Directors and Music Directors Announced For the 33rd Annual FESTIVAL OF NEW MUSICALS

National Alliance for Musical Theatre has announced this year's directors and music directors for the 33rd Annual FESTIVAL OF NEW MUSICALS, which will be held on Thursday, October 21 and Friday, October 22, 2021. This year, NAMT's Festival of New Musicals will be presented as a unique digital and in-person hybrid, allowing wider accessibility for attendees.

Now in its 33rd year, the National Alliance for Musical Theatre's FESTIVAL OF NEW MUSICALS attracts theatre producers from around the world to discover eight new musicals over two days. Production costs are underwritten by NAMT, which funds the Festival entirely through donations and sponsorships.

This year's NAMT Festival of New Musicals features an impressive line-up of directors and music directors.

Directors include Elena Araoz (Off-Broadway: Original Sound, Fur), Sherri Eden Barber (New York: Emily's D+Evolution, Only You Can Prevent Wildfires), Stephen Brackett (Broadway: Be More Chill, The Lightning Thief), Sammi Canold (Forbes Magazine's 30 Under 30; New York City Center's Evita), Amy Anders Corcoran (La Jolla Playhouse's Bhangin' It), Rebecca Martínez (Regional: Anna in the Tropics), Arpita Mukherjee (Regional: House of Joy) and Jesca Prudencio (Steppenwolf's The Great Leap).

Music directors in this year's Festival include Kurt Crowley (Broadway: Hamilton), Steven Cuevas (National Tour: Once On This Island), Erika Gamez (Regional: Allegory), Nate Hopkins (Broadway performer: Bandstand), Emily Marshall (Broadway: Be More Chill, Elf), Mona Seyed-Bolorforosh (Harry Potter Soundtrack Orchestra), Sinai Tabak (Regional: Paint Your Wagon, Evita) and Rose Van Dyne (Regional: Interstate).

"We are tremendously excited to welcome this amazing team of directors and music directors. Their diverse styles and experiences will undoubtedly benefit this year's hybrid presentations in wonderful and powerful ways. We cannot wait for audiences to experience this year's Festival." Betsy King Militello, Executive Director of NAMT

The Festival has introduced musical theatre producers to nearly 300 musicals and over 500 writers from around the world. As a direct result of the FESTIVAL OF NEW MUSICALS, more than 85% of the shows presented have gone on to subsequent readings, workshops, productions or tours; been licensed; and/or recorded on cast albums. Some past Festival shows include Come From Away, Lempicka, The Drowsy Chaperone, Lizard Boy, Benny & Joon, Darling Grenadine, Ordinary Days, Striking 12, It Shoulda Been You, Interstate and Thoroughly Modern Millie, among many others.

NAMT will film live presentations of all Festival musicals this year. Those presentations will then be screened at an in-person event on October 21 and 22. Members of the industry are invited to attend the screening, where they also can meet the writers, or they can view a livestream of the presentations, which will be shown in collaboration with Broadway On Demand. The general public will be able to view the streaming portion of the event by making a small donation to NAMT.

Festival registration is now open and available at namt.org/festival.

This year, a committee of 15 theatre professionals selected eight new musicals out of over 200 submissions. The musicals chosen for the 33rd Annual Festival are:

AZUL (Book by Melis Aker and Tatiana Pandiani, Music by Jacinta Clusellas, Lyrics by Jacinta Clusellas and Ruben Dario), Fanny and Stella (Music & Lyrics by Eamonn O'Dwyer, Book by SEVAN), Little Duende (Music & Lyrics by Robi Hager, Book & Lyrics by Georgina Escobar), Māyā (Book & Music by Cheeyang Ng, Book & Lyrics by Eric Sorrels), Missing Peace (Book, Music & Lyrics by Kalani Queypo and Kyle Puccia), Private Gomer Jones (Written by Marshall Pailet), Senior Class (Book, Melodies & Lyrics by Melvin Tunstall, Music by Greg Borowsky), TL;DR: Thelma Louise; Dyke Remix (Book & Lyrics by EllaRose Chary, Music & Lyrics by Brandon James Gwinn).

