The Baltimore Playwrights Festival Announces Fourth Public Reading Marathon Jan 29

The Baltimore Playwrights Festival (www.baltplayfest.com) announces the fourth public reading "Marathon" to take place on Saturday, 29 January at the Single Carrot Theater, 120 W. North Avenue, Baltimore, MD 21201. Beginning at 11:00 a.m. plays to be read are Mandy, by Ben Logan , followed by My First Love, by Paula Stone, at 1:00 p.m., and The Sculptress, by Marilyn Millstone at 3:00 p.m. After each reading there will be a discussion of the script with the playwright, director and actors. The event is free, and the general public is encouraged to attend.

Mandy, by Ben Logan, is a love story set in Baltimore. Mandy is from a solid middle class family. David is from an upper middle class family. To both families, each is the perfect child. They met and fell in love with each other. The only problem is that Mandy is white and David is black . . . two similar families . . . two different worlds. What happens when the perfect child wants the unthinkable? The story starts in the 1990s. Way after the "whites only" and "no colored" signs, way after the water hoses and dogs. We have come so far that race is no longer an issue...right? Oh young love, that once-in-a-lifetime love. A flame that never dies.

Ben Logan was born and raised in Baltimore, a member of a large family. A retired widower, he is the father of two and grandfather of four. He has penned more than ten plays and has published three book of poems and short stories, and along with his brother Gary, has been featured Poets at venues throughout the Baltimore area.

 

In My First Love, by Paula Stone, Lily and Cliff, who have not seen each other for thirty-five years, realize they will meet again, after they each receive an invitation to the wedding of a mutual relative. All of their old, jumbled feelings for one another resurface. There's love: Lily's first love was Cliff, and Cliff thinks Lily was probably his first, too. But there also are not-so-loving feelings: Their relationship ended badly, without even a goodbye. Both Lily and Cliff agonize about their impending encounter and seek advice from the other characters. Turns out the others all remember their first love; and the comic, poignant stories they tell help prepare the former lovers to face both each other and the past.

Paula Stone began creative writing as a little girl, but writing went on the back burner while she pursued a PhD at MIT and a career in technology policy and systems engineering. Now retired, she writes poignant comedies about everyday life. More than a dozen of her 10-minute plays have been competitively selected for inclusion in play festivals, showcased by invitation in public readings, and/or commercially published. Her one-act play KITCHEN SINK qualified for a public reading as part of the 2008-2009 Baltimore Playwright's Festival and went on to win First Prize in the Brevard Little Theatre's 6th Annual New Play Competition (2009-2010, one-act category) and be chosen as a Finalist in the 33rd Annual National One-Act Playwriting Competition, Dubuque Fine Arts Players, Dubuque, IA (2010). Paula, originally from Massachusetts, is a long-time resident of Montgomery County, Maryland, and is a member of the Playwright's Forum of Washington, DC.

The Sculptress, by Marilyn Millstone, follows the story of Camille Claudel, a gifted sculptor and the mistress of Auguste Rodin, who was committed to an asylum by her mother and brother eight days after her father's death in 1913, when she was 48. It's January 1935: Genevieve Renat, the assistant administrator of the asylum where Camille Claudel is still committed, has requested a meeting with Camille's brother Paul. A prominent French ambassador, Paul Hopes the meeting will be brief so he can return to his pressing, high-level duties. However, what Renat wants is problematic for him: she wants him to permit someone new to enter Camille's life -- a Spanish surrealist painter named Remedios Varo. Camille has seen Varo's work in art magazines Paul pays for her to receive in the asylum; she is intrigued by Varo's work and is clamoring to meet the young artist. Reluctantly -- and in part out of guilt for continuing to keep Camille committed, even after their mother's recent death -- Paul arranges for Varo to visit his sister. What unfolds is a story about the power of friendship, the fine line between eccentricity and madness, and the things that matter -- no matter what.

First-time playwright Marilyn Millstone is also a journalist, essayist and poet. Currently, she is a frequent contributor to Baltimore-based American Style Magazine, which focuses on cutting-edge American craft. A member of Playwrights Forum under the direction of Ernie Joselovitz since 2006, Marilyn lives in Kensington, MD, with her husband, Bill Apter, and two cats -- all of whom have sweetly supported her playwriting efforts.

The Baltimore Playwrights Festival has presented 266 scripts by 158 playwrights, produced by 25 different companies, over the past 29 Years. Further information can be found at www.baltplayfest.com .