New Play Café reading series – donations at door

Six new plays by Pacific Northwest playwrights, selected from 75 submissions, are featured in the launch of the New Play Café reading series, presented by Bellingham TheatreWorks. The New Play Café continues Bellingham TheatreWorks mission to produce stories of significance to the Pacific Northwest, with an emphasis on local actors, directors, and playwrights.

The inaugural New Play Café series is March 3,4,5 and 10,11,12 at 7:30 pm at the New Prospect Theatre, 207 Prospect Street, Bellingham. Donations are accepted for admission.

The plays will have one or two rehearsals, and are presented without staging, props or sets.  The actors are at music stands, reading from the script.
“This is an exciting new step for Bellingham TheatreWorks, (BTW), one that’s been made possible thanks to our expanded community-member board,” said Mark Kuntz, BTW artistic director. “My producing partner Steve Lyons and I have both written and directed plays for BTW in the past. Now we have the organizational capacity to expand our programs to showcase and celebrate the work of emerging local artists and foster their growth.”

The playwrights come from throughout the Pacific Northwest, including two from Bellingham, two from Seattle, one from Camano Island, and one from Portland.

Themes in the plays include the complexities of family dynamics, and monsters; an exploration of sex, power and unrequited love; belonging, connection, and the barriers we experience with each; and, two plays inspired by real events: one of a famous Seattle Madam and a second play about a lighthouse keeper.

Friday, March 10th

Thais Passion by Michael Wallace

Why do we fall in love with what we cannot have? A young Christian monk falls in love with a servant of Venus. A timely exploration of sex, power and unrequited love.

Michael is a long time resident of Bellingham and Washington State. His plays have been produced in several local venues including the Idiom There, Sylvia Center for the Arts, Bellingham Theatre Guild, BAAY, and Western Washington University. He received the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival jury selection (2000) and the Bill and Peggy Hunt Playwrights award (2009).  He has two collections of one acts entitled “Different: 7 Ensemble One Act Plays for Young Audiences” and “Survival of the Unfittest,” which include plays that have had worldwide exposure.