LOWER LAKE — On Saturday, July 8 and Sunday, July 9, four very different plays were presented in a “reader”s theatre” style at the Weaver Auditorium as part of the third biennial Playing by the Lake Scriptwriting Festival. The main idea behind these festivals is to expose our Lake County community to previously unperformed plays from across the world. Linda Altman, who has coordinated each of the three scriptwriting festivals over the past six years, described the process in a very detailed manner:
Announcements for the Scriptwriting Festival were listed on various Internet writer networks such as the Writer”s Market and the Playwright”s Notice Board. Submissions were required to be of feature length. This year, there were 105 submissions from all over the world. Then, these submissions flowed through an extensive process of readers to screen out plays that did not fit the feature length criteria, plays that were inappropriate for this forum and others. Plays that showed promise went on to other readers, and eventually, through the efforts of the readers and other collaborators, four feature length plays were chosen to be presented to a live audience and a final panel of judges on July 8 and 9. The process was very much like how manuscripts travel through a publishing firm, Altman said.
In presenting these scripts, a staged reading was implemented in which the use of sets, props and movement was fairly minimal. The judges were asked to focus solely on script itself instead of the performance. Directors and actors from both within and out of the Lake County Repertory Theatre were either chosen or volunteered to organize and put on the presentations of the different scripts. The plays that were presented on July 8 and 9 included “The Thing with the Tree,” submitted by Vicki Riba Koestler of Virginia, “The Last Stage East,” submitted by David Hall of Colorado, and “Some Remote and Distant Place,” submitted by William Baer of Evansville, Ind. “Legerdemain,” submitted by Michael Wolfson of the San Diego area and directed by Bert Hutt for the festival, was the winner and will be given full production at the Weaver Auditorium in October.
It became very clear as the festival came to a close that this was a very worthwhile pursuit and was perceived very well by the theatrical community and by the Lake County community in general. When asked which play was her favorite, Mrs. Altman very quickly responded, “My role is to coordinate the big picture, not to judge.” Perhaps that is to say something about the theatrical community at large: it does not exist to judge people or communities or ideas; it is simply there to present to the audience a glimpse of that big picture.
Lastly, the festival would like to recognize the work and help of Bert Hutt, Winkie and Dick Griffin, Sandra Wade, Randy Hare, Linda Lake, Bob Sprouse, and Rich and Linda Altman. Thank you for your work and your contributions to Lake County.
Editor”s Note: Middletown High School graduate Eric Clow is interning for the Clear Lake Observer*American through a Lake County Office of Education partnership.
