Famous For 15 Minutes Playwriting Festival
The Bermuda Musical & Dramatic Society [BMDS] is holding their 10th Annual Playwriting Festival “Famous for Fifteen Minutes”.
Kelvin Hasting-Smith, one of the founding producers of the festival, tells us how the idea was originally conceived:
“BMDS is no different from other not for profit organizations. It is an institution which is run by its members and has a governing body – for BMDS an Executive Committee. Unlike other organizations however it has a Drama Committee. Many a crisis has been turned into a drama during its meetings.
So it was in 2000. There was a need to find something different and original for BMDS to do. It is all very well putting on British comedies but the theatre going public of Bermuda had clearly indicated that they wanted something different.
BMDS were fortunate to have on its Drama Committee at that time Tom Coash, a professional playwright and a dramaturge attached to the Manhattan Theatre Company in New York.
Tom was a great one for theatrical ideas – he had already directed ‘Our Country’s Good’ by Timberlake Wertenbaker, which also introduced one of the most controversial words in the English language to the Bermuda stage – in the opening scene!
Tom, had been telling the committee of a theatre company in Philadelphia who performed their work in alleys and pathways in obscure parts of the City.
This led Dr. Phillip Jones, committee member, emergency room doctor and exquisite character actor to question the length of these plays and how an audience watching the street play may be put off if it was variously raining, cold, being too hot.
Much comedy was had as these two, joined by yours truly started to throw ideas around as to what Bermuda could do to match such a wonderful idea. Soon (and don’t ask) the topic of soup came up and then Andy Warhol and then …. The Famous for Fifteen Minutes Playwriting Festival was born.
At around this time, the BMDS Charitable Trust had been created. The aims of which were to promote the arts and to encourage training and education in the performing arts. Why not, says I, lets have the proceeds of the Festival go to the Trust?
The concept was created around the table and later in the bar. Although amusing, the concept spurned rules which are as current today as they were in 2000. The play should be an original, never before performed; be of no longer than 15 minutes in length, must not be a musical and no helicopters.
As the discussion progressed we worked out that everything about ‘Famous’ had to be simple. The staging had to be simple, the set minimal, the lighting uncomplicated and the sound …well, you get the idea.
Then the other two seemed to lose interest in the practicalities of putting the Festival on and I found myself as producer with Phillip arranging the bartenders for the show nights!
The rehearsal time was limited to four weeks; there would be six plays that could be performed; there would be open auditions and the script deadline (we had to advertise the Festival and call for scripts) would be about a week or two before the auditions started.
The scripts would be delivered to an anonymous reading committee who would choose the six best plays. The rest would be rejected and those six would go on to be performed with a winner being chosen by a celebrity theatre professional on the Gala night final performance (when ticket prices were at least twice ordinary show night prices and attendees were treated to bubbly and supper before and after the show).
In the first ever Festival in 2001 we ran for three nights and sold out. We now run for 9 nights and sell out.
Our first celebrity judge was Norm Foster, the prolific Canadian playwright and the most performed playwright in North America. The first winner of the Festival and the holder of the ‘Golden Inkwell’ Award was Marg Hammond.
BMDS had commissioned the award from the lovely and talented Julie Hastings-Smith who cast the concept for the trophy from bronze and donated it to the cause. The trophy has pride of place today in the BMDS Trophy Cabinet and now has 9 worthy winners surrounding Julie’s original design.
Let’s put “Famous’ into perspective – it is not a Festival about BMDS putting on a series of one Act plays – it is a writing Festival. The performances are all about the writing. In our discussions we realised that there were not many outlets for budding writers in Bermuda and there was a need for a vehicle to showcase writers’ talents.
Although the eventual winner gets the ‘Golden Inkwell’ and a cheque for $250 it is not about the winning it is more about having the play performed. Six playwrights have that chance of seeing their work come to life on stage – every night for nine nights before the celebrity judge announces his choice as winner – based purely on the writing and not on the performance of the actors or the staging or direction.
Those playwrights who have had their plays performed (and those who have not but enter the Festival anyway) have gone on to write more fifteen minute plays, full length plays and had them performed in professional theatres overseas, performed as radio plays and even performed at City Hall in Hamilton.
Some writers make a departure from their own comfort zone to submit to ‘Famous’ novelists and poets have also contributed and have gone on to have greater success with their traditional writing.
And the Trust? Well, it has gone from strength to strength and is now a formidable player in the bursary and scholarship stakes for aspiring Bermuda students who wish to follow study/education in any aspect of the performing arts. Our bursary winners have included actors, vocalists, set designers, dancers, lighting designers and more.
Various Bermuda publications refer to ‘Famous’ as being firmly on the Bermuda Performing Arts Calendar each year. Ten years ago it was but a dream that we would put on the first and dare to have a second show the next year.
So popular is the event that writers will organise their vacations and business trips around the Festival so that they can be assured of being in Bermuda on the Gala Night (a requirement under the rules) and the actors love to be involved because so many are needed – four maximum for each fifteen minute play (a requirement under the rules) and the designers always want to show off what they can do with the minimum requirements under the rules. And of course, the audiences love the night out – where else can one get such an entertaining night out?”
This year’s Famous for Fifteen Minutes Playwriting Festival runs from September 22 – October 1, 2011. The script deadline is July 20, 2011, and auditions on August 15 & 16, 2011. Please see www.bmds.bm for further information
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