HotCity Theatre Awarded a $20,000 Grant by PNC Bank

HotCity Theatre, a professional theatre company with a focus on contemporary programming and new play development, has been awarded a $20,000 grant by PNC Bank and their Arts Alive St. Louis program. This grant will support the commission of a new play by author and playwright Lia Romeo. The commissioned script will integrate social online media into the play-going process, and engage audiences with the characters before, during and after the show.

The PNC Arts Alive grant will enable HotCity to workshop and produce the script in St. Louis through the "Greenhouse" series - HotCity's new play development program committed to new works. The grant will also allow HotCity to offer extremely reduced ticket prices for students. HotCity's Associate Director Chuck Harper will direct.

The yet-to-be-titled show is currently being written and will premiere as a fully realized production in the HotCity Mainstage season in December, 2012. HotCity currently performs its mainstage season at the Kranzberg Arts Center in Grand Center.

Artistic Director Marty Stanberry says, "HotCity is very pleased to be receiving the PNC grant for development of this exciting new play project. In the past few years, our focus has been on new play development, enabling emerging playwrights a platform for which to have their plays developed and produced. Not only does this grant aid in the costs of theatre production, it has given the company the artistic encouragement that validates our mission. HotCity and its New Play Festival has quickly generated an artistic "buzz" nationally as evidenced through the 300+ submissions of new work recently received from all over the country - three of these scripts will be chosen for the Festival in November, 2011. The PNC grant will definitely propel the company's profile as a mentor of young playwrights as well as a producer of new work."

Thoughts from the Playwright:
"To me, one of the most interesting things about the rise of social media - and more broadly of the internet in general - is the way it has turned the communication of information from a one way into a multi-way conversation. Rather than media being something we sit back and absorb, we've become active participants not only in choosing among the multitude of sources of information and entertainment that are now available, but also in creating and sharing information and entertainment ourselves. So when I was thinking about how to integrate social media into a theater project, it struck me as interesting that most theater is still a one-way conversation, and I started thinking about ways to get the audience actively involved in commenting on or even shaping the direction of a piece of theater in real time, as it was going on." - Lia Romeo

Lia Romeo's Bio:

Lia Romeo earned her B.A. in comparative literature from Princeton University and her M.F.A. in playwriting from Rutgers. Her play Green Whales was read or developed at the Kennedy Center, HotCity Theatre, Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey, and New Jersey Repertory Theatre, and received its world premiere from Kansas City's Unicorn Theatre in March 2010. Her play Right Place, Right Time was a finalist for the O'Neill National Playwrights' Conference, the HotCity Theatre New Play Festival, and the Centre Stage New Play Festival. It received its world premiere from the Renegade Theatre Experiment in January 2010, and will be produced by Stillwater Theatre in September 2010. Her short plays have been produced in thirteen different states and internationally. Lia was the National New Play Network's Emerging Playwright-in-Residence at Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey in 2008-2009. She and her brother Nick are co-authors of 11,002 Things to Be Miserable About. The book was published by Abrams Image in 2009, and garnered favorable reviews in the Boston Globe and other national publications.

HotCity Info:

Web: www.hotcitytheatre.org

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/HotCity

Twitter: http://twitter.com/hotcitytheatre
PNC Arts Alive Info:

Web: http://www.pncartsalive.com/stlouis/index.php

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