Database Of Plays By Women Launches Next Month

New Perspectives Theatre Company (NPTC) has announced the March 4, 2022 launch of ON HER SHOULDERS: Celebrating 1,000 Years of Women Writing Plays, the first-of-its-kind database of women from the around the world who have used the dramatic form of expression for the whole, or for part, of their literary careers. A cocktail party honoring the launch will be held on March 8, International Women's Day, one of several activities taking place this Spring as NPTC moves toward its 30th birthday, in June.

ON HER SHOULDERS (OHS) was created in 2013 and is part of NPTC's Women's Work Project. A program of readings, OHS grew out of the 50/50 in 2020: Parity for Women Theatre Artists Initiative, of which NPTC was a co-founder. Among the goals of that initiative: challenging the conventional theatre history narrative, which too often excludes women, and expanding the canon to include more women, such as Margaret Cavendish (1623-1673) and Pauline Hopkins (1859-1930).

A unique aspect of the OHS program is the Play In Context component, which includes a scholarly essay that analyzes each featured play within its own time and place; a substantial playwright biography; and an introduction to a reading or performance by a dramaturg who brings a personal perspective to the dramatist and her work. From its inception in 2013 until 2019, OHS was produced in collaboration with The New School in New York City. Since 2020, all events have been produced virtually and made accessible to a worldwide audience. To date, NPTC has presented 60 plays by 47 playwrights, from the years ca 955 to 1970.

The creation of the ON HER SHOULDERS Database has been two years in the making and it contains lists of plays by 250 women from multiple countries, along with brief biographies. New Perspectives Theatre Company will share the ON HER SHOULDERS Database free of charge with theatre practitioners and educators, as a resource for increasing productions of plays by women and enriching theatre history curricula. Interested members of the general public will also be able to increase their knowledge about the work of theatre women through the ages. Research is ongoing, and NPTC will update the contents on a regular basis. Users are all invited to participate in the expansion of the database by providing names and other information about women who are not yet included.

NEW PERSPECTIVES THEATRE COMPANY (NPTC) is an award-winning, multi-racial company performing for the last 30 years in Midtown Manhattan, communities throughout NYC and the Northeastern U.S., and as of 2015, internationally. The company's mission: to develop and produce new plays and playwrights, especially by women and people of color; present classic plays in a style that addresses contemporary issues and restores forgotten female theatre practitioners to the canon; and extend the benefits of theatre to young people and communities in need. NPTC was named a Cultural Architect by The Jubilee in 2018. Our aim is not to exclude, but to cast a wider net. www.nptnyc.org

Melody Brooks (Project Director) is the founder and Artistic Director of NPTC. She is an award-winning producer, director and dramaturg and recipient of the Spirit of Hope Award from Speranza Theatre Company for her career-long support of female theatre artists. Brooks and NPTC also received the Trailblazing Women and Arts Institutions Award from Rhythm Color Associates. She currently leads NPTC's Women's Work Project, which develops new plays by women and revives plays that have been forgotten or neglected. Brooks is on the Board of the League of Professional Theatre Women and has co-produced the triennial LPTW Gilder/Coigney International Theatre Award Program since 2014.

NPTC's Women's Work Project is supported, in part, with public funds from the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council. The Play in Context, the dramaturgical and scholarly presentation component to the program, is sponsored in part by the League of Professional Theatre Women, a non-profit organization promoting visibility and increasing opportunities for women in theatre since 1982. www.theatrewomen.org

To post a comment, you must register and login.