Casting for each musical and further programming details will be announced soon.

AZUL

Book by Melis Aker and Tatiana Pandiani, Music by Jacinta Clusellas, Lyrics by Jacinta Clusellas and Ruben Dario

Director: Elena Araoz
Music Director: Kurt Crowley

Elena Araoz directs theater, opera and virtual performances, with productions at BAM, New York City Opera, Prague Shakespeare, New York Theatre Workshop Next Door, Bucharest International, Glimmerglass Opera, Oregon Symphony, Cherry Lane and PEN America. Upcoming: virtual CGI opera A Survivor's Odyssey (White Snake Projects), Sugar Skull! (Mexico Beyond Mariachi), commercial musical Havana Music Hall (Miami), opera I Am a Dreamer Who No Longer Dreams (Resonance Works). Currently playing: The Manic Monologues (McCarter Theatre), Nightfall (Audible). At Princeton University she founded and directs Innovations in Socially Distant Performance and serves as Producing Artistic Director of the Theater and Music Theater Season. www.elenaaraoz.com

About AZUL: In an epic world of magical realism, Bluebird, an idealist poet, seeks a better life in a new land. Years later, in present-day Jackson Heights, Rita, a composer, struggles to forgive her father, understand her roots and reconnect to a land she has never known. AZUL is a bilingual spectacle, as well as a psychological deep-dive into the immigrant father-daughter relationship. It questions the place of art in capitalism and explores how memory and imagination reshape immigrant identity. The score is a constellation of songs rooted in Latin American folkloric traditions, along with jazz and chamber music.

Fanny and Stella

Music & Lyrics by Eamonn O'Dwyer, Book by SEVAN

Director: Stephen Brackett
Music Director: Emily Marshall

Stephen Brackett's credits include The Lightning Thief and Be More Chill on Broadway and Off-Broadway productions of A Strange Loop (Playwrights Horizons/Page 73, Obie and Drama Desk Awards), Be More Chill (Signature Theatre/Two River Theater/London's Other Palace Theatre & Shaftesbury Theatre), The Lightning Thief (TheaterworksUSA/National Tour), Buyer & Cellar (Rattlestick/Barrow Street/National Tour/Menier Chocolate Factory), The Mad Ones (Prospect Theater), Ultimate Beauty Bible (Page 73), Carnival Kids (Lesser America), After (Partial Comfort), Be A Good Little Widow (Ars Nova), and The Tenant (Woodshed Collective). Regionally, he has directed Fall Springs (Barrington Stage), Significant Other (Geffen Playhouse), I Now Pronounce (Humana Festival), Le Switch (About Face), The Great Pretender (TheatreWorks). Upcoming projects include A Strange Loop (Woolly Mammoth), A.D. 16 (Olney Theatre) and To My Girls (Second Stage).

About Fanny and Stella: London, 1870s: Frederick Park and Ernest Boulton were unremarkable

middle-class boys growing up in Dulwich, who fled their suburban upbringing to live as Fanny & Stella

in frenetic Victorian London. A run-in with the law casts them in their own coup de théâtre: the

sensational show-trial of the 'He-She Ladies.' Dominating the press and scandalizing the nation, the

investigation exposed every sordid detail of their wild lives. In a time when simply being themselves

made them a threat to the establishment, this ordeal would test their extraordinary friendship and the

resolve of an empire.

Little Duende

Music & Lyrics by Robi Hager, Book & Lyrics by Georgina Escobar

Director: Rebecca Martínez
Music Director: Erika Gamez

Rebecca Martínez is an award-winning director, choreographer, deviser and the BOLD Associate Artistic Director of WP Theater. Rebecca has worked with WP, INTAR, Theater for One, Working Theater, the Lark, The Playwrights Realm, New Dramatists, Radical Evolution, Long Wharf, Baltimore Center Stage and Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, among others. She is a member of Sojourn Theatre, a 2019 Audrey Resident, a New Georges Affiliated Artist, member of the 2018-2020 WP Lab, 2017 Drama League Directing Fellow, a member of SDC and was recently named one of the 2021 TCG Rising Leaders of Color.

