Tag Archive for: Walnut Street Theatre

Back In New York

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Oh man…I have not been updating the Producers Blog. So here we go: I have been reading scripts and I am very encouraged by this year’s submissions. So many powerful new plays to choose from. The American theater is alive and vibrant with new work. I hope to announce the 2010 Five Play Repertory in early January. I just love this process. Reading new work  turns me on…And I am very turned on by many of the new scripts that I am reading. I usually read scripts early in the morning when our building is quiet and free of distractions. On a good day I can read two to three new plays. I like to read a script in one sitting without interruption so that I can hear the play from beginning to end. The Fall is one of my favorite times of the year and I enjoy the excitement of reading new work.

I am back in New York on Friday for two days of auditions for the World Premiere of THE ECLECTIC SOCIETY by Eric Conger. I am directing this exciting new play at The Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia. Rehearsals begin in late December. Earlier this month we had auditions in Philadelphia and this weekend we are casting the final thee roles in New York. 

THE ECLECTIC SOCIETY concerns the events surrounding a hazing incident at a New England Ivy College in the fall of 1963…two weeks before the Kennedy assassination. An elite fraternity is fractured when an inner-city black student is brought to the house. Traditional values collide with race, class, and gender issues, as a new world prepares to unfold.

I will write more on this project in future blogs. For more info on THE ECLECTIC SOCIETY check-out The Walnut Street Theatre web-site: www.walnutstreettheatre.org

In addition to casting THE ECLECTIC SOCIETY I will also be attending a concert-reading of a new musical that I am considering for our 2010 Festival. I also have several appointments with playwrights and Lit Agents. I will return to Shepherdstown on Wednesday and take some R&R time over Thanksgiving…I am very fond of this particular holiday.

Ed Herendeen

WALNUT STREET THEATRE

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I am directing a Reading of THE ECLECTIC SOCIETY a new play by Eric Conger at THE WALNUT STREET THEATRE in Philadelphia. We have rehearsal today at 1PM and a public Reading at 7Pm.

This chilling new drama by Eric Conger depicts life in a 1960’s fraternity house as a group of young men struggle to balance tradition with the ever-straining currents of change. The audience is thrown into the testosterone-fueled world of these “brothers” as their house is slowly torn apart by the initiation of an African-American scholarship student. With their country and their lives teetering at the precipice of change, this eclectic group of young men must find a way to overcome their differences before 125 years of tradition comes crashing down around them.

THE ECLECTIC SOCIETY concerns the events surrounding a hazing incident at an Eastern school in the fall of 1963. An elite fraternity is fractured when an inner-city black is brought into the house. Traditional values collide with race, and gender issues, as the new world prepares to unfold.

Eric Conger and I have been developing his new play with THE WALNUT STREET THEATRE. This is our second workshop Reading. I will direct the World Premiere of THE ECLECTIC SOCIETY in January 2010 in Philadelphia.

Ed Herendeen