TheatreWorks New Works Festival Includes Readings of Two New Musicals and Two New Plays

TheatreWorks Silicon Valley’s 21st Annual New Works Festival kicks off on Friday and runs August 9-18 at the Lucie Stern Theatre in Palo Alto. The festival presents plays and musicals in their early stages of development. With multiple performances of each work and input from the audiences, playwrights and composers are able to revise and refine their shows during the festival. The New Works Festival also includes keynote talks with playwrights and directors, special events, food truck dining, and more.

Selected by TheatreWorks artistic producer of the New Works Festival Jeffrey Lo with TheatreWorks artistic director Giovanna Sardelli, this year’s lineup includes readings of the new musical 5 & Dime, the one-woman musical Molly Bell’s Hysterical, the new play Liebling, and the new play A Driving Beat.

5 & Dime is a new musical with a book by Ashley Robinson (Brokeback Mountain), music by Dan Gillespie Sells (Everybody’s Talking About Jamie), lyrics by Shakina (Difficult People), and direction by Giovanna Sardelli, based on the classic play and film Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean by Ed Graczyk. Set in a small Texas town in 1975, the all-female fan club of ’50s heartthrob James Dean hosts a reunion commemorating the 20th anniversary of the actor’s death, recalling the life-changing period when Dean, along with Elizabeth Taylor and Rock Hudson, were in nearby Marfa, Texas filming Giant.

Molly Bell’s Hysterical is a one-woman madcap musical ride through motherhood written by and starring playwright, composer, and performer Molly Bell (The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee) and directed by Obie Award winner Timothy Near.

Liebling by Vichet Chum and directed by Jeffrey Lo is a drama about two American writers confronting their separate German and Cambodian war-haunted heritages.

A Driving Beat by Jordan Ramirez Puckett and directed by Shannon R. Davis is a play about identity and self-discovery brought to light by a mother-son cross-country road trip, set to the teen’s hip-hop beat.

Click here for more information about the festival, including a full schedule.