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POWERSTORIES THEATRE PLAYWRITING FESTIVALS

VOICES OF TRUTH THEATRE FESTIVAL – Showcasing Seven Voices of Truth
VOICES OF WOMEN THEATRE FESTIVAL – Featuring Seven Female Playwrights

Powerstories Theatre is thrilled to be hosting the Voices Playwriting Festivals again this year as part of our 2022 Season. There is no fee to submit your play(s). Last year’s Voices of Truth and Voices of Women Theatre Festivals greatly expanded our playwright’s audience and creative network throughout the United States and beyond. The two festivals presented over 30 plays by up-and-coming new playwrights with vibrant voices and stories. During a difficult time in our history, the stories reminded us we have much to learn by listening to each other, and our similarities outweigh our differences.

The Voices of Truth and the Voices of Women Theatre Festivals are two different festivals produced by Powerstories Theatre. The festivals offer an artistic platform empowering, encouraging, and enabling diverse voices to inspire audiences worldwide through the gift of sharing strong voices and meaningful stories. Powerstories is proud to provide opportunities for artists and playwrights of all genres to share their original plays and musicals to our expanding community and audiences near and far. Both festivals will offer seven evenings each of performances highlighting humorous, heartbreaking, eye-opening, and conversation-starting plays and musicals.

ABOUT POWERSTORIES THEATRE & OUR FESTIVALS

Powerstories offers an artistic platform empowering, encouraging, and enabling diverse voices to inspire audiences worldwide through the gift of sharing strong voices and meaningful stories. We provide opportunities for artists and playwrights of all genres to share their original plays and musicals. This is showcased in two weekends, highlighting eye-opening, conversation-starting, humorous, heartbreaking, true, and fictionalized plays and musicals.

The mission of Powerstories Theatre is to stage true stories to open minds and hearts and inspire action worldwide. The purpose is to create, present, and celebrate true stories to inspire courage and deepen understanding of ourselves and others.

Powerstories Theatre is a professional non-equity theatre that produces true or historic themed plays of social importance. For 21 years, we have helped others know the value of true stories through published and original theatre, workshops, festivals, online true story platforms, and programs for youth. Each year we produce four main stage productions in our 40-seat black box theatre, in addition to several Festivals and the Girlstories Leadership Theatre Program.

We are a member of Theatre Tampa Bay, a local organization that promotes and supports professional theatre in the Tampa Bay Area. In 2010, Powerstories won The Arts and Humanities Youth Program Award, presented to Powerstories at the White House by First Lady Michelle Obama. Powerstories has also won the Spirit of Humanity Award from the DeBartolo Foundation, the Community Hero Award from The Tampa Bay Lightning Foundation, and The WEDU Arts and Culture Award.

VOICES of TRUTH & VOICES of WOMEN THEATRE FESTIVALS

The Powerstories Theatre philosophy is that every person, organization, corporation, and community has a powerstory to discover and share with others. The discovery and the telling of these stories create new success, invest our lives with more meaning, and connect us more vitally with others.

Currently, in our Country’s history, we feel compelled to bring about these Festivals to increase awareness and bring to light issues, challenges, concerns, and difficulties significant to people throughout the world. We support courage and confidence, deepen appreciation for diversity, and strengthen the bonds between people.

The festivals will be a combination of in-house theatre and digital productions, all live-streamed to empower, encourage, and enable diverse voices the opportunity to inspire audiences worldwide through the gift of sharing a vibrant theatrical production. We will be showcasing seven voices with each festival, highlighting eye-opening, conversation-starting, real-life, humorous, heartbreaking plays and musicals.

FOR PLAYWRIGHTS: A CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

All the selected plays will be considered for possible mainstage production at Powerstories Theatre for the next or upcoming seasons.

Your main goal is to produce a quality production. We understand some of you will be presenting a staged reading, some a fuller production. Your play can be a full production with a minimal set or a staged reading. Each submitting playwright will be responsible for all costs related to casting, directing, and mounting the show to achieve the festival goals. All proceeds from ticket sales will go to Powerstories Theatre.

