Forum Theatre (Washington, D.C.)

Last updated
Forum Theatre
Formation2003
TypeTheatre group
Location
Artistic director(s)
Michael Dove

Forum Theatre was a non-profit theatre company based in Washington, D.C. Founded in 2004 as Forum Theatre and Dance, it worked out of the Warehouse Theatre, the H Street Playhouse and, in its final years, out of a black box theatre in Silver Spring, Maryland. The company focused on plays that featured storytelling and theatricality. The company also aimed to host productions dealing with topics that lent themselves to post-show discussions, which the theatre hosted in the lobby. It was known for producing "new and recent plays at revolutionarily low prices," according to The Washington Post . [1] The Forum Theatre ceased operations on July 31, 2018. [2]

Contents

History

Forum Theatre was founded in 2004 by Kelly Bartnik, Michael Dove, Paul Frydrychowski, and Mark W.C. Wright. Instead of using a single performance method, Forum would explore storytelling styles and artistic media. The founders had backgrounds in film, dance/movement, music, visual art, and theatre.

The company also aimed to bring new or seldom-performed plays to Washington, using the shows to promote artistic expression and discussion. The company's first productions were a collection of Samuel Beckett short plays and a movement and video piece called All Things Seen, based on Jean-Paul Sartre's No Exit .

The company performed at the Arena Stage in Washington, Warehouse Theater, Church Street Theater, The University of Maryland, The Kennedy Center Millennium Stage, and Round House Theatre in Silver Spring, Maryland before taking up residence at the H Street Playhouse in northeast DC in June 2007. Its production history includes the world premieres of Israeli playwright Ami Dayan's UpShot and a new translation of The Gas Heart commissioned by the company, along with the DC premieres of Hamletmachine , Václav Havel's The Memorandum , Kid-Simple: A Radio Play in the Flesh , Caryl Churchill's The Skriker , and Don DeLillo's Valparaiso .

In October 2006, Forum founded and produced (with the Irish-American arts organization Solas Nua) the DC Samuel Beckett Centenary Festival, [3] to celebrate the writer's work and impact on contemporary art. The festival, which took place in several DC venues, included two weeks of theatre productions, film screenings, panel discussions, academic symposia, book clubs, downloadable radio play podcasts, and the international touring production of Waiting for Godot by Ireland's Gate Theatre. The festival was sponsored by the Embassy of Ireland, The University of Maryland, and the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

For its 2007–08 season, the company produced Jean Anouilh's Antigone , The Last Days of Judas Iscariot by Stephen Adly Guirgis, and Marat/Sade by Peter Weiss. The group later launched a blog called "OpenForum".

At one point, the group has 16 performers, technicians, and theater administrators, supported by a 13-member board.

The Washington Post noted that Forum was among the first theatres in the D.C. area to both pursue gender parity when selecting which playwrights they performed and to employ a "pay what you want" admission policy.

Production timeline through 2009

2004-2005

2005-2006

2006-2007

2007-2008

2008-2009

Company members

Awards

The Forum Theatre received ten nominations for the Helen Hayes Award. [6]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Hall (director)</span> English theatre, opera and film director (1930–2017)

Sir Peter Reginald Frederick Hall CBE was an English theatre, opera and film director. His obituary in The Times declared him "the most important figure in British theatre for half a century" and on his death, a Royal National Theatre statement declared that Hall's "influence on the artistic life of Britain in the 20th century was unparalleled". In 2018, the Laurence Olivier Awards, recognizing achievements in London theatre, changed the award for Best Director to the Sir Peter Hall Award for Best Director.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Royal Court Theatre</span> Theatre in London, England

The Royal Court Theatre, at different times known as the Court Theatre, the New Chelsea Theatre, and the Belgravia Theatre, is a non-commercial West End theatre in Sloane Square, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London, England. In 1956 it was acquired by and remains the home of the English Stage Company, which is known for its contributions to contemporary theatre and won the Europe Prize Theatrical Realities in 1999.

The Shakespeare Theatre Company is a regional theatre company located in Washington, D.C. The theatre company focuses primarily on plays from the Shakespeare canon, but its seasons include works by other classic playwrights such as Euripides, Ibsen, Wilde, Shaw, Schiller, Coward and Tennessee Williams. The company manages and performs in two spaces: The Michael R. Klein Theatre and Sidney Harman Hall. In cooperation with George Washington University, they run the STC Academy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Theatre Intime</span>

Theatre Intime is an entirely student-run dramatic arts not-for-profit organization operating out of the Hamilton Murray Theater at Princeton University. Intime receives no direct support from the university, and is entirely acted, produced, directed, teched and managed by a board of students that is elected once a semester. "Students manage every aspect of Theatre Intime, from choosing the plays to setting the ticket prices."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Ortiz</span> American actor and artistic director (born 1968)

John Augustin Ortiz is an American actor. He is known for his antagonist role as Arturo Braga in Fast & Furious (2009) and Fast & Furious 6 (2013), and Clyde in Jack Goes Boating (2010), which earned him a nomination for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Actor. He is also an artistic director/co-founder of the LAByrinth Theater Company.

