SF's AATC wins grant

Six teams of Bay Area theater companies and emerging (no older than 35, at the time of applying) California playwrights have received $50,000 Emerging Playwrights Awards, the trade magazine Theatre Bay Area reports in its March issue.

The one-time awards -- $25,000 each to the writer and the company -- are part of a three-year initiative by the Wallace Alexander Gerbode and William and Flora Hewlett Foundations to support the creation of performing arts works in the Bay Area (the first set of awards went to choreographers; the next round will fund emerging composers).

The recipients range from the most established companies to the new and struggling. Aurorae Khoo's project with Asian American Theater looks at the Army-base relationship between an Asian American woman and an African American man shipping off to Iraq.