New Visions/New Voices is a week-long biennial workshop/festival for playwrights and theaters to stimulate and support the creation of new plays and musicals for young audiences and families. Since its inception in 1991, the program has assisted in the development of 111 new plays, musicals, and operas from 97 playwrights and 38 composers, working with 61 U.S. and 12 international theater companies, and has received awards for exemplary service to the field from both the American Alliance for Theater and Education and the Children's Theatre Foundation of America.

Following the cancellation of the Kennedy Center’s in-person New Visions/New Voices Festival in May 2020, Theater for Young Audiences provided funds to the six selected U.S. theater companies, as well as the 2020 Translation Project, to be used toward future development.  Explore how the companies are working to develop these new plays and musicals below!

IMAGE: A group of smiling actors dressed in dark clothing stand behind music stands, in a room with white paneled walls and wood floor.

New Visions/New Voices 2020 

Scot Reese, Head of Performance, University of Maryland Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies interviews co-founding directors Deirdre Kelly Lavrakas and Kim Peter Kovac about the founding and history of the New Visions/New Voices festival, and introduces the continuing work on the projects selected for the 2020 festival.

Deirdre Kelly Lavrakas founded and directed the Theater Training Program for Young People at the Kennedy Center. Teaching highlights include residencies in Israel, Palestine, Nepal, India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Thailand, and she adapted her Kennedy Center theater training curriculum to help create the only theater training program for children and young people in the Arab Middle East, at the Performing Arts Center in Amman. In May 2011, she co-founded Write Local. Play Global, an international network for theater for young audiences playwrights, which currently has 375 members in 52 countries. She has an MFA in acting from George Washington University.

Kim Peter Kovac has worked as a producer, director, designer, and playwright for theater, opera, and dance, has served on panels for the National Endowment for the Arts and TCG.  Since 1998, he has been on the board of TYA/USA, and was president from 2004-2008. He has been a member of the board of IPAY since 2010. In May 2011 he co-founded ‘Write Local. Play Global’, an international network for playwrights for young audiences. In 2008, both International Performing Arts for Youth (IPAY) and American Alliance for Theater in Education (AATE) honored him for long-time distinguished service to the field. He has an MFA in directing from the University of Texas at Austin.

FAREWELL OPPORTUNITY

Filament Theater, Chicago, IL

A new play by Georgette Kelly

Directed by Julie Ritchey

“I wish to go to Mars.”

That’s what Halley said when she was referred to a wish-granting program for children fighting critical illnesses.  It’s also what Dr. Silva said years ago, before becoming a lead scientist on the Opportunity Mars Rover mission.

And that’s how Halley first visits the laboratory and meets Opportunity. What starts as a one-time visit quickly becomes a weekly habit. Over time, she and Dr. Silva find themselves transformed by new unlikely friendships—with each other and with a rolling robot millions of miles away.  Through heightened language and imaginative realism, their wishes come true and they are on Mars, charting the ridges and valleys of a new planet, on the wings of Opportunity. Ultimately, however, Opportunity’s mission must come to an end: a major dust storm on Mars causes the lab to lose contact with the  rover. Halley is left wondering how to connect with those she loves on earth, especially her sister.

Farewell Opportunity is a new play by Georgette Kelly about living with a prognosis. At its core is the question, how do you keep roving when you—or someone you love—faces a dust storm that threatens to block out the sun? By exploring experiences of illness and death through the proxy of the Mars rover, children and families will leave Farewell Opportunity engaged in a dialogue about loss, grief, and hope.

Farewell Opportunity is being developed with partners at Crescent Cove, the first children’s residential and respite hospice home in the Midwest.

For more information about Farewell Opportunity, contact playwright Georgette Kelly at www.georgettekelly.com/contact.

SELENA MARIA SINGS

Childsplay, Tempe, AZ

Written by Miriam Gonzales

Original Music by Daniel French

Directed by Melissa Crespo

Selena Maria is a 14-year-old indie songwriter. With a unique style and a sophisticated fusion of sounds, she composes music on her laptop wherever and whenever she finds inspiration. But Selena Maria lives in the shadow of a big legacy: her namesake and her mother’s favorite superstar Tejana singer, Selena Quintanilla. When tragedy strikes her family, taking away the one person who truly appreciates her musical voice, Selena Maria must learn to navigate a new town, a newly evolving relationship with her grief-stricken mother, and a new and rising fear: what if her true self isn’t enough? Written by Miriam Gonzales with original music by Daniel French and directed by Melissa Crespo, this vibrant and deeply moving play takes us on a journey of loss, perseverance, and love. 

Premiering October 3, 2021 at Childsplay: https://www.childsplayaz.org/

ONLY ONE DAY A YEAR

The Coterie Theater, Kansas City, MO

Written by Michelle Tyrene Johnson

Directed by Nedra Dixon

During the Jim Crow era of racial segregation, it was perfectly legal for Kansas City, Missouri’s most popular amusement park to limit admission to black patrons to only one day a year. In this play, we see teenage Rose James, in the early 1960s, use smarts, determination, and a little bit of magic to try to defeat this policy, plus fight to grant her little brother’s wish of getting to ride the Fairyland Park rollercoaster on his actual birthday. In contemporary times, we see Rose’s teenage granddaughter Ella use her spirited nature, talent, and inherited magic to stand up to bullies at the school administration level. Written by Michelle Tyrene Johnson and directed by Nedra Dixon, the play offers the invitation to see how the past clearly connects to the present, and how discrimination can be battled by tapping into love, a sense of empowerment, and actual black girl magic.

Producer's Developmental Update:  Only One Day a Year was originally to be produced in the Fall of 2020, following its New Visions/New Voices development week. The play has continued its development through additional drafts, working with the director, Nedra Dixon, and the commissioning theatre, The Coterie, in Kansas City, MO. The play will now get a staged reading during Fall 2021, with a world premiere in February and March 2022.