If selected, your play will be presented on a given night during the festival, followed by a live Playwright talkback. Additionally, your play will be part of our Encore Program, where viewers can watch your play after its initial debut over 48 hours. Each submitting playwright will be responsible for DIY self-producing: casting, directing, and mounting the show.

Due to COVID-19, artists will be asked on their application to choose one of the following methods to produce their work:

Live In-Theatre Performance at Powerstories with an audience – These performances will be live-streamed. (We will be following all recommended COVID-19 procedures and protocols.)
Prerecorded Performance – Prerecording on Zoom (or another platform) and live streaming using Powerstories’ platform.

For both options, the Playwright must be available for post-show talkback Q&A after the performance. The directors and cast are also highly encouraged to attend the Q&A.

Each submission will be time-stamped, and you may submit to one or both festivals by choosing your preferences in the submission form.

What We Need

An artistic committee will review all plays and proposals. Selections will be announced by mid-January 2022 or earlier on social and by email notification. Submissions will be reviewed in consideration of the following criteria:

Your submission is congruent with the mission of Powerstories Theatre – staging true stories to open minds and hearts.
Your submission supports diversity and inclusion.
Your submission reflects overall quality and is a fully developed and well-written play
- Strongest consideration will be given to new works.
Your submission is no shorter than 20 to no longer than 90 minutes
- Shorter products can be considered for Friday Night Shorts, a combination of two short plays
The playwright is willing to have their play live-streamed and be available for a playwright talkback either in-person (if produced in theatre) or on Zoom (if prerecorded).
If selected, your play needs to be exclusively presented in conjunction with Powerstories Theatre and cannot be produced elsewhere during these times: December 2021 through April 2022 for Voices of Truth and June through August 2022 for Voices of Women.

What We Provide

Powerstories Theatre will provide the following:

Our 26×13 black box stage for final performances
- If bringing set pieces and props, they must fit in a small van for ease of moving in and out of the theatre
Rehearsal time as per the preapproved schedule
In-theatre technical assistance
- Stage lighting, sound, projection options, and a list of available stock set pieces in our theatre
Marketing assistance
- Including but not limited to our website with photo, bio, play synopsis and schedule, playwright interview to use for promoting your play, press release, and graphics for social media
- Social media marketing
- Logo design, if needed
In-theatre box office assistance
High-quality live-streaming of your play
A copy of the live stream video
An All-Access Festival Pass to enjoy your fellow playwrights’ works

The deadline for submissions to both the Voices of Truth and the Voices of Women Theatre Festival is December 15, 2021

The Voices of Truth Theatre Festival will be held March 15-20, 2022.
The Voices of Women Theatre Festival will be held July 19-24, 2022.

(The submission window for the Voices of Women Theatre Festival may re-open at a later date).

If selected, playwrights will receive more detailed technical information and be responsible for attending a mandatory orientation session via a zoom presentation.

On behalf of the Board of Directors and leadership of Powerstories Theatre, we look forward to receiving your submissions and presenting to the world your amazing stories.

Locations

Here’s where we will be bringing theatre to you next!

JANUARY 2025 – JANE: ABORTION AND THE UNDERGROUND
HCC Mainstage Ybor City
1411 E 11th Ave, Tampa
JANUARY – FEBRUARY 2025 – CADILLAC CREW
The Studio @620,
620 1st Ave S, Saint Petersburg
MARCH 2025 – VOICES OF WOMEN THEATRE FESTIVAL
USF College of the Arts,
School of Theatre and Dance,
3837 USF Holly Drive, Tampa
JULY 2025 – WITCH HUNT
Stageworks Theatre,
1120 E Kennedy Blvd., Tampa
SEPTEMBER 2025 – ADA AND THE ENGINE
Stageworks Theatre,Save
1120 E Kennedy Blvd., Tampa

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Mailing address

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