4th Annual NEURODIVERSITY NEW PLAY FESTIVAL Returns, September 7 - 9

Spectrum Theatre Ensemble (STE) in Providence along with the Die-Cast Collective in Philadelphia present the fourth annual Neurodiversity New Play Festival (NNPF) from September 7 - 9, 2023 at various venues in the Jewelry District in Providence. 

The Festival will coincide with PVDFest, Providence's premiere outdoor arts festival produced by the City of Providence in partnership with FirstWorks.  Tickets and passes are available now at stensemble.org.

This will be the fourth Neurodiversity New Play Festival for Spectrum Theatre Ensemble.  The programming consists of six original short plays, produced by STE specifically for the festival. In addition, Die-Cast Collective will produce two short plays as well as one devised piece that will be created during the week leading up to the festival. 

On Saturday, September 9, Spectrum Theatre Ensemble will host a special VIP event at District Hall in Providence, featuring selections from STE's playwright-in-residence, Harmon dot aut's full-length play, Tornado, as well as food, drink and celebrity guests. 

 

This year, NNPF is thrilled to partner with the City of Providence, FirstWorks and PVDFest. "PVDFest is a celebration of the diverse and profound artistic talent that energizes Providence and makes it the place we're all proud to call home," said Director of Arts, Culture and Tourism Joe Wilson, Jr. "At the heart of it all are the visionaries who channel their life experience into art. I'm thrilled to welcome the Neurodiversity New Play Festival to PVDFest and celebrate these stories."

 

With the help of its community collaborators, creatives, and ever committed thinker-doers, STE will be highlighting the defining narrative of this year's New Play Festival through content-inspired, community-specific events programming. Programming that includes, but is not limited to, a community-led symposium on how to both access and navigate nuero-psychological care in today's current care systems; a participatory workshop on making, representing, and performing identity through costumed puppetry (provided by Providence's favorite extraterrestrials, Big Nazo); as well as an inclusive community art gallery that's inviting local neurodivergent individuals, as well as neurotypical peers, to fabricate art pieces speaking to their nuerodiverse experiences.

 

The gallery space is coordinated by STE Fellow Brielle Fratoni-Jaskiewicz, M.S. She explains, “Factors like mobility, cognition, learning disabilities, and low socioeconomic status often limit individuals from being active members in a world designed for the able-bodied. Art transcends these limitations. In collaborating with STE, we hope to facilitate a true representation of the 'least restrictive environment' within a curated gallery space and encourage all participants to share their personalized neurodiverse experiences to highlight equity and inclusion within our community.”

 

The NNPF is designed to address the limitations around neurodiversity in the arts and provides a platform for neurodivergent artists to create and present new work centering their stories and the issues they find important.

 

“While STE has succeeded in presenting existing work that is relevant to the company's mission, there are a limited number of plays written by and about neurodivergent people,” explains STE's Artistic Director, Clay Martin. “The few plays that do exist often portray monolithic and outdated representations of neurodivergence and that number dwindles to almost nothing when one looks for plays that intersect the neurodivergent identity with BIPOC communities, or those of sexual and gender minorities. STE's mission through The Neurodiversity New Play Festival is to change this by not only commissioning and producing new plays that expand the canon of neurodiversity in theatre, but also through the collaboration of diverse artists both on and off the spectrum.”

 

Special thank you to the generous funding of the National Endowment for the Arts, The Papitto Opportunity Connection, The Rhode Island Foundation and the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts.

 

Tickets and passes are available now. For a full list of events and more information, visit: https://www.stensemble.org/

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