onStage Pittsburgh: The Pittsburgh New Works Festival (PNWF) 31st season is well underway, running through September 18th. This one-of-a-kind theatre festival is a reminder of Pittsburgh’s robust arts culture. The New Works Festival features four programs across four weekends. Each program runs from Thursday to Sunday and is composed of 3-4 new plays submitted by entrants nationwide. A different regional theater company produces each selected play. PNWF is hugely ambitious in scope and fabulously rich in rewards for attendees.
4 comments:
I had no idea that the Pittsburgh New Works Festival was so close to starting this year. I knew of it, but I wasn’t exactly sure what it entailed until now. I think it’s incredibly cool that these are new plays that are composed by new and old playwrights nationwide. To be this close to something so influential and new is enlightening because the arts scene in Pittsburgh is inspiring as a young artist who is constantly growing and changing. To see shows like this that are also growing and changing as much as the culture around it, is exciting and pushes me to thrive to become a better artist and to go out and see all these different productions to broaden my horizons. The plays like I don’t know what I’m Doing and Mom & Mom sound like productions that I am excited to see. I am hopeful that I will be able to go see the 31st season of the New Works Festival because I am really intrigued and interested in seeing what it’s all about.
I’ve been aware that Pittsburgh has a pretty solid arts and culture scene, but I didn’t know of this specific festival. I like that these reviews came out while the festival is still continuing on, so people can read about it and choose to attend the rest. The plays show a variety of human relationships, some focusing more on family and others on friendship; it seems like there’s something to appeal to everyone. Noting that the plays are low-tech and focus on the “play’s essence” is a good line to include in this article to ensure audiences don’t expect a fully realized, high budget production, and go in with a proper mindset to watch a new work. The festival is well framed this way, noting that the Pittsburgh New Works Festival strives to “continually deliver on the wavering mirage of newness.” Especially since people do like to turn towards the newest thing.
Like Sidney, since moving to Pittsburgh, I've become more and more aware of the rich and active arts and culture scene, but this is the first I'm hearing of this festival. I'm not sure if it's just because I'm still new to the city and "out of the loop", or if Pittsburgh is just not great at advertising everything it has going on. I actually don't even know where to look to find these events!
I've gone exploring through the website for this festival and they actually have so much going on beyond the three plays mentioned in the article. That's amazing to see! I like that there are discounted student tickets (I'm assuming any student ID would qualify) and that they also have tickets for virtual events. It's nice to see that virtual tickets are sticking around -- not only does that bring in more revenue from a business standpoint, but it's also a vital option for increased accessibility. I may actually buy a virtual ticket of my own!
I did not know that Pittsburgh has a New Works Festival. Nor did I know about the company onStage. I think that it is cool that they accept applicant’s plays nationwide. I also wasn’t familiar was any of the regional theaters that they mentioned were producing the festival. I think I need to do more research on Pittsburgh’s theatre community. I also appreciated the section about how humans like new things. Seemed a little silly and slightly off topic on the point of the article but I love little added jazz. I also noticed that the article reported that this festival was over the course of 4 weeks but according to the date it was posted there are only two weekends left to be able to go see some new plays. I wish that it was written earlier so that I could have been able to see more shows! I will say that Across A Crowded Room sounds really interesting.
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