Artistic Director Rob Melrose’s Reflections on the Alley All New Festival
I’m excited to let you know about the triumphant return of the Alley All New Festival. Because of the calendar switch (changing from spring to fall), it means that it’s been a year and a half since our last festival. So it’s been a while! But to jog your memory and to help folks who have joined the Alley in the last year and a half, the AANF is the most bustling time of the year at the Alley. We will have two full productions on our stages, Noises Off and the World Premiere of The Janeiad, as well as four readings of new plays. For that week, the building will be full of actors, directors, playwrights, agents, and theatre leaders from all over the country. There is always an electric feeling in the air during this week and it is a lot of fun. It is also where you will see the plays that eventually make it onto our stages. In the five years I’ve been here at the Alley, Born with Teeth, Amerikin, 72 miles to go…, High School Play: A Nostalgia Fest, Torera, Pictures from Home, The World is Not Silent, and Thornton Wilder’s The Emporium all started in Alley All New before they became full productions.
I’m so happy to introduce you to an incredible lineup of new plays from some of this country’s greatest living playwrights.
You can reserve a festival package here, which includes tickets to all five performances, two-panel discussions, and two opportunities to mingle with festival writers, directors, and performers.
Here’s a brief overview of the featured plays, and why I’m so excited about them:
The Janeiad
by Anna Ziegler
World Premiere
This favorite from the 2023 festival returns in the form of a full production. Anna Ziegler’s beautifully poetic meditation on love, grief, and loss is heightened by an elegant design and show-stopping performances from three incredible actors. This everyday epic follows the story of Jane, whose grief reaches mythical proportions as she waits for her husband to return home after 9/11.
Wolfie
by Sharr White
Reading
The last time Sharr was featured in the Alley All New Festival, he developed his play Pictures from Home based on the work of photographer Larry Sultan. Pictures from Home went straight to Broadway, followed by a run in our Hubbard Theatre last season. Sharr’s latest comedy, Wolfie, follows the story of two couples of different generations in an epic battle of money, manners, and man’s best friend.
The Alley
by comfort ifeoma katchy
Reading
comfort ifeoma katchy is a native Houstonian, who was accepted into Yale Drama’s prestigious MFA program after graduating from the University of Houston. We’re so excited to welcome comfort back to Houston for her first featured project at Alley Theatre, appropriately titled The Alley. This slice-of-life drama depicts a family in 1970s Houston, living in a small section of row houses that still stands today.
Uhuru
by Gloria Majule
Reading
In order to write Uhuru, Gloria Majule literally climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro. Gloria, who was raised in Tanzania, spent a week on the mountain observing the complex dynamic between tourists and guides as they made the impossible trek to the ‘roof of Africa.’ The resulting play is a hilarious yet poignant dramedy, which follows an unlikely assembly of hikers as they make the climb.
Zero Hour
by Tea Alagic
Reading
Tea Alagic’s Zero Hour carries an air of unquestionable authenticity. This is because all of the events depicted in the play actually occurred. Prolific and experimental theatre-maker Tea Alagic explores her own past in this riveting autobiography, which depicts her struggle to escape from war-torn Bosnia in the 1990s.
I love all of these plays and I hope you can see a couple if not all of them!
See you at the theatre!