About Little Duende: In the land of Elflán, life and beauty flourishes. Adelita, an adventurous and curious young elf, is eager to find what lies beyond the horizon. When the evil spirit of La Mancha kidnaps her mother, Adelita is forced to travel north to the land of the Hadaseñas in hopes of being reunited with her again. Little Duende is a musical with the aesthetic tones of Pixar's Coco and Guillermo Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth. With fairy tales and mythological themes, this musical comments on real-world matters as it explores the border crisis, dual-citizenship, and the consequences of a family secret.

Māyā

Book & Music by Cheeyang Ng, Book & Lyrics by Eric Sorrels

Director: Arpita Mukherjee
Music Director: Nate Hopkins

Arpita Mukherjee is a New York based director and screenwriter. Their recent directing credits include Bollywood Kitchen by Sri Rao (Geffen Playhouse, 2021), Jump by Charly Evon Simpson (APAC), House of Joy by Madhuri Shekar (San Diego Rep), Māyā by Cheeyang Ng and Eric Sorrels (Pace University New Musical Lab), One Way by Ben Bonnema and Christopher Staskel (NAMT) and Eh Dah? Questions for My Father by Aya Aziz (Next Door @NYTW). Upcoming: Running by Danny Pudi (EWP, Enacte, Hypokrit).

Arpita has developed work at WP Theater, The Public Theater and Ma-Yi Theater amongst others. She is a 2020 Clubbed Thumb Directing Fellow, a 2018 - 2020 Women's Project Lab Member and a 2018 Eugene O' Neill National Directing Fellow. She is an alumni of the Lincoln Center Directors Lab. Arpita is currently the book writer for Monsoon Wedding musical and is the Artistic Director of Congressional Award winning Hypokrit Theatre Company.

About Māyā: Māyā is many things: it's a philosophy of Hinduism; the idea that the world around us is really an illusion; and a girl's name. Set in the British Raj in 1930, Māyā is the story of a struggling poet in need of an awakening, not unlike India herself. When Gandhi's non-violent Independence Movement arrives on Māyā's doorstep, she is thrust into one of the most turbulent political climates in history. When she commits herself to the cause, she begins to shatter the illusions that have been deceiving her to discover the difference she'll really make.

Missing Peace

Book, Music & Lyrics by Kalani Queypo and Kyle Puccia

Director: Jesca Prudencio
Music Director: Steven Cuevas

Jesca Prudencio is a director and choreographer dedicated to developing new theatrical works that humanize issues nationally and internationally. Recent works: Can We Now? (La Jolla Playhouse WoW Fest), UnRemarkable! A Melissa Li and Kit Yan Concert Special (Musical Theatre Factory), Interstate by Kit Yan and Melissa Yi (NAMT, Mixed Blood World Premiere) and the award-winning short film American Quartet (Filmelodic, NYC). Other credits include The Great Leap by Lauren Yee (Steppenwolf), Vietgone and Actually (San Diego Rep), Calling (La MaMa ETC), Man of God (East West Players), A&Q (Pineapple Lab, Philippines) and FAN (B-Floor, Thailand). She is a recipient of The Drama League Fellowship and the inaugural Julie Taymor World Theater Fellowship. BFA: NYU Tisch, MFA: UC San Diego. Jescaprudencio.com

About Missing Peace: Chase wakes up from a coma, his past a blur. To his family's surprise, Chase is happy and free until the dark memories begin to flood back like quick cuts of a movie trailer that just don't add up. As Chase grapples with his attempted suicide, bad choices he's made and the people he's hurt along the way, he begins to work through his pain and heal relationships with those he loves the most.

