TheaterWorks' Ken Nicholson Leaves 'New Works Director' Post

TheatreWorks has announced that Kent Nicholson will be leaving his post as Director of New Works to become the Director of Musical Theatre Development at Playwrights Horizons. He will be transitioning into the position as a job share until March of 2009, where he is replacing the recently departed Christie Evangalisto. His position there was cemented by the Mellon Foundation's recent $2 million grant to Playwrights Horizons to establish collaborations with regional theatres to develop new musicals, an area in which Nicholson has excelled for TheatreWorks, where he has led the charge, establishing the New Works Festival and Writers Retreat programs as sources for the development of works of national importance.

TheatreWorks will launch a national search to replace Nicholson, with his assistance in seeking and establishing his replacement over the next few months. TheatreWorks Artistic Director Robert Kelley said of the change, "TheatreWorks is a better theatre company because of the contributions of Kent Nicholson. He has done a tremendous job in establishing and nurturing programs at our company that have attracted some of the most important voices in theatre and given them a place to explore new material. We wish him nothing but the best in his future endeavors." Nicholson added, "This is in many ways a natural transition point. My replacement at TheatreWorks will be able to take ownership of an expanded New Works Festival in the spring of 2009 and plans that are afoot for an even larger Festival next season, and bring his or her own ideas to this program's growth."

Since its founding in 1970, TheatreWorks has become one of the nation's leaders in cultivating and producing new musicals, developing and premiering more than 50 works by new artists as well as veterans. The company's New Works Festival and Writers Retreat programs attract authors and composers of national stature (Paul Gordon, Marsha Norman, Henry Krieger, Stephen Schwartz, Duncan Sheik, Joe DiPietro, and Andrew Lippa, among many others), providing a solid place for America's musical theatre artists to create new works. In addition, the company has developed scores of works which have gone on to both regional and Off-Broadway productions. Over the past three years, fully half of the musicals presented at the National Alliance for Musical Theatre's Festival of New Musicals were developed at TheatreWorks. Works that received early developmental work at TheatreWorks include EMMA, VANITIES (due to open on Broadway next spring), MEMPHIS (also headed for Broadway), THE SUMMER OF '42 and STRIKING 12 (both of which enjoyed successful Off-Broadway runs), and many others now touring regional theatres.

TheatreWorks is an Equity/LORT theatre, producing eight shows annually, and playing to more than 100,000 patrons a year. TheatreWorks continues its dedication to the Bay Area community with increased audience services and subscriber benefits, the "How TheatreWorks" series, Wednesday discussion nights, and opening night celebrations in which the community is invited to mingle with cast and crew. In addition, TheatreWorks offers many public services such as the costume rental program and education outreach program The Workshop, which reaches some 12,000 students annually with in-class workshops, The Children's Healing Project in partnership with Lucile Packard Children's Hospital, underwritten matinees, the lauded Bridges Project, and the Young Playwright's Initiative.

Photo: Kent Nicholson and Reza Jacobs