Additional Details: Cast breakdown - 3 F, 2-3 M, 1 youth.  Approx. running time - 65 minutes www.thecoterie.org

this is what i chose no i’m not sorry and yes if you’d ask me i’d do it again

Jackalope Theatre, Chicago, IL

Written by Daria Miyeko Marinelli

Directed by Will Kiley

Even after William’s death, high school life has trudged on. But when Sara & Aimée start planning “Alive Together” to honor William, his sibling Vivian finally takes a stand and ask-demands Sara to cancel the event.

But should Vivian get to decide, given that William and Sara were “a thing, like romantically” and The Band has been planning their debut for the event? And did anyone think to ask Brett and Aüge who really knew Will, but have been cutting class all year? And what’s going on between Brett and Aüge anyway?

With three moments of decision and eight play tracks, this is what i chose and no i'm not sorry and yes if you'd ask i'd do it again is a birufcating modular play that explores who has ownership over a tragedy, when to stand by your friends, and what it is to try and make sense of a loss when you still have to show up and survive school every single day.

Development
this is what i chose... was originally developed in 2017 & 2018 in partnership with Broadway Training Center of Westchester under Artistic Directors Jason Brantman and Fiona Santos. Through a collaboration with director Will Kiley, this is what i chose...has since received a reading at the University of Texas at Austin, acceptance into the 2020 Cohort of The Kennedy Center & TYA-USA’s New Visions New Voices via Jackalope Theatre, and a year-long workshop at Weiss High School.

Visit https://www.jackalopetheatre.org/education for more information. 

To explore the script, visit: https://www.uproartheatrics.com/shows  or View PDF.

WHAT DO YOU DO WITH AN IDEA, THE MUSICAL

Bay Area Children’s Theater, Oakland, CA

Book and Lyrics by Adam Tobin

Music by Debora Wicks La Puma

Directed by Nina Meehan

Yumi is BORED. The kind of bored that lasts forever, where everything loses its color ...UNTIL... an idea pops into their life. At first they don't know what to do with Idea, hiding it in the forest. And as Idea grows, Yumi realizes it needs nourishment and takes Idea home. But the World Famous Critic has nothing nice to say about Idea, and their friend wants to change Idea. Yumi fears that maybe their idea isn't any good. But through the power of play and imagination, Yumi and Idea find their voices and grow in ways they could never have imagined, ultimately bringing color and music into the world. 

This bold musical adaptation of the bestselling book by Kobi Yamada with an all a-cappella score and fluid gender casting features book and lyrics by Adam Tobin, music by Deborah Wicks La Puma, and direction by Nina Meehan. Now slated as a co-production with Oregon Children’s Theatre and New York City Children’s Theatre, it will delight dreamers and skeptics alike.

Amid the quarantine of COVID-19, the La Puma family singers recorded this rendering of the play's finale, "All Kinds of Ideas."

Visit https://bactheatre.org/ for more information.

INEŻ KIENET PERF(ETTA) [INEŻ WAS PERF(ECT)]

The Translation Project, Malta

Written by Simone Spiteri

Directed by Karin Serres

Ineż is fourteen. She’s what they call a Perf - short for “perfect”. Popular, beautiful, sassy, rebellious, a saint. Perfect in all senses. Kind of.

Ineż goes missing.

No one seems to be culpable but everyone is complicit in her disappearance.

The play is based on a Maltese 19th century novel and set in contemporary times as it tries to understand who Ineż could be in a 21st century setting and whether we are still finding ways to keep her as voiceless and vulnerable as her earlier counterpart.

From Karin Serres – Director

When the Kennedy Center invited me to direct the rehearsals and public reading of Ineż Was Perf(ect) in the frame of New Visions New Voices 2020, I was aware and thrilled by the depth and the playfulness of this very peculiar play dramatizing a true contemporary and global story.

Because of the COVID crisis, I had to work on it online, within our committed team: Simone Spiteri, Kim Peter Kovac, Deirdre Kelly Lavrakas, and more associated artists.

Together, we've embarked for a long and very enriching journey around the American translation of this play. Our long-term talks, exchanges and adjustments to the tiniest details, followed by the two shared Zoom readings, have revealed to me the true core of this play: a vibrant chorus about our young people’s emotions and pressure, today, especially girls, especially when they seem “perfect”.

Do read this awesome American version of Ineż Was Perf(ect), do jump into its intense young world, powerful structure and playful language, do count hours and days with us before Ineż is found again and do ask yourself and your team and your audience, again and again: who’s truly responsible for Ineż’s disappearance?

If you have questions or wish to obtain a perusal copy of the script, please email Playwright/Translator Simone Spiteri at [email protected] or View PDF.

THE BOY WHO KISSED THE SKY

An Electric Musical by Idris Goodwin

Seattle Children’s Theatre, Seattle, WA

Written by Idris Goodwin

Directed by Tim Bond

Set in the heart of the Seattle’s Central District to the rhythms that shaped a generation, The Boy Who Kissed the Sky is inspired by the early life and influences of Seattle native and musical icon Jimi Hendrix. The early era of rock ‘n roll music sets the stage as a young Black boy conjures his creativity as a budding guitarist. Guided by the spirit of music itself, the Boy learns to find harmony inside the challenging noises of his life.

Told with vibrant music and daring imagination, this play inspires us to dream big when it matters most. Commissioned by SCT in partnership with Alliance Theatre Company, this highly theatrical play by Idris Goodwin and directed by Tim Bond is funded in part by The Kennedy Center’s New Visions, New Voices to support the creation of new plays and musicals for young audiences and families.