Meet the Artist New Play Readings Will Take Place Wednesdays in May at Vivid Stage

Vivid Stage, in residence at Oakes Center at 120 Morris Avenue in Summit, will present its annual Meet the Artist new play reading series on Wednesdays, May 6, 13, 20 and 27. All readings will take place at the Summit Community Center, 100 Morris Ave, at 7 pm. 

The new play reading series is a chance for the audience to participate in the development of new works, both to hear the plays read by professional actors and also to discuss the projects with the playwright, director and actors afterward. There will be an opportunity for the audience to provide feedback to the team after every performance. 

On May 6, Vivid will present Brad Goren-Wilson's Socks on the Wall. As the pandemic rages, a young man tries to drive across the United States to see his grandmother for Christmas. Simple, poetic, and cathartic, Socks On the Wall is a bittersweet comedy exploring the pillars and symbols we look to for guidance as we choose how to use the little time we have. 

On May 13, Vivid will present Chagutok by Vince Gatton. Four Americans each make a solitary pilgrimage to a remote, unpopulated island off the Alaskan coast, hoping to witness an obscure and mysterious atmospheric phenomenon known as the Chagutok Lights, which occurs only once every seventeen years. They each expect to be camping alone out there, but find themselves stuck in each others' company - an unwelcome situation for these people-skills-challenged individuals, but they manage...until a dead body appears. And it's just the first. Alone on this barren island, these four loners must work together to solve the mysteries of the dead, the Lights...and each other.

On May 20, Vivid will present Erin Mallon's Neither Rain Nor Snow. A solitary, independent woman fosters an unlikely friendship with her mailman, despite her initial distrust of him. It's clear that they both enjoy each other's company, but as his true colors are revealed over the span of a year, we realize the woman was right. This man's intentions are not at all what they first seemed.

On May 27, Vivid presents Harm Reduction by Elizabeth Irwin. As Kayla, a seventeen year old in the foster care system, pushes through her last few months of high school, her foster mother, Susan, tries to figure out how to be a mother when you've spent the last sixteen years on the bench. Their neighbors, Amanda and Evan, (possibly mediocre) parents themselves, offer help and judgment and resentment and advice. No village is perfect but is this one going to let Kayla down or will they be enough?

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