickstarter campaign, directed  an award winning show with Mind the Art in the NYC Fringe (joey), had the incredible joy to play a very challenging role in Whitebird Productions “Born of Conviction” at the Irondale (kathryn), found and lost too many peformance spaces to count, assembled a wonderful and inspiring cast, assembled an equally astonishing production team, including the inimitable Erin Bigelow, booked our theater – Center Stage,NY, been covered in The Clyde Fitch Report, Works By Women, ArtOfTheBiz.com, twittered about by The American Theater Wing…  problem solved  ISP and ticket sale issues, theorized, strategized and marketed….and now, at last, the fun begins!

I am so grateful to our incredible community for all of your support.  The phrase “we couldn’t do it without you” has never been more true.

Thank you. We will do you proud!