PORT TOWNSEND — The 21st annual PlayFest, a production featuring one-act plays written by local playwrights, continues its stagings and readings for the next two weekends.
Hosted at the Key City Playhouse, 1128 Lawrence St., the event features performances, open rehearsals, discussion panels and workshops in an effort to bare the inner workings of the creative process, according to organizers.
Tickets are $10 each for the one-act readings, $15 for the one-act productions and $20 for the “Evening with Wendy MacLeod.” A $35 Festival Pass grants attendees access to all events, while a $90 Writer’s Pass includes all events and enrollment in a playwriting intensive workshop with MacLeod. There also will be free-to-the-public events.
This year’s featured playwright is Wendy MacLeod, author of “Women in Jeopardy,” which staged at Key City last year, and the play “The House of Yes,” which became an award-winning film and was produced by numerous theaters.
A graduate of the Yale School of Drama, her other works include “Sin,” “Schoolgirl Figure,” “Juvenilia” and “The Water Children.”
MacLeod will workshop her new play, “Juan Deere.”
Joining MacLeod are regional playwrights Jeni Mahony and Duncan Frost with their scripts “Kandahar” and the for-young-audiences-only “My Father’s Dragon,” respectively.
Six local winners of the Port Townsend Arts Commission’s One-Act Play competition will showcase their work during the festival: Hewitt Brooks with “The Tree Frog Does Not Know,” Micheal Cavett with “Peach Cobbler Justice,” Doug Given with “Intelligence,” Mark Rose with “Family Style,” Deborah Wiese with “R.A.P. Anonymous” and D.D. Wigley with “Red Bikini Red.”
Brooks, Cavett and Rose will be featured during the staged one-act productions, while Given, Wiese and Wigley are spotlighted in the one-act readings.
The festival is sponsored by John L. Scott Real Estate and funded by the Port Townsend Arts Commission and Dramatists Guild Fund.
Here’s a schedule for PlayFest 21, which started Thursday. All events are at the Key City Playhouse unless otherwise indicated.
Today
• 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. — One-act productions ($15).
Saturday
• 3:30 p.m. to 5 p.m. — Teen Lab Musical, where local teens will perform Rowan Gallagher’s senior project, “Sacrificing a Saturday” (free).
• 5 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. — Working drafts, where cold readings are given of new scripts by local playwrights Christopher Clow, Joanne Kumekawa, David Langley and Jack O’Connor (free).
• 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. — One-act productions ($15).
Sunday
• 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. — One-act productions ($15).
• 3:30 p.m. to 5 p.m. — “Kandahar” reading ($10).
• 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. — Teen Lab Musical (free).
Thursday
• 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. — Festival happy hour.
• 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. — One-act productions ($15).
Friday, March 10
• 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. — “My Father’s Dragon” reading at the Pope Marine Building, Madison and Water streets ($10).
• 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. — One-act readings at the Pope Marine Building ($10).
• 3 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. — Teen Lab Musical (free).
• 5 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. — Working drafts (free).
• 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. — “An Evening with Wendy MacLeod” ($20).
Saturday, March 11
• 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. — Free playwriting workshop at the Pope Marine Building, where students are asked to bring in a page of overheard dialogue and transform it into a short play (free).
• 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. — Open rehearsal for “Juan Deere” (free).
• 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. — Open rehearsal for “My Father’s Dragon” at the Pope Marine Building (free).
• 3:30 p.m. to 5 p.m. — One-act productions ($15).
• 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. — Working drafts at the Pope Marine Building ($10).
• 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. — Panel discussion with MacLeod, Mahoney and Frost, and moderated by PlayFest Director Denise Winter, on how dramatic writers move from concept to creation (free).
• 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. — “Juan Deere” reading ($10).
• 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. — InstaPlay at the Pope Marine Building, where a brief play is written on the spot and performed instantaneously (free).
Sunday, March 12
• 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. — Advanced playwriting workshop at the Pope Marine Building, where attendees will “explore the physical life of the characters and how the setting offers opportunities for behavior,” according to organizers ($70).
• 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. — One-act readings at the Pope Marine Building ($10).
• 1:30 p.m. to 3 p.m. — One-act productions ($15).
• 3:30 p.m. to 5 p.m. — “My Father’s Dragon” reading at the Pope Marine Building ($10).
• 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. — “Kandahar” reading ($10).
