1 Revolution Play Festival: Backroom of Revolution
Brazosport College was recently the site of the Trans-Atlantic Theatre Arts Exchange’s fifth 1 Revolution Play Festival. Formed in 2005 after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, TATAE’s goal was to entertain children displaced by the disaster. From that sprang the idea of the 1 Revolution Play Festival. 1 Rev’s concept is ideal for anyone who wants to participate in theater, but doesn’t have the time to commit; all it takes is one Saturday. Friday night six playwrights sequester themselves away and get to work, each writing a ten page script. At 7:00 AM they’re done, and the scripts are given to six directors. They read them and divvy them up, then cast from a pool of actors, with no auditions. All throughout the day they rehearse, while also working on costumes, sets, lighting, etc. At 8:00 PM it’s go time, and the plays are performed for the first and possibly last time in front of an audience, the whole process taking approximately 24 hours.
While this years crop saw situations as varied as anarchy at a sperm bank, a post-apocalyptic world, a boy band encountering fans, a hectic day of moving into an apartment, and a behind-the-scenes look at writing one of the plays, the most appropriate for us takes place in a side room at a convention. It’s here four friends sneak away and bring up a variety of geek-centric topics. Written by my friend William Humbird, and directed by another friend, Dustin Cordoba, it plays out like a hundred different conversations I’ve been a part of. I urge you to take 14 minutes and check it out.
If you dug that, here’s a link to the other plays from this year.
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Very cool, and a very inventive approach to theater.
Yeah, it’s a really cool idea. So far work has prevented me from being anything other than an audience member, but hopefully I can participate in a future event.
Oh WOW. While it’s not close to where I live, I might want to get involved in this at some point. One of my favorite things from theatre school was directing a one-act play. And I’ve always wanted to write one (that gets performed… I’ve definitely written my share of one-act plays, none ever being produced).
Or maybe I’ll just steal the idea and do it here…
@Mary – It’s a lot of fun, I highly recommend it. It also is a great way to get the community involved in the theater either as a patron or participant.
I’ve been lucky enough to be involved in all five of the 1 Revolution Festivals in our area and every single time we have brought in new people that become regulars in our audience or have come out to audition for our regular season shows. Since it’s non-profit, it’s also helps us get our theater mentioned a few extra times in the local newspaper (that might help you sell it to the managers of your own local theaters as well as it being super cheap to produce).
Good luck with your own productions!
- On a side note, it is a huge thrill to see your own plays produced for one of these, as a result – our writer slots are always the first volunteer slots to fill up.