NEW PLAY AWARD
Portland Civic Theatre Guild New Play Award 2023
The Portland Civic Theatre Guild presents a reading of our 2023 New Play Award Winner!
BAD BABIES (A Western Fairytale)
By Jacklyn Maddux
Directed by Allen Nause
Featuring: Jacklyn Maddux*, Deanna Wells, Sean D Lujan
Sunday, September 10th at The Sanctuary, 1785 NE Sandy Blvd
Two performances! 2:00 pm and 7:00 pm. Donation only
Synopsis:
“Left in a garbage can as an infant, abandoning her own child on a doorstep, a scurrilous old woman lives on the edge of the desert offering water and unexpected gifts to lost men. Cactus Jack revels in her aloneness and howling at the mountain lions who smile at her from the mountains many miles away, until two visitors arrive and change her life forever.”
This is a DONATION only event. All proceeds go to benefit the Portland Civic Theatre annual Endowment Awards, given out to local theatres, artists and students.
Allen Nause is a resident artist at Artists Repertory Theatre where he previously served as Artistic Director for 25 years. Besides directing over 75 productions for Artists Rep, Allen directed at many professional theaters throughout the Northwest including the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and Portland Center Stage. In the 1990s, Allen led three international tours to Africa and the Near and Middle East representing American regional theater for U.S.I.A. Arts America. In 2000, Allen traveled to Vietnam and co-directed a bilingual, bicultural production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and a Vietnamese production of A Glass Menagerie as part of the Vietnam/America Theater Exchange. In May 2007 Allen directed All My Sons with the Palestinian National Theater in Jerusalem as a Cultural Envoy with the US Dept. of State. In 2010 Allen has directed in Islamabad, Pakistan and Tobolsk Russia also as a Cultural Envoy. Allen was a recipient of the 2003 Oregon Governor’s Arts Award.
Jacklyn Maddux* is a playwright and an actor. Her play, STRANGE SIGHTINGS IN THE GREAT SOUTHWEST, was a finalist for the Oregon Book Award and subsequently produced by the Foothill Theatre Company. Her play WOMAN FLOATING OUT A WINDOW was chosen by the Ensemble Studio Theatre in New York for their One Act Festival. Her play, TIME BEING, was chosen to be read by the Reading Parlor. As a Portland actor, Jacklyn has appeared with Third Rail Repertory, Profile Theatre, Shaking-
The-Tree and Corrib Theatre. Nationally, Jacklyn has appeared at Joseph Papp’s Public Theatre in New York in THE ART OF DINING, HAGAR’S CHILDREN, New York Shakespeare Festival, Colorado Shakespeare Festival playing Portia in THE MERCHANT OF VENICE and Beatrice in MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING, and at the Cincinnati Playhouse and Thirteenth Street Theatre in New York in the Off-Broadway revival of Israel Horovitz’s LINE and SHOOTING GALLERY. She is a member of Actors’ Equity and the Dramatists Guild.
Deanna Wells (Bunny MacNally) has worked with many local theatres: Tygres Heart, The Really Big Dance Co., Cygnet, Miracle, Triangle, ART, CoHo, Northwest Classical, The 3rd Floor, Profile and Corrib. A few favorite productions are: All My Sons, Hamlet, Julius Caesar, Gint, Tales of the Lost Formicans, No Mercy, Bloody Poetry, Jingle Spree, and Little Gem. She loves bringing new works to fruition and has worked with artists: Constance Congdon, Shelly Lipkin, Marv Ross, Romulus Linney, and Jacklyn Maddux. Deanna hails from California, originally and is a graduate of Pacific Conservatory for the Performing Arts in Santa Maria, CA.
Sean D Lujan is a founding member of The Reformers, a local immersive off-kilter production company in Portland. The Reformers next production /slash/ will take place inside Movie Madness this October.
* Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers.
The Portland Civic Theatre Guild is also pleased to recognize our seven 2023 finalists for their outstanding works listed below in alphabetical order by playwright:
Shanghai by Linda Alper
Still Harvey Still by Brianna Barrett
Sube y Baja by Francisco Garcia
The God Cluster by Ernie Lijoi
The Eclipse by Sofia Molimbi
Hot Times by Nancy Moss
Hector of LA by Cari Quistberg
BAD BABIES (A Western Fairytale) marks the eleventh anniversary of the Portland Civic Theatre Guild’s commitment to Portland area playwrights and new works through the Portland Civic Theatre Guild New Play Award.
Each spring The Guild calls for submissions from Portland area playwrights, selects a new script, and provides everything the playwright needs to bring the new work from the page to the stage. Previous winners include The Sweatermakers by Andrew Wardenaar, Love is Enough by Donna Barrow-Green, Deception by Nancy Moss, Rimbaud’s Daughter in Louisiana (or the Drunken Pirogue) by Steve Patterson, Badge of Honor by Tim Blough, I Love You/Who Are You by Matthew Miller, Shakespeare's Skull by Rich Rubin, Recent Unsettling Events by Andrea Stolowitz, Cat Napper by Kwik Jones, and Dorothy's Dictionary by E.M. Lewis.
