In the Indiana college town of Bloomington lays a building painted in shades of blue with the word “Playwrights Project” plastered in red. Its impossible to pass the eye catching building without taking a second glance, as it stands out sharply against the red brick and dull concrete that surrounds it. This auspicious blue building is home to the Bloomington Playwrights Project, an Indiana theatre with a focus on developing new plays. This Indiana performing arts group seeks out submissions from playwrights around the world, bringing new plays to the stage each and every season.

Bloomington Playwrights Project’s mission is simple. It “strives to be a leading artistic force in the production and encouragement of new plays.” By providing a myriad of opportunities ranging from development of new plays with public readings and director driven workshops to education for the public about the importance of new play development in our time, the Bloomington Playwrights Project supports new Indiana art.

Their main stage season each year consists of entirely original plays, often making their premiere at Bloomington Playwrights Project before rocketing onto the national and international theatre scene. Written by both promising and established writers, these scripts are produced in a nurturing environment with a playwright centric mode of thinking in a professional environment.

Founded more than thirty years ago by Tom Moseman and Jim Leonard, the Bloomington Playwright Project started with a vision. Moseman and Leonard hoped to create a venue to workshop and produce local playwrights’ works, while simultaneously providing a place for actors, directors and theatre technicians to hone their crafts. Their vision soon blossomed into an amazing collision of artistry and questioning as they provided a safe space for playwrights to continue work during the middle and final stages of their writing process.

You may ask, “Why new plays? Haven’t there been enough written to produce for centuries over?” But the Bloomington Playwrights Project realizes the importance of developing and fostering the work of playwrights from our own time, who will write to reflect on our current issues faced by our collective consciences. On their website they say, “Without theatres willing to take the risk of staging a new play, most of these voices would never be heard and theatre would become a museum paying homage to the past. We understand clearly now more than ever is the time when new art must be created and voices of the present must be brought to the forefront.”

The process of selecting an entire season programed with new work is an arduous and important one. Two of the Bloomington Playwright Project’s main stage shows are selected through contest submissions: the Woodward/Newman Drama Award and the Reva Shiner Comedy Award. Hundreds of submissions are mailed with addresses around the globe. The artistic staff of the Bloomington Playwrights Project choose two plays to fill these slots. In addition, the Bloomington Playwrights Project often commissions plays for its AwareFest while also selecting submissions by only Indiana based playwrights.

Another one of its main stage selections is a recently produced a new play on off or off-off Broadway, with the goal of giving a new script a second production. (Something many new plays never see.) Lastly, the Bloomington Playwrights Project produces a small scale musical selected through agent submissions.

Interested in getting involved in the work of the Bloomington Playwrights Project? They are always seeking artistic and administrative volunteers interested in digging deep into new play development. Visit their website (listed below) for more information.

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Bloomington Playwrights Project
107 West 9th Street
Bloomington, IN 47404
812.334.1188
Website

Elinor Ostrom, a professor at the Indiana University‘s main campus in Bloomington, Central Indiana, has been named a co-recipientof the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences. She shares the honor and the prize money with Oliver E. Williamson, a teacher from the University of California at Berkeley. Ostrom is the first female to have won this particular Nobel prize, instituted in 1968.

Fun City Finder salutes Ms Ostrom for her fine accomplishment and dedication in the field of economic sciences, which place her among the top echelons of notable Indiana people.

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