Bay Area Playwrights Festival Partners with Tides Theatre

Playwrights Foundation has announced a partnership with Tides Theatre as the new home for our annual Bay Area Playwrights Festival (BAPF), now in its 38th year, which will run July 17-27, 2015 at the 90-seat theater in the heart of San Francisco's Theater District.

Centrally located in the heart of downtown, Tides Theatre offers the festival an accessible, nicely appointed, intimate theater, with an abundant lobby for mingling between plays during the intensive weekend of six new works. Tides recently inherited the space from the SF Playhouse after making their recent move to the Post St. address. Building on a growing relationship between organizations, Tides has been home to Playwrights Foundation's Biennial Des Voix Festival, a celebration of new French plays in translation, and the 2014/15 Rough Readings Series. "Extending this partnership to include our cornerstone annual event is a brilliant next step and makes perfect sense," explains Amy Mueller, Artistic Director of Playwrights Foundation. "Moving from the Thick House (in Potrero Hill) to Tides allows us to bring the Festival to a wider audience, and will serve our playwrights beautifully by providing such a central and vibrant location."

The BAPF is the oldest and most successful new play festivals in the U.S. Established in 1976, the festival has continuously discovered original and distinctive new voices in the theater, and invested in the development of their work. Playwrights Sam Shepard, Nilo Cruz, Bill Irwin, David Henry Hwang, Anna Deavere Smith, Maria Irene Fornes, Naomi Iizuka; and more recently, Marcus Gardley, Annie Baker, Sam Hunter, Katori Hall, Lauren Yee, Aaron Loeb, Lauren Gunderson, Kimber Lee and Dan Dietz are just a few of the hundreds of writers who were recognized early in their careers through the BAPF, and who are today some of the most prominent names in contemporary theater.

"Amy and her team are integral to the fabric of the Bay Area theater scene," enthuses Jennifer Welch, the Producing Artistic Director of Tides. "They are one of the primary champions of new play development on the West Coast and have always served to bind our many playwrights, theaters, directors and actors together. In perfect complement to their vision, Tides is committed to developing new work that speaks to our greatest contemporary challenges. We're so excited to be forging and deepening this partnership through the BAPF."

The lineup of plays and playwrights for the 38th Annual BAPF is set to be announced on May 1st, and tickets will go on sale starting on June 1st.