Following on the heels of a super-successful 2022 season when the Jasper Project’s Play Right Series launched first-time playwright Colby Quick’s Moon Swallower onto the stage with a highly sophisticated staged reading directed by Chad Henderson last summer, we’re excited to kick off the winning 2023 Play Right Series selection of Lonetta Thompson’s THERAPY!
The cast and crew are on their marks, the rehearsal hall is reserved, and the schedule is set—we just need to recruit a few more Community Producers to be able to wave the starting flag.
Are YOU the Community Producer we’ve been looking for?
What is the Play Right Series?
In an effort to enlighten and empower audiences with information about the process involved in creating theatrical arts, at the same time that we increase opportunities for SC theatre artists to create and perform new works, the Jasper Project created the Play Right Series.
The purpose of the Play Right Series is to allow a select group of volunteers insider views of the process of creating theatre art by offering limited open readings, rehearsals, and discussions of theatrical work. We can also offer folks the opportunity to actually PRODUCE A PLAY by keeping production costs low and involving community assets already in place, in exchange for an established minimal financial contribution of $250.
This also increases opportunities for theatre artists to create and participate in new art without being attached to an existing theatre organization, while providing affordable and experimental theatre experiences for new and emerging artists and their audiences; thereby expanding cultural literacy and theatre arts appreciation throughout the SC Midlands.
How does this work?
Every Sunday afternoon in July 2023, starting July 9th, you are invited to join with the cast, crew, and fellow Community Producers of Therapy for an enlightening and entertaining session that pulls back the curtains of theatre development and illuminates how a stage play goes from page to stage. Your first session will offer you a private viewing of the first step in any play production, the Table Reading – this will be the first time the cast of Therapy reads their parts together for their director, Elena Martinez-Vidal.
Subsequent sessions will focus on essential ingredients in the production of a successful staged reading, such as the stage manager’s job; props, lighting, blocking, and sound; unique insights from the director; how the actors prepare for their parts; playwright perceptions from this year and past projects; and an invitation to the dress rehearsal. In addition to your invitation to gather with the cast and crew every Sunday in July, each session will also feature exciting snacks and beverages. And many more surprises each week!
Finally, you’ll take your reserved, best-in-the-house seats to a ticketed staged reading of Lonetta Thompson’s Therapy on Sunday, August 6th.
And there’s more.
Your name will be included as a Community Producer on programs, posters, press releases, and other promotional materials as well as in the perfect bound book, Therapy by Lonetta Thompson, published by Muddy Ford Press and registered with the Library of Congress, and you will take home your own copies of Therapy as a souvenir of your experience.
What is expected of Community Producers?
We hope you can make it to every exciting Sunday afternoon meeting, but we understand if you have to miss some. Each session will last from 90 – 120 minutes.
The financial commitment for a Community Producer is a minimum of $250 per person, but institutional sponsorships are also available and appreciated. You can also sponsor a student for $250 if you are unable to participate yourself.
Our hope is that you will be so enlightened and inspired by this experience that you will become a diplomat of live theatre, fresh playwrights, and the Jasper Project and encourage your friends and colleagues to participate in live theatre themselves!