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2008 Winners
THIRD ANNUAL SAN FRANCISCO YOUNG PLAYWRIGHTS FESTIVAL MAY 15, 17, and 18 AT THE DIEGO RIVERA THEATRE IN SAN FRANCISCOSAN FRANCISCO, CA—The San Francisco Young Playwrights Foundation is proud to present the Third Annual San Francisco Young Playwrights Festival on May 15, 17, and 19, 2008 at the City College of San Francisco’s Diego Rivera Theatre.
This year, over forty high school students submitted their works for review, and the SFYPF is happy to announce the winning selections that will be appearing in this year’s festival:
- Colossians 3:14 by Romolo Wilkinson (School of the Arts)
- Mary by Tanea Lunsford (School of the Arts)
- Sexy Knees by Santino Garcia (School of the Arts)
- Within the Wall of Sand by Kalson Chan and Benson Ma (Lowell High)
Sixteen-year-old Tanea Lunsford, currently a junior at School of the Arts, is another two-time winner. This year, she returns to the festival with her play Mary, a darkly comedic look at the life of a 16-year-old growing up in a broken home in the 1960s. Playwright Molly Rhodes, whose work has been featured at the Magic Theatre and PlayGround, helped Tanea sharpen her emotional family drama.
The hilarious Sexy Knees by Santino Garcia brings a much-welcomed jolt of energy to the festival. In this sparkling gem of a play, Santino, a 16-year-old junior at School of the Arts, asks us, “What if you were in love with knees? And what lengths would you go to to cure it?” City College professor Deborah Shaw directs, and Bay Area Playwrights Festival alum Christopher Chen served as his mentor.
Rounding out the winners are Lowell seniors Kalson Chan and Benson Ma, the writing team behind the magical Within the Wall of Sand. Kalson and Benson, both 17, were mentored by Not Quite Opera artistic director Anne Doherty. Directed by Jessica Holt, who recently received her MA in Theatre at UC Berkeley, Within the Wall of Sand introduces us to the down-and-out pair, Milton and Jane, who stumble upon a mysterious motel that seemingly makes their wildest dreams come true? But could their Shangri-La become yet another Hotel California?
The San Francisco Young Playwrights Festival (SFYPF) is the first citywide high school playwriting contest of its kind in San Francisco, providing young playwrights the opportunity to see their work produced, directed, and performed by professional theatre artists in the Bay Area community. Winning playwrights receive a $300 honorarium and two months of developing their piece alongside a professional playwright mentor in preparation for the festival. Submissions came from all over the city, with nearly a dozen San Francisco high schools represented in the submission pool.
Performances for Third Annual San Francisco Young Playwrights Festival are Thursday, May 15 at 8pm, Saturday, May 17 at 8pm, and Sunday, May 19 at 2pm (with a playwright Q&A session following the performance). General admission is $10 advance, $12.50 at the door. Student / TBA member admission is $7.50 advance, $10 at the door.
2007 Winners
After dozens of submissions and hours of deliberation, the winners of the 2nd annual San Francisco Young Playwrights Festival have been announced.The 2006-2007 winners of the festival are:
- Saint by Juliana Caccavo (Balboa)
- Mama by Tanea Lunsford (SOTA)
- The Real Reasons Behind Mysterious Disappearances by Nina Moog (Lick-Wilmerding)
- The Method of Being a Velociraptor by Romolo Wilkinson (SOTA)
Submissions came from all over the city, with nearly a dozen San Francisco high schools represented in the submission pool.
Sixteen-year-old Juliana Caccavo’s Saint tells the story of two girls who build an unlikely bond in a mental facility. Caccavo’s sharp, witty voice captures the spirit of the teenaged years, as well as the painful desperation of these young women. Caccavo, a Balboa junior, will work with Playwright Center of San Francisco’s Jody Handley as her mentor.
Tanea Lunsford’s Mama is a powerful look into the lives of four African-American women, as they celebrate the bonds of sisterhood. Lunsford, 15, most recently saw her work staged as part of The Blank Theatre Company’s Young Playwrights Festival, a national playwriting contest that attracts nearly 300 submissions from young playwrights each year. Noted playwright Scott McMorrow will mentor Lunsford, a School of the Arts sophomore.
Nina Moog, a 16-year-old Lick-Wilmerding junior, bridges the gap between reality and the absurd in her play The Real Reason Behind Mysterious Disappearances. For every young person who has ever wondered what lies beyond their own lives (or underneath their beds), Moog provides a charming answer. City College of San Francisco professor Susan Jackson will mentor Moog.
