NYTimes pictures Playwright Heaven

Care and Feeding of Plays and Playwrights

NYTimes article
By JESSE GREEN

I don't know how long it will be possible to read this before it disappears, but it is enough to make every aspiring playwright weep with envy.

Published: February 25, 2007 QUOTING EXCERPT:
"MONDAY Something felt very unusual about the first public reading, earlier this month, of Brooke Berman’s “Out of the Water.” It wasn’t just that the play was good; that sometimes happens. Nor was it so rare to find, even on a bitter Monday night in February, an enthusiastic audience of 40 and a top-notch cast of young theater names. But it seemed almost suspicious that a hip new play by a writer not widely known was being presented in a room with comfortable seats. Also, the heat worked. And what had become of the rats and pigeons that usually attended such readings? Who printed the nice programs? Why were the bathrooms so lovely?

Then there is a nice photo of them in their clean well-lighted place:
Members discuss a script at Ars Nova’s Play Group. From left, Mat Smart, Etan Frankel, Liz Flahive and Carly Mensch. The group focuses on emerging writers and scripts in development. “It’s like a pep rally with pizza and beer,” Ms. Mensch said.

One more paragraph of Fair Use:
"The answer to all of these questions was Ars Nova, the mighty little uptown-downtown theatrical venture on far West 54th Street, which was presenting “Out of the Water” as part of its Out Loud play-reading series. In a landscape defined by stately institutional behemoths and youthful but impoverished start-ups, Ars Nova has designed something new from the best elements of each."