Moving Arts' 'SONG OF EXTINCTION' Honored with Steinberg/ATCA Award

Variety reports that the American Theatre Critics Association honored E.M. Lewis' Song of Extinction as the recipient of the 2009 Harold and Mimi Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award, which rewards plays that debut at regional theaters outside New York City, on Saturday, April 4th at the Humana Festival in Louisville, Kentucky. 

The award carries a $25,000 cash prize, making it the most generous national award for a new play reports Variety.

The Steinberg/ATCA panel also awarded $7,500 in citations to previous winner Lee Blessing for "Great Falls," which bowed at the 2008 Humana Fest, and Tracy Letts' "Superior Donuts," which premiered at Steppenwolf in Chicago last summer. To read the full article click here.

"A boy's struggle with grief turns into a magical, musical journey for him, his family, and the teacher who tries to save him. Moving Arts presented the World Premiere production of Song of Extinction, written by multiple award-winning playwright E.M. Lewis, directed by Heidi Helen Davis and with original music by Geoffrey Pope. Featured in the cast was Aileen Cho, Will Faught, Darrell Kunitomi, Trey Nichols, Michael Shutt, Tristan Wright and Lori Yeghiayan. Song of Extinction ran November 7 through December 14 at the 87-seat [Inside] the Ford, the first production in an adventurous season of new plays that is part of the Ford Theatres partnership program with L.A. County-based producers and performing arts organizations".

Song of Extinction is the story of Max Forrestal, a musically gifted high school student who is going to fail biology if he doesn't complete a 20-page paper on extinction by Tuesday. But Max's mother is dying of cancer, and school is the last thing on his mind. His biologist father, obsessed with saving a rare, threatened Bolivian insect, is incapable of dealing with his wife's impending death, or his son's distress. Max's teacher wants to offer him guidance; but helping his student pushes Khim Phan into a magical journey of his own - from the Cambodian fields of his youth into the undiscovered country beyond.

A meditation on the science of life and loss, the relationships between fathers and sons, Cambodian fields, Bolivian rainforests and redemption, the play integrates music and elements of magical realism to weave its spell. Ms. Lewis, who does extensive research for her plays, immersed herself in books about endangered species and the environment, and interviewed survivors of the Cambodian killing fields now living in Long Beach. Emerging composer Geoffrey Pope was commissioned to write the title piece of music - the "song of extinction."

"Early on in the process of writing, I knew that music would be an important part of my play," explained playwright E. M. Lewis. "Fifteen-year-old Max clings to his music when everything else in his life is becoming unfathomably dark."

In addition to winning the Ashland New Plays Festival, Song of Extinction was a finalist at both the 2008 Sundance Theater Lab and HotCity Theater's Greenhouse Festival. It received readings in NYU's hotINK International Festival of New Plays and Atlantic Theater's Next Page reading series.

E.M. Lewis has seen her plays produced across the country. She is the recipient of the American Theatre Critics Association's 2008 Francesca Primus Prize for an emerging woman theater artist. In 2007, LA Stage magazine selectEd Lewis as one of twelve Los Angeles "theater artists to watch" when two of her full-length plays received their world premieres locally: Heads, a hostage drama set against the war in Iraq that Edward Albee called "provocative and wonderfully threatening," received its world premiere at the Blank Theater and was named one of the top ten productions of 2007 by the Los Angeles Times; Infinite Black Suitcase, a large ensemble play about grief and survival in rural Oregon, was given its world premiere by TheSpyAnts at the Lillian Theater.

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