Romolo Wilkinson’s The Method of Being a Velociraptor instantly charmed the selection committee. A hilarious send-up of traditional Stanislavski training, Velociraptor expertly skews every amateur acting class you’ve ever had the misfortune to be a part of. Wilkinson, a student at SOTA, will further refine his play with his mentor, Not Quite Opera artistic director Anne Doherty.
Selection committee members included Deborah Shaw, a noted professor of theater at City College of San Francisco, Trish Tillman of California Shakespeare Theatre, and Three Wise Monkeys Theatre Company’s executive director Richard Bernier. The winning playwrights are currently revising their plays with the help of their mentors, who will guide the young writers through the revision process.
In addition to a royalty of $300 for each winning play, the students will also receive a full production of their plays in late May.
Auditions for the Festival will take place in mid-March. Details regarding auditions will be posted in February on the Foundation’s website.
Spark
Thanks so much for supporting the SF Young Playwrights Festival this year; it was a great success and I was so honored to have you see the show and/or support the work of our very talented young playwrights. This was absolutely not possible without all of you.On Wednesday, July 26, at 7:30pm, KQED featured the Festival and three other arts programs in its TV show SPARK. Watch it and see all the backstage you didn't catch at the performance!
2006 Winners
After dozens of submissions from high school students around the City and extensive deliberation by the selection panel, the winners of the 1st annual San Francisco Young Playwrights Festival have finally been decided.The winners are:
- A Way Away by Aaron Goldman-MacLachlan (SOTA)
- Brothers by Sacha Mount (Lowell)
- Flowers for the Dead by Jane Reynolds and Chloe Jenkins-Sleczkowski (Lowell)
- Good Charlotte by Hallie C. Scheflin (Lowell)
- Miracle by Karla Gallardo (Balboa)
"It was an extremely difficult decision for us to make," executive director and founder Lauren D. Yee said. "So many talented young writers entered the contest; it was really exhilarating and reassuring to know that such talent exists."
Selection committee members read through 49 plays from nearly a dozen schools, a figure that surprised and delighted outreach director Alisa Farenzena.
"This is only our first year and we got 49 submissions, so this shows both the enthusiasm of San Francisco’s high school students and the need that there has been for such a festival to showcase their works," Farenzena said. "We're very excited to fill this need and provide a chance for these talented students to have their plays seen."
Although each submitted play had to be less than 30 minutes, subject matter and theme were open to the playwrights. Consequently, the submitted plays represented a wide range of styles and subjects--from cafeteria discussions to the celebrity culture of Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie to domestic violence.
As the San Francisco Young Playwrights Festival is the first citywide high school playwriting contest in San Francisco, this contest represented the first forays into playwriting for many of the students. For all but one of the winning playwrights, this was the first time each of them had written a play. Yet, the winners still managed to imbue their plays with an inherent sense of dramatic structure and rhythm, as well as a feeling of honesty and openness.
Lowell junior Hallie C. Scheflin said that her main goal in writing Good Charlotte was to present something truthful and realistic. Her play about a young girl at odds with the administration tackles real-life issues that could affect any school.
Other writers drew from real experiences. Karla Gallardo, who wrote her play with the help of the Magic Theatre’s Young California Writer’s Project, was inspired by the local media circus in writing Miracle. Lowell seniors Jane Reynolds and Chloe Jenkins-Slezckowski said that their experience of being double cast for a bit part in their high school play is what led them to write the touching Flowers for the Dead, which centers around two girls double cast for the role of the Mexican Woman in A Streetcar Named Desire.
SOTA freshman Aaron Goldman-MacLachlan’s lyrical A Way Away stood out for its freshness and originality. With the help of his WritersCorps teacher Andres Saito, Goldman-MacLachlan crafted a strongly poetic play that deals with the themes of escape and home.'
Selection committee members were also impressed with Lowell senior Sacha Mount’s powerful Brothers about gang violence in the Mission. Mount said that after attempting to write Brothers as a short story, he decided to turn it into a play after hearing about the contest from his teacher.
The winning playwrights will now be paired up with playwriting mentors, who will guide the young writers through the revision process.
"The mentoring component is possibly the most beneficial part of the competition for the students," mentoring director Harrison Rivers said. "These young people now have the opportunity to take their already impressive work to the next level, to enhance and polish, to develop and clarify their writing with the help of theater professionals. I am excited to witness the inevitable transformations."
In addition to a royalty of $300 for each winning play, the students will also receive a full production of their plays in late May.
Auditions for the Festival will take place in early March. Details regarding auditions will be posted in late January on the Foundation’s Web site.
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