Stephen Adly Guirgis is an American playwright, screenwriter, director, and actor. He is a member and a former co-artistic director of New York City's LAByrinth Theater Company. His plays have been produced both Off-Broadway and on Broadway as well as in the UK. His play Between Riverside and Crazy won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

Mad Forest: A Play from Romania is a play by English playwright Caryl Churchill. The three acts occur, respectively, shortly before, during, and shortly after the Romanian Revolution of 1989. The play is mostly written in English, but has several passages in Romanian, including having the cast sing Romania's national anthem, "Deşteaptă-te, române!".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rupert Goold</span> English theatre director

Rupert Goold is an English director who works primarily in theatre. He is the artistic director of the Almeida Theatre, and was the artistic director of Headlong Theatre Company (2005–2013).

Bart DeLorenzo is a Los Angeles-based theater director and producer. He is the founding artistic director of the Evidence Room theater, a 17-year-old company renowned in Los Angeles for contemporary theater productions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sean Mathias</span> British actor

Sean Gerard Mathias is a Welsh actor, director, and writer. He is known for directing the film Bent and for directing highly acclaimed theatre productions in London, New York City, Cape Town, Los Angeles and Sydney.

<i>The Last Days of Judas Iscariot</i> Play written by Stephen Adly Guirgis

The Last Days of Judas Iscariot is a play by American playwright Stephen Adly Guirgis first staged Off-Broadway at The Public Theater on March 2, 2005, directed by Philip Seymour Hoffman.

The Skriker is a 1994 play by Caryl Churchill that tells the story of an ancient fairy who, during the course of the play, transforms into a plethora of objects and people as it pursues Lily and Josie, two teenage mothers whom it befriends, manipulates, seduces and entraps. Whilst speaking English in its human incarnations, the Skriker’s own language consists of broken and fragmented word play. Blending naturalism, horror and magical realism, it is a story of love, loss and revenge. As with Churchill's A Mouthful of Birds (1986), the play explores the themes of post-natal psychosis and possession.

Nomadic Theatre is a co-curricular, student-led theatre group at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. in the United States. Focused on being "technically ambitious and socially engaged," it is dedicated to producing new works that have an aspect of social awareness and using the theatre process to allow students to learn about theatre. The group takes its name from its history of having no permanent theatre to work in.

Seven Jewish Children: A Play for Gaza is a six-page, 10-minute play by British playwright Caryl Churchill, written in response to the 2008-2009 Israel military strike on Gaza, and first performed at London's Royal Court Theatre on 6 February 2009. Churchill, a patron of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, has said that anyone wishing to produce it may do so gratis, so long as they hold a collection for the people of Gaza at the end.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Caryl Churchill</span> British playwright (born 1938)

Caryl Lesley Churchill is a British playwright known for dramatising the abuses of power, for her use of non-naturalistic techniques, and for her exploration of sexual politics and feminist themes. Celebrated for works such as Cloud 9 (1979), Top Girls (1982), Serious Money (1987), Blue Heart (1997), Far Away (2000), and A Number (2002), she has been described as "one of Britain's greatest poets and innovators for the contemporary stage". In a 2011 dramatists' poll by The Village Voice, five out of the 20 polled writers listed Churchill as the greatest living playwright.

John Morogiello is an American playwright In residence with the Maryland State Arts Council. His plays are often comedic examinations of history, literature, office politics, or a life in the theater. Since 2016, he has served as artistic director of Best Medicine Rep, a theater company located in Gaithersburg, Maryland that specializes in new comedies. Morogiello's work has been compared to that of British playwright Tom Stoppard.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Karen Zacarias</span> Mexican-American playwright

Karen Zacarías is a Latina playwright who was born in Mexico in 1969. She is known for her play Mariela in the Desert. It was the winner of the National Latino Playwriting Award and a finalist for other prizes. Mariela in the Desert was debuted at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago. Zacarías is the founder of the Young Playwrights' Theater located in Washington, D.C.

Love and Information is a play written by the British playwright Caryl Churchill. It first opened at the Royal Court Theatre in September 2012. It received many positive reviews from critics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cara Ricketts</span> Canadian film, stage and television actor

Cara Ricketts is an actress, best known for her roles as Mary Lacroix in Anne with an E and Lilly Rue in the 2019 revival of Street Legal.

References

  1. Marks, Peter (July 16, 2014). "Next Season Preview: Forum Theatre". Washington Post.
  2. Marks, Peter (June 6, 2018). "Forum Theatre, a small local gem, to close its doors". Washington Post.
  3. "Beckett Centenary Festival". Gate Theatre Dublin. Retrieved 2023-03-16.
  4. Marks, Peter (2006-01-21). "Forum Gets a Line On Nonlinear Works". Washington Post. ISSN   0190-8286 . Retrieved 2023-03-16.
  5. "Kelly Bartnik". Kelly Bartnik. Retrieved 2023-03-16.
  6. "Nominations for the 2017 Helen Hayes Awards". Washington Post. ISSN   0190-8286 . Retrieved 2023-03-16.