The Farm Theater to Present The Draft Reading Series 8/26 & 8/27 at ART NY

The Farm Theater will present The Draft, a new reading series featuring plays and playwrights whose work has been developed by The Farm Theater, and is now being showcased for future production. The first reading series will take place on August 26 & 27 at ART NY (520 8th Avenue, 3rd Floor) and feature new plays by Maria Paz Alegre, Merridith Allen, and Alex Raid. Admission is FREE, but seating is limited.

Please RSVP torsvp@thefarmtheater.org with the performance you'd like to attend and the number of tickets requested.

How to Survive a Flood

Written by Maria Paz Alegre

Friday, August 26 @ 7pm

The largest hurricane in recorded history has decimated the small city of Tacloban in the Philippines. As the waters rise, a little boy climbs into floating refrigerator and is taken out to sea. With no way to find out if he is dead or alive, his sister in New York travels across the world to find him. Based on true events.

A Step Beyond the Rain

Written by Merridith Allen

Saturday, August 27 @ 4pm

Deirdre wants nothing more than to care for her ailing grandfather and run the family business, a local watering hole. But when her grandfather passes and she rekindles a romance with her high school boyfriend, she must come to terms with the ghosts of her past, and find hope for the future...before it's too late.

The Floor is Lava

Written by Alex Raid

Saturday, August 27 @ 7pm

Held up in the basement of a billon dollar Silicon Valley start-up's News Years Eve Party with an endless supply of scotch, a technophobic twenty something, whose successful life self destructed spectacularly in New York, struggles to maintain normalcy, old relationships, and his sanity as he ponders where he fits in a world governed by social media.

Maria Paz Alegre (Playwright) is a New York based actor, activist and playwright. She is thrilled to have a reading for her first full-length play, How to Survive a Flood, which has taken two years to write, under the guidance of writer/director Padraic Lillis. Earlier this year she was honored to give a speech alongside former President Bill Clinton titled, 'Stories Are the Only True Human Currency' based on her work in international micro-finance and education. Recently, she interviewed prima ballerina Misty Copeland about her work mentoring young children of color and was a guest speaker at the 4th Universalist Society regarding her work as a volunteer children's librarian in Ferguson, MO. She has collaborated with many theater companies both in New York and abroad including the Shelter, Vertigo Theater and LAByrinth Theater Co, of which she is a member of their 2012 Intensive Ensemble. BFA in Acting from Emerson College, MLS from Queens College.

Merridith Allen (Playwright) Merridith's plays have been read and produced at such venues as The Manhattan Repertory Theatre, The Provincetown Theatre, Urban Stages and New Georges development space, The Room. Her work has been featured in over ten anthologies through Smith & Kraus Publishers and Applause Theater and Cinema Books. Merridith was a recipient of the Tennessee Williams Scholarship from the Sewanee Writer's Conference, a semi-finalist for the National Playwright's Conference and Juilliard fellowship, and a VCCA scholar in Auvillar, France. Most recently, Merridith completed a writer's residency in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, where she taught playwriting and began a new project. So much love and gratitude to Padraic and The Farm Theater Company for the inspiration to keep writing plays, become a part of an extraordinary community...and to learn to bat left handed.

Alex Raid (Playwright) is a playwright and screenwriter originally from the San Francisco Bay Area and is currently a resident of Washington Heights in New York City. His work has been read, workshopped, and produced in New York City, Upstate New York, California, and England. In Manhattan, Essential Theatre Group (ETG) produced productions of his plays If You Ever Come By Here in July 2014 and When You Go (part of Zurich, NY) in May 2014 all at the Tank Theater. In addition to those ETG collaborations, some of his other New York writing credits include productions of his full-length play Standbys at the Cabrini Rep's 2013 Thespis Festival in Washington Heights and readings at the Cherry Lane Theater, Bank Street Theater, Ruddy Productions, and Crashbox Theater. Most recently, he collaborated on the feature film Scenes from the Underground, which just wrapped shooting in June 2016. Alex is a member of Indie Theater Now, an online theatre publication where you can find his work as well as other writers he's proud to be published alongside. indietheaternow.com/Playwright/alex-riad

The Farm THEATER The name is inspired by the "farm" system of baseball whose role is to provide experience and training for developing players. The Farm Theater develops early career artists that may not have the support system afforded others, through workshops, productions, and mentoring. The centerpiece of our programming is the College Collaboration. This program in our first year developed a play that will be produced Off-Broadway in the fall of 2016, was published in Indie Theater Now, and the project was featured in an article on HowlRound. The Farm Theater since its inception has hosted Bullpen Sessions, which are free bi-monthly conversations between special guests and early career artists. Special Guests for the Bullpen Sessions have included Rajiv Joseph, Lucas Hnath, Anne Washburn, Paul Schnee, and Halley Feiffer. The Farm Theater also offers skill-building workshops throughout the year. The Farm Theater was inspired from Founding Artistic Director Padraic Lillis' twenty-five years of experience working directly with over 2,000 early career artists, developing multiple award winning new plays, and collaborating with artists working at the highest level in their field. www.thefarmtheater.org