Katherine Koller on Script Salon and Its Influence
Katherine Koller
Playwright in Springboards and Producer of Script Salon.
I remember Springboards at Workshop West in 1995 with my very first public reading ever, a short play called Beatty. The next year, two of my one-acts were in the festival and my director was Heather Inglis. The year after that, Heather directed (and encouraged) my first attempt at a full-length play. Of these four early plays, two were published. In 2008 I had two excerpted readings at Springboards. One of the plays was The Seed Savers, which premiered at Workshop West the following year.
My Springboards experience taught me that play development festivals help playwrights revise, make contacts and get produced. Reading to an audience is a step after hearing the play read at the workshop table. It helps to test out material by being in the audience.
So when a group of playwrights met with the intention of getting new Alberta scripts read by professional actors in front of audiences as a development tool, I volunteered to coproduce. We came up with the name Script Salon to reflect the venue (Holy Trinity Upper Artspace), negotiated contracts and payment assistance from Alberta Playwrights Network (including an honorarium for the playwrights), financial and promotion support from the Playwrights Guild of Canada, put out a donations jar at the door, and hoped for the best. Our first reading in 2014 was my play Last Chance Leduc, which recently won the Alberta Playwriting Competition. An audience came, and came month after month to hear a new play by an Edmonton playwright.
The Script Salon audience is also invited to stay after the reading for a Playwright Talkback, and many patrons have said to me that this is their favourite part of the evening, the chance to complement the playwright, ask a question, or provide an image, a line, or action from the play that resonated with them. One said, “At Script Salon, I feel like I’m part of the theatre.” For those of us in the room who are playwrights, Script Salon is a teacher. We learn from each other and from the professional community of actors and directors in Edmonton. Of the 139 full scripts, shorts and excerpts we have read so far at Script Salon, 56% have gone on to full productions elsewhere.
Scripts ready for an audience come to us from Alberta playwrights at all stages of their careers. Readings are at 7:30 pm on the Second Sunday of each month (unless otherwise noted) and posted on our Facebook Page, Script Salon. To receive email notifications, or to send a script, contact edmontonscriptsalon@gmail.com.
Every March, Alberta Playwrights Network collaborates with Script Salon to present a script selected from the Finalists in the Alberta Playwriting Competition. The Fringe Script Tease is another favorite Script Salon event, where up to ten groups present a teaser of their Fringe shows. This year, it takes place on August 7 in the Upper Artspace.
Upcoming is a special co-presentation with the Citadel Collider Festival of Alina by Lianna Makuch on April 10 (at the Rice Theatre). On May 8, we celebrate 8 years of Script Salon with 8 playwright readings at the Upper Artspace!
I am happy to be at the new Springboards New Play Festival on March 27 with a snippet of my play Riverkeeper at the Alive and Kicking Cabaret, proudly co-presented by Script Salon, with so many playwrights in the room. See you there!
