The Emanuel Fried New Play Workshop

Dedicated to supporting playwrights in the development of scripts with strong production and performance values. It is named for RLTP favorite and one of our region's most respected original playwrights Emanuel "Manny" Fried.

Each year up to ten participants are selected to meet twice a month to craft their newest play in an atmosphere of peer support and guidance. At the end of the development cycle, each work is given a public staged reading featuring Western New York's leading talent to test the audience-readiness of the piece.

The workshop is led by Workshop Director Kyle LoConti and Literary Director Jon Elston.

RLTP’s Emanuel Fried New Play Workshop supports the development of original dramatic works by local playwrights. Under the supervision of Workshop Director Kyle LoConti and Literary Manager/Resident Playwright Jon Elston, playwrights provide peer support to one another during the composition and revision of their original plays over a nine month period. RLTP then presents readings of these new plays to the public, directed by and featuring some of WNY’s finest theatrical talent. Audience members who attend these readings are invited to enjoy a glimpse of tomorrow’s world premiere productions and to offer their constructive feedback—an integral component of each playwright’s process.

Free public readings of the plays developed in the 2010 NPW will begin in September of 2010.

9/20/2010 @ RLTT:

Eats by Melody Von Smith

Sometimes the worst things can happen in even the best of restaurants... the Artie award-nominated author of Bonegrinders brings you a toothsome new comedy that exposes the hysterical excess of the world of haute cuisine.

Directed by Norm Sham.

9/27/2010 @ RLTT:

Internal Continuity by Shaun McLaughlin

It might be the end of the Ice Age for aging fanboys Efrin, Shelby, and Buster when Efrin finally discovers the fairer sex. Will Shelby and Buster be able to dissuade their lifelong friend from the Dark Side of the Force? Will tabletop gaming night survive?!

Starring Rolando Gomez, Matt Witten, and Carlton Franklin.
Directed by Jon Elston.

10/4/2010 @ BE:

Practical Time Travel by Vincent Scarsella

The Terminator as told by Alfred Hitchcock: A man must stop his own father from traveling back in time to prevent his birth in this unusual sci-fi mystery.

Starring Kristin Bentley and Courtney Weather.
Directed by Craig Staufenberg

10/11/2010 @ BE:

Clean Break by Darryl Schneider, RLTP Resident Playwright

More high stakes drama from the Artie-winning author of War Room: an inveterate gambler and his estranged daughter roll the dice one final time... for the future of their relationship.

Starring Kelly Meg Brennan
Directed by Tim Kennedy.

10/25/2010 @ RLTT:

Dependent, Undisciplined, And Sleeping Late by Steve Roylance

This offbeat comedy of sibling symbiosis puts upright neatnik Kevin at the mercy of his slovenly slacker brother Jerry, turns the classic Odd Couple formula on its head, and asks the eternal question: why is China Beach still not on DVD?!

Starring John Kreuzer, Jonathan Shuey, Jessica Wegrzyn, and Stefan Brundage
Directed by Kristin Bentley

11/1/2010 @ RLTT:

A New Kind Of Faggot by Justin Karcher

The sequel to 2009’s NPW offering Last Of The Sensitive Bastards (premiering 11/2010 @ Buffalo East); Mike and Brian’s whiskey-soaked misogyny and self-loathing grows to positively Biblical proportions in this scathing dark comedy.

Starring Michael Renna, James Wild, and Megan Callahan
Directed by Drew McCabe.

11/8/2010 @ RLTT:

A Wretch Like Me by James Marzo

An aging father and his two adult sons engage in a devastating battle over the final fate of the family’s waning matron in this tense domestic melodrama...

Directed by Joe Natale

11/15/2010 @ BE:

Ruby ‘67 by Annette Daniels-Taylor

June 26th, 1967: While the streets of Buffalo prepare to explode into a catastrophic race riot, the Wells household threatens to similarly unravel from within... over custody of thirteen year-old Ruby, raised by her (black) grandparents and coveted by her estranged (and white) biological mother... the triumphant return of Artie winner Annette Daniels-Taylor (A Little Bit Of Paradise). Starring Jermain Cooper, Adrienne Lewis, and Megan Callahan. Directed by Lorna Hill.

Starring Jermain Cooper, Adrienne Lewis, and Megan Callahan
Directed by Lorna Hill

11/22/2010 @ BE:

Greenspan & The Trilobites by Michael Fanelli

Landis, the affable antique-hunting host of syndicated TV hit “The Cavorting Collector”, finds himself in deep fiscal shit when he is inexplicably mistaken for former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan by two vindictive victims of foreclosure, held hostage, and forced to appraise the value of Everything. A political fantasia from our favorite local absurdist, Michael Fanelli.

Starring Greg Howze
Directed by Tilke Hill

11/29/2010 @ BE:

Waking Cassandra by Alex Livingston

The author of 2009’s cult hit The Alpha Geek returns with another disparate vision. Vespasian Gillingham would count himself a king of infinite space, were it not that he has bad dreams... dreams that show a time and place unfamiliar to a young man in 1850’s New England. Are Vespa’s dreams a blessing, or a curse? And will the motley crew of intellectuals and rogues tasked with solving Vespa’s case be able to bring him peace - or will they be dragged into his infernal madness? 

12/6/2010 @ RLTT:

The Water Table by Jon Elston, RLTP Resident Playwright and Co-Founder

Cologna Estates is a family vineyard at war from within... torn down the middle by the arrival of the mysterious, charismatic, and strikingly different Jaheira Amberlayn. Is she an agent of progress and unity... or a saboteur bearing a secret agenda? The author of Triangles: The Elliptical, American Deal, and the Artie-winning Interrogation Room presents a new (and already-controversial) political allegory...

Directed by Kyle LoConti

12/13/2010 @ RLTT:

The Brown Bull Of Cuailnge by Neil Wechsler

The author of 2009’s Yale Drama Prize-winning world premiere Grenadine returns with the tale of four more men on a very different kind of epic journey; in search of their company, in the middle of an ancient Irish war, they lie by the fire: desperate to justify their situation, and at the mercy of the very nature of storytelling...

Starring Vincent O’Neill

Applications for the 2011 New Play Workshop will be accepted beginning December 1st, 2010. Only electronic submissions (via e-mail) will be accepted. For more information, please visit www.roadlesstraveledproductions.org, or contact Jon Elston at newplayworkshop@roadlesstraveledproductions.org

PAST PARTICIPANTS

• Eric Appleton (06/07)
• Dana Block (06/07, 2009)
• Frank Canino (05/06,06/07)
• Annette Daniels-Taylor (05/06,06/07)
• Cindy Darling (05/06, 2009)
• Philip Durgan (2009)
• Michael Fanelli (05/06,2008)
• Hunter Fernandez (2009)
• Tom Paul Fox (2008)
• Billy Horn (2008)
• Donna Hoke-Kahwaty (2008, 2009)
• Justin Karcher (2009)
• Aaron Krygier (2008)
• Christopher LaBanca (2008)
• Alex Livingston (2008, 2009)
• Melissa Mawhinney (2009)
• Andrew Novell (04/05)
• Donald Richardson Jr. (2008)
• Gary Earl Ross (2008)
• Darryl Schneider (04/05,05/06)
• Ibn Shabazz (2008)
• Lisa Vitrano (04/05)
• Melody Von Smith (06/07,2008)
• Wendy Weinstein (2009)