Time has just flown, and NEXT MONDAY we will be kicking off the 2014 Essential Theatre Festival with our first Bare Essentials reading, Trolls by Robin L. Burke of Snellville, Ga.

We had a chance to speak with the playwright, and here is what she had to say:

Tell us about the show we are going to see this Monday night.
TROLLS is a farce about a practical-minded attorney who discovers her father believes his river home has trolls.  I guess it’s a pretty fair question to wonder what inspired that.

What was your inspiration for writing this play?

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Thanks to Julie Bookman and Encore Atlanta for this article about our festival this summer!

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE- ATLANTA, GA

RAVENS & SEAGULLS, written by Karla Jennings, one of the co-winners of the 2014 The Essential Theatre Playwriting Award, focuses on three women who face the final days of their ailing sister’s life. Through exploring the dynamics of sisterhood and familial strife and companionship, RAVENS & SEAGULLS is at once emotionally raw and painfully funny, standing as a transcendent study of love, mortality and survival.

Since the beginning of the festival in 1999, The Essential Theatre has committed to producing at least one new play a year by a Georgia playwright.

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The Essential Theatre Festival made the AJC’s Guide to Atlanta’s Summer of High Drama (And Comedy Too)! Go team!!

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“Essential Theatre continues its tradition of premiering the best new work by Georgia playwrights for Atlanta audiences with this summer’s Essential Theatre Play Festival, taking place July 18 through August 17 in its new home at the West End Performing Arts Center, located at 945 Ralph David Abernathy Boulevard…” 

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE- ATLANTA, GA-

That Uganda Play, written by Theroun Patterson, one of the co-winners of the 2014 The Essential Theatre Playwriting Award, is an epic story that moves from America to Africa and back again, imagining the ghosts of war, political corruption and personal betrayal that might lie behind the recent anti-Gay legislation in the nation of Uganda.  Previously, Theroun won the Essential Award back in 2011 for his family drama A Thousand Circlets, which was a big hit in that year’s Essential Theatre Festival.

Since the beginning of the festival in 1999,

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Atlanta Fringe 2014 is upon us, and this year’s Festival features 20 different performance groups from all over the country. We at Essential, of course, are super proud to report that of those, 11 different groups are Georgia artists. Way to represent!

Tonight at 8:00 at 7Stages Theatre,
check out the FREE PREVIEW PARTY
and get a sneak peek of all of the shows!

On the docket from Georgia, you will see:

Middle Eastern Dance, from Awalim Dance Company of Stone Mountain
Belly Dancing, from Beyond Borders of Atlanta
Spoken Word/Storytelling,

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SO MUCH THANKS to all 60 of our amazing, incredible and SOOO appreciated power2give campaign donors. Thanks to your support, this summer’s festival will continue to deliver the excellent theatre you’ve come to expect from Essential and our playwrights and artists, and we will be able to achieve all the goals we set for ourselves to better serve the artists and audiences who make our work worthwhile.

From the bottom of our hearts, thank you each and every one:

Mark Perloe
Jennifer Kimball
Chris Carlsten
Justin Bradshaw
Cathy Jamison
Mary Marshall
Jill Buechner
Patricia Wright
Portia Cue
Judy Beasley
Rial Ellsworth
Jo Howarth-Noonan
Charlotte Fleck
Yolanda Asher
Topher Payne
Ellen McQueen
Bob Smith
Theo Harness
Brenda Porter
Joseph Gantt
Lenny Pallats
Susan Steifel
Vynnie Meli
Klimchak
Timothy McDonough
Kathleen McManus
Rebecca Westlake
Richard Belcher
Hank Kimmel
Sarah Cave
Kelly Christopher
Steven Ritchie
Robert Drake
Jill Patrick
Danyale Taylor
Hilary King
DeWayne Morgan
David Keith Best
Lee Buechele
Lori,

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-by Jennifer Kimball, managing director, Essential Theatre

As you are well aware by now, the Essential Theatre Festival is moving to the West End Performing Arts Center this summer. Honestly, it’s not a place I had been aware of before our search for a new home began last fall. But what a treasure it is!

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – ATLANTA, GA –  MAY 27, 2014

Since the beginning of the festival in 1999, The Essential Theatre has committed to producing at least one new play a year by a Georgia playwright. Essential began its annual Essential Theatre Playwriting Competition in 2001, strengthening its ties to local writers by establishing  the only competition exclusively dedicated to playwrights in the state of Georgia. The award for this competition? Production of the play in that year’s Festival and a cash stipend. Now in its 14th year, TheEssential Theatre Playwriting Award co-recipients are Karla Jennings and Theroun Patterson.  

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