Diverse City Theater Announces Roster of Original Plays for The Equality Plays Festival

Playwrights Tackle "Gender Identity Issues of the 21st Century" Festival Receives Award from Disney Foundation's "Cast Community Fund"
NEW YORK-Diverse City Theater Company ("DCT") today announced the roster of original plays it commissioned for its Equality Plays Festival ("The Festival"), a month-long theater festival of original one-act plays slated to open in August 2006 at Theatre Row's Clurman Theatre on West 42nd Street in New York City. Nominated by several Disney employees, DCT's Equality Plays Festival is the recipient of Disney Foundation's "Cast Community Fund" award. The Festival will present four original one-act plays:

• Robert Askins' absurdist CLEAN LIVING, a riff on the military's "don't ask, don't tell policy"
• Joe Byers' VEILS, about an American soldier in a war-torn Middle-Eastern country and his first sexual encounter with a local woman
• Stuart Harris' ONNA FIELD, about a gay high school boy and his sports coach
• Jorshinelle Taleon-Sonza's COLD FLESH, about a recently 'outed' gay Filipino doctor dealing with the arrival of his wife from the Philippines.

All four plays were commissioned by DCT as part of its annual mission to develop plays that revolve around one diversity issue of cultural significance. Launched in December 2005, this season's festival focus is on "gender identity issues of the 21st century." Three other plays by female playwrights are still in consideration as of press time. Linda Faigao-Hall's Walking Iron, a play about a construction worker who outs himself in the worksite, will conclude the festival in February 2007. The festival is an intense creative process that begins with commissions given to selected playwrights to write and develop plays exploring one diversity issue in a six-month workshop guided by this year's Festival Dramaturg, Maxine Kern. The workshop includes dramaturgical guidance as well as individual sessions with the playwrights, group meetings and readings by company actors.

Playwright Linda Faigao-Hall, DCT's Associate Artistic Director/Festival Curator and who was instrumental in designing the format, said: "Producing a playwright's work is an integral part of the playwright's development. A playwriting workshop should end with a production of the work. And that's what DCT is doing. We're providing playwrights the time, the space, an expert dramaturg, and professional actors and directors to help them in the process of writing their plays. And then produce them. That's what makes our model unique. It's a playwright's workshop 'made in heaven.'"

Actor Victor Lirio, DCT's Chief Artistic & Producing Officer, stated that "although DCT uses the theater as a venue for examining social issues, the festival's primary goal remains to present character-driven plays that dramatize the human experience. Behind all the painful and sobering cultural collisions that arouse powerful emotions in our discussions today, there are universal truths, about everyone's need for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We want to share serious, whimsical, funny, and absurd stories about what it means to be human."

He added: "I am fortunate to be part of a highly-charged artists community where playwrights want to write about profound issues and actors seek greater and deeper meaning in their creative expression. We live in a global society. Artists' roles have increasingly become more significant in communicating human truths and affecting social changes in the community." The festival will run at Theatre Row's Clurman Theatre at the heart of the theater district, 410 West 42nd Street in New York City. Performance schedule and cast will be announced at a later date.

Diverse City Theater Company
Diverse City Theater Co. Inc., is an independent not-for-profit 501(c)(3) organization-run by artist playwrights, directors and actors-that focuses on promoting diversity in the theater arts. Its mission is to commission, develop and produce original plays that explore and examine diversity issues in our national culture thereby creating multiculturally fluent theater audiences, as well as advocate the non-traditional casting of actors.

Formed in 2003, Diverse City Theater Co., Inc. is based in New York City. For more information, visit the organization's website at www.diversecitytheater.org.

Contact
Diverse City Theater Company
Victor Lirio
(p) 212-309-9031
(e) victor@diversecitytheater.org

Linda Faigao-Hall
(p) 917-302-2346
(e) linda@diversecitytheater.org