Great news on the production front. January 2008 saw me bring up the 100th production of one of my ten minute plays !
The clear leader is 10,000 cigarettes on 21 productions, followed by Saturday Night Newtown, Sunday Morning Enmore (11), The First Fireworks (9), The Gift of the Gun (9), Drew Barrymore and Sigmund Freud meet the Cookie Monster (6), The Actress Dilemma (4), The Celine Dion Songbook (4), Fate's Steady Hands (4), Southern Cross Swastika (3), Lonesome Cruiser (3), Donuts (2), Five Kings (2), Gone (2), Rumpole of the Sydenham Line (2), You (2), Beijing Big Mac (2) and Mozart and the end of time, Ice, A Difficult Birth, Yell (ow), Sardine, Un-Australian Day, blog, somewhere between the sky and the sea, The Choice, Gun Laws, Subverting the Will, Twenty Dollars, The Dead Sun, Tel Aviv Disco Bombing, Philip with one l, Photocopy Love, Qwendolyn's Gambit, Gina Goes Down and Armistice Day (all 1).
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35 ten minute plays produced in all in 105 productions ! 65 more produced plays to go to reach my goal of 100 plays produced.
On 10,000 cigarettes, the play is enjoying an incredible run in the USA at the moment with no less than thirteen productions in 11 states over the last 12 months.
Pictured right is the production from Rock Island High School in Illinois, directed by Ben Simkins (extreme left) with (from right to left) Grace Damewood, Mari Alvarado, Alyssa Clevenstine and Hannah Mattison.
The play has also had its first production in the Philippines at the University of the Philippines in Mindanao, Philippines.
The play is published in the USA by Heuer Publications. For more information go to www.hit-plays.com
The play plays at the Seymour Centre Downstairs from Tuesday February 12th to Saturday February 16th at 8pm as part of Week 5 at the Seymour Centre Downstairs. If you're in Sydney and feel like getting along you can book tickets through the Seymour Centre on 02 9351 7940
New productions of Beijing Big Mac and The First Fireworks at the Price Laboratory School in the University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, Iowa, USA, directed by Karla Koch;
The premiere of blog as part of Hot from the oven : a la Carte at the Fine Arts Association, Willoughby, Ohio, USA, directed by Ann Hedger;
New productions of Fate's Steady Hands and The Actress' Dilemma as part of "Buffalo Quickies" at the Alleyway Theatre, Buffalo, New York, USA, directed by one of my favourite directors, the wonderful Joyce Stilson who has now directed four of my ten minute plays. Thanks Joyce !
The premiere of Sardine as part of Eight 10s @ Eight at the Actor's Theatre, Santa Cruz, California, USA. A special thanks to director Brian Spenser and producer Clifford Henderson who worked so hard on the production that sounded tremendous, despite not being to the liking of the local theatre critic !
Another new production of The Actress' Dilemma as part of the American College Theatre Festival in Jamestown, North Dakota, USA, directed by a talented youngster by the name of Daniel Walstad.
On the writing front I have finished drafts of two new full length plays 10,000 beers (a male version of 10,000 cigarettes) and Gentle Kisses, Strong Embraces ( a play about something we are all very familiar with - spamming). Also three new ten minute plays The Kiss, The Kill and Cate Blanchett wants to be my friend on Facebook (another of our current obsessions !) - so look out for these on the site soon.
One the film front I have finished a screenplay version of The Jacaranda Tree, that I have started sending around, and another screenplay that I am extremely excited about but can't say anything more about at this stage for reasons that may soon become apparent. Hopefully there will be some good news about it soon !
Thanks for your ongoing support of the website, which has been a big hit with over 25,000 hits in its first six months - so thanks for your patronage !
Hope you are all well !
Bw,
Alex Broun
In September Dad and I had eight of our ten minute plays - four plays each - performed in Sydney at the Newtown Theatre under the title of Love & WAR, presented by New Mercury Theatre.
Dad's plays were: The Club, Play up and Play the Game (both directed by Katie Gompertz), The Girl Next Door (directed by Lauren Pfitzner) and The Interview (directed by Suzanne Hauser).
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The cast included Kath Perry, Richard Mason, Gary Boulter, Marc Kay, Mary-Ann Halpin, Marina Margarita, Ben O'Donnell, Jules Walsh, Benjamin O'Donnell, Damien Blackshaw, Megan Hipwell , Stephanie Son, Leo Kim, Denby Weller, Ryan Paranthoiene, Orlena Steele-Prior and runner up Best Actor Short & Sweet 2007 Maurizio Degliesposti. Design was by Dani Gilbert and lighting Larry Kelly.
