The award-winning Emerging Artists Theatre (EAT) returns with its bi-annual Spark Theatre Festival NYC. The 3-week festival will showcase new musicals, dance, solo shows and plays in various stages of development. Broadway talent will take part in the festival including Chilina Kennedy (Carole King in Beautiful on Broadway) and Constantine Maroulis (Rock of Ages, Best Actor Tony Award Nomination) who will take part in the reading of the new musical All The Rage written by Larry Kirwan, directed by Karen Carpenter.
Headlining the festival is the solo show Use Your Words!, written and performed by Karen Eleanor Wright (Screwtape Letters, Off-Broadway and West End) and co-directed with Wright and Zinc Tong. The fully staged production was previously workshopped at the Spark Theatre Festival NYC festival and will receive nine performances. Use Your Words! is a one-act comedy—in five wordless scenes—about a new mother struggling with the responsibility of caring for a tiny human. The show is rooted in comic physicality with many props mimed—most importantly, the baby.
In addition to the musical All The Rage, four other musicals will be presented including Band Boy (written & directed by Sandy McKnight), Letters from Clara (composer/lyricist/book writer Sarah Statler) and Virtually Ours (written by Lisa Ann Grant, Eva Grant Rawiszer, Diana Sussman and Lisa Yves).
Other festival highlights include the solo shows Fingers Crossed by Vanessa Shealy, Leaving Kiev by Mila Levine and The Longer My Mother is Dead, The More I Like Her by Deborah Unger. Numerous plays will be presented at the festival, including Finding Elvis: Elvie by Mindy Pfeffer, Fight or Flight by Allison Furlong and Landscaping by Curt Strickland.
Twenty-nine dance pieces will be presented, including Crossing Through (choreographed by Teresa Fellion) that explores gender identity, Ghostbusters (choreographed by Ellie de Waal) a jazzy dance piece inspired by the 1980’s hit movie and Basketballography: A Tribute to Dolph Schayes (choreographed by Hannah Schayes) created by Dolph’s granddaughter, the piece pays homage to the player’s legacy and contributions to the development of the NBA.
