Free Staged Readings to be Presented At Cranford Community Center in October

The Theater Project will continue its fall 2025 New Play Readings and discussion series at 2 p.m. on Saturday, October 18, at Cranford Community Center's 110-seat theater. Admission is free, with no registration required.

The October 18 event will comprise readings of three plays by two playwrights who have long associations with The Theater Project, Lynn Marie Macy of Cranford, and Joseph Vitale, Randolph, NJ, making the event a family affair: Macy's husband, David, will serve as director; the actors will be husband-wife-and-daughter team David Tillistrand, Lisa Ferraro, and Anya Tillistrand. All are Theater Project veterans.

The three short plays being showcased are:

·      Tiny, Tasty, Colorful, Fruity Bears by Lynn Marie Macy. The Prescott family is a quarrelsome clan. Will an unexpected mishap shake them out of their doldrums and allow them to reconnect?

·      Sister Resisters, also by Macy. Two women meet and bond in a ladies' lounge after escaping an American protest march.

·      It's for You by Joseph Vitale. A telephone rings. A husband and wife argue over who should answer. Paranoia mounts, loyalties fracture, and their landline soon becomes a landmine.

Joseph Vitale, a finalist for the 2020 Woodward-Newman drama prize and recipient of a NJ Council on the Arts fellowship in playwriting, is the author of many plays, including The Interpreter, produced by The Theater Project in 2024. Actor, director, and playwright Lynn Marie Macy is part of the On Her Shoulders project, New Perspectives Theatre Company, which strives to make it impossible for producers and theater companies to deny or ignore the 1,000-year history and value of women's contribution to the theatrical canon.

Following the readings, the audience will have the opportunity to offer feedback to the playwrights. “When audience members share their reactions with the playwrights and the actors, they gain understanding of how a theatrical work comes into being,” said Mark Spina, artistic director of The Theater Project. “By the same token, the playwrights gain direct insight into how their words, ideas, and stories are received.”

The Friends of the Cranford Library will host the series, which is made possible in part through a Union County Local Arts Grant. Large-print programs and scripts will be available with advance request. Cranford Community Center is located at 220 Walnut Avenue.

Founded in 1994 and based in Union, The Theater Project introduces New Jersey audiences to new plays and supports rising playwrights and theater artists. It develops new audiences for theater by service to the community, providing programs for children, and using theater as a forum to address current issues.

For further information, visit https://www.thetheaterproject.org/new-play-readings.