New Works Play Lab at FSU/Asolo Conservatory

The New Works Play Lab aims to give graduate student-actors in the FSU/Asolo Conservatory experience with developing a new play, starting with the workshop process and ending in a staged-reading. The New Works Play Lab gives playwrights a laboratory to experiment with their work in a supportive, educational setting, while also teaching developing actors how to serve the text. Most excitedly, our FSU/Asolo community gets to experience fresh, innovative theatre!

Tragedy: A Comedy by Crystal Skillman and Fred Van Lente
Directed by Cat Brindisi

Friday, December 12th, 7:30pm

It’s the annual tragedy-writing festival in ancient Athens, and all your favorites are here: Sophocles is premiering Oedipus Rex, Euripides is premiering Medea, and Euphorion, the son of Aeschylus…is premiering a fraud. His play was secretly written by an enslaved woman, Harmonia. Her attempts to get her production done in the face of blasphemy accusations, threatened execution, an advancing army, a foul-mouthed chorus, the usual backstage backstabbing, is nothing short of epic. 

Companie Men: A Historie Playe by Ken Ferrigni
Directed by Veronika Duerr

Saturday, December 13th, 3:30pm

It is February 1599, and the Globe Theatre will not open for six months. In a urine-soaked pub just north of London, the Lord Chamberlain’s Men lick their wounds after a disastrous opening of Ben Jonson’s new play. Facing the imminent threat of debtor’s prison, a Battle of Wills erupts within the company pitting London’s most celebrated clown, Will Kempe, against a rising playwright destined to become the greatest writer in history. Companie Men is a tale of how – among pimps and whores, executions and bear fights – an ego-driven group of men (played by women) went from good to great. This is the probably, mostly true story of how one fateful evening changed the direction of the English theatre forever.

The Simaraboo Two by Phillip Gregory Burke
Directed by Jasmine Bracey
Saturday, December 13th, 7:30pm

“Two lovers, taken to a whole new world that is not of their first worlds, try to make sense of their dire circumstances. But when a mysterious sign, coupled with an ancient prophecy appears to offer them a way out, cultural tensions erupt, forcing them to confront the reality of what, where and who is home. A play with music and dance, The Simaraboo Two is the first play in Phillip Gregory Burke’s epic ten-play cycle, chronicling the sociology of the African diaspora, under obscure yet critical moments, in American history.”

There will be a talk-back following each reading that will include the playwright, director, and dramaturg for the New Works Play Lab, James Monaghan (Director of New Works and Dramaturg, Asolo Rep). ALL STAGED-READINGS ARE FREE w/ RSVP!