At the same theatre as the late show my one man Half a person - My life as told by The Smiths enjoyed its second season after a successful run in Adelaide at the FEAST Festival earlier this year. The production was directed by Robert Chuter for Fly-on-the-Wall Theatre with the very talented David Forster as William. It played to good reviews and very good houses and seasons are now planned in 2008 in Melbourne and London !
In Melbourne, I enjoyed an excellent run during the Melbourne Fringe Festival with two ten minute plays and one full length play performed as part of the Festival. The full length play was Pick Ups which was presented at Cape Live in Fitzroy by Sodastream Productions, directed by Jamie Unicomb with Gina Morley, Christine Husband, Cameron Box and Austin Turner.
The second was a production of 10,000 cigarettes presented by Melbourne Writer's Theatre as part of Melborn at the Carlton Courthouse. Directed by Alice Bishop with Marnie Gibson, Heather Lythe and Elizabeth Thomson. Yep - just three. A bit of a surprise, especially when I went along to the dress rehearsal.
In all this year I have had 29 productions of 18 different ten minute plays in Australia, the UK, Europe, Singapore and the USA.
The play has also been published in the USA by Heuer Publications. For more information go to www.hit-plays.com
10,000 cigarettes was also produced by Fleshpot Theatre at the Devonshire Arms in London and by the Drama Department at Flinder's University in Adelaide. Directed by Joh Hartog.
Drew Barrymore and Sigmund Freud meet the Cookie Monster has also had a number of recent productions. In Melbourne it was produced at Dante's in Fitzroy as part of
Mini-Fiesta under the title "4 x 2" a long with Fate's Steady Hands, Lonesome Cruiser and the world premiere of Beijing Big Mac.
Speaking of Fate's Steady Hands it's also had a number of productions this year including at Short & Sweet Sydney 2007, directed by myself, and at Deloraine One Act Play Festival in Tasmania, produced by the Hobart Repertory Society.
Also presented in Deloraine was another ten minute play You, its second production.
Another play to enjoy recent success is Saturday Night Newtown, Sunday Morning Enmore that was presented in New York in December 2007 by Fn Productions at the 78th Street Theatre Lab, directed by Frank Blocker and starring Blocker and Stacie Theon.
The play is also published as part of Stage This TOO ! by Diesel ebooks. For more information click here
Saturday Night Newtown, Sunday Morning Enmore was also staged by The BareStage Theatre in Red Bluff, California as part of Six 10s @ Eight New Plays Festival and at Williamstown Little Theatre in Melbourne as part of Play Six.
The film version of Saturday Night Newtown, Sunday Morning Enmore, directed by Christopher Johnson, produced by Luke Eve and More Sauce Productions, starring Octavia Barron Martin and Christopher Baker, just won BEST FILM at the 7th Annual Bondi Short Film Festival and the 12th Annual Canberra Short Film Festival. It won the Award for Best Film Under Ten Minutes at the 14th Annual Independents' Film Festival in Tampa, Florida USA and won a Special Jury Prize (out of over 1,200 entries) in the Action / Cut Short Film Competition based in Los Angeles. It has now been shown at 26 different film festivals across the globe.
A number of other ten minute plays were also produced in 2007: the world premieres of The Choice and Gun Laws as part of "Subversive" at Gasworks Theatre in Melbourne, presented by Defector Art; the world premiere of Subverting the Will as well as another production of Lonesome Cruiser, produced by Arkham Entertainment at Sandford House in Adelaide as part of the 2007 Adelaide Fringe Festival; Un-Australian Day, produced as part of "Art is a Weapon" at the New Theatre in Newtown, directed by Louise Fischer; and Donuts, which was presented as part of "Love at First Date" at Santucci's, directed by Brenda Fraser.
My 35th ten minute play to be produced, somewhere between the sky and the sea, will follow shortly after as part of Sydney Short & Sweet 2008, to be directed by Alex Byron.
On the full length front, The Jacaranda Tree, was read at the International Playwriting Festival 07 at the Warehouse Theatre in London in early December.
In terms of new works I'm currently flat out running Melbourne Short & Sweet but once that finishes on December 22 I'm looking forward to getting stuck into some writing - I have four ten minute plays I'd like to write, a second draft of two full length plays, a first draft of another, a first draft of a film script with Rob Chuter, a second draft of two other film scripts and finish the first draft of a one man show I'm working on with Chris Pender from Fly-on-the-wall Theatre, Communion in the Dark.
So lots of work to do. Looking forward to getting back to the computer.
Bw,
Alex Broun