Private Gomer Jones

Written by Marshall Pailet

Director: Sammi Canold
Music Director: Mona Seyed-Bolorforosh

Sammi Cannold is a director who is one of Forbes Magazine's 30 Under 30 in Hollywood & Entertainment, 2019. Credits include Evita (New York City Center), Endlings (NYTW, A.R.T.), Ragtime on Ellis Island and Violet on a moving bus (A.R.T.). Sammi just completed her first documentary feature, The Show Must Go On, which premiered at Broadway's Majestic Theatre this summer. She is now developing or preparing to go into production on several feature films, limited series, plays and musicals. Sammi has served as an Artistic Fellow at the A.R.T., a member of Cirque du Soleil's Creative Cognoscenti and a Sundance Institute Fellow. B.A., Stanford University; M.A., Harvard University. www.sammicannold.com. @sammi.cannold

About Private Gomer Jones: 1914. Young Gomer Jones has ambitions to join the Welsh army. But since he's lost his hearing, he needs the help of a nurse with ties to the Deaf community to fake his way past the recruiters. And so begins Gomer's journey as a deaf soldier pretending not to be a deaf soldier. He loses friends, his moral compass and his humanity. And then, through a series of moments in an increasingly senseless war, he finds himself again. When he returns to Wales, his sense of purpose has been decimated. But hope for a humanistic life has been found.

Senior Class

Book, Melodies & Lyrics by Melvin Tunstall, Music by Greg Borowsky

Director: Amy Anders Corcoran
Music Director: Sinai Tabak

Amy Anders Corcoran is currently attached to three new musicals and will have a new show debut on the Disney Wish in 2022. She was the associate/resident director of Escape to Margaritaville for Christopher Ashley on Broadway, and ahe directed the national tour. She also served as Mr. Ashley's Associate Director on Disney's Freaky Friday. Amy helmed the Off-Broadway and London premieres of Unexpected Joy and received the SDC Noël Coward Fellowship for Comedic Direction. A proud member of SDC, she holds a B.A. in Psychology with Honors from the University of Kansas and an M.F.A. in Directing from Penn State. Upcoming: BHANGIN' IT, La Jolla Playhouse.

About Senior Class: When the Senior Class Musical production of My Fair Lady is canceled due to budget cuts, two theater nerds in Harlem convince the school to do a one-night-only, royalty-free staging of Pygmalion. When they meet a subway dancer named Alizé, art begins to imitate life as they try to transform her into their perfect Eliza Doolittle. However, this new modern-day Eliza schools them all as she proves she can Doolittle and so much more.

TL;DR: Thelma Louise; Dyke Remix

Book & Lyrics by EllaRose Chary, Music & Lyrics by Brandon James Gwinn

Director: Sherri Eden Barber

Music Director: Rose Van Dyne

Sherri Eden Barber is a director, Artistic Director of Ricochet Collective, and Resident Director of Hamilton on the West Coast. Recent productions: Tiny Beautiful Things with Nia Vardalos (Pasadena Playhouse), To Let Go and Fall (Theater Latté Da), Esperanza Spalding's Emily's D+Evolution (development on European tour), Happily After Ever (Ricochet Collective - 59E59, Edinburgh Fringe), good friday (The Flea Theater), Only You Can Prevent Wildfires

(Ricochet Collective - Teatro Circulo), Gordy Crashes (Ricochet Collective - IRT), Mr. Landing Takes A Fall (The Flea), Herman Kline's Midlife Crisis (The Beckett) and 24 Hour Plays on Broadway with Pablo Schreiber, Laverne Cox, and Melanie Griffith (American Airlines Theatre). Sherri is a recipient of The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center's National Directors Fellowship, a Drama League Directing Fellow, and recipient of the US/UK Exchange Award.RicochetCollective.com | SherriEdenBarber.com

About TL;DR: TL;DR: Thelma Louise; Dyke Remix is a fantasy-driven, irreverent, rocking meta-analysis of queer women in media that asks, "why do strong female characters always gotta die?". The cast and band, made up of six queer folks, defies the traditional cis, white, femme, skinny, able-bodied, male gaze-inspired concept of queer women in media. We start with T and L suspended in mid-air over the Grand Canyon - they promptly make out and then, with the help of their newfound queer community (The Band), seek a queer future that has never been modeled for them, the happy ending they deserve.

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