2016 Scenesters, No. 3: Kristine Guo

Today at the DCPA NewsCenter, we continue our exciting daily countdown of the 10  student playwrights have been named semifinalists for our third annual statewide playwriting competition. (Details below.)

Kristine Guo 2016 ScenestersScenester No. 3: Kristine Guo

School: Peak to Peak Charter School

Teacher: Kristie Letter

Play title: Daffodil

What is your play about? Daffodil tells the story of rebirth and new beginnings, found as a result of the least likely of partnerships and most commonplace of adventures.

Favorite word that appears in your script: “Gift.”

Excerpt from your play: BERTHA: All the food that we throw away at the end of every day. Instead of putting it into the garbage where no one can eat it, we can give it to people like him. … It’s a warm, homemade meal to fill their stomach.”

Who was your inspiration for writing your play? This play actually began in English class as a simple playwriting exercise with “restaurant” as the setting. I was immediately engaged, as I have always loved cooking shows such as Top Chef and Hell’s Kitchen. Combined with my love for fond bickering and unexpected empathy, the story just took off and gained a life of its own, becoming what it is today.

Killer casting: Helen Mirren as Bertha because she is a sophisticated lady who has poise and dignity, just like Bertha.

What did you learn from writing this play? It’s not easy to write a play. This was my first attempt at playwriting, and I learned a lot about the difficulties involved in creating a plot, making believable characters and world-building.


Our complete countdown of 2016 semifinalists (to date):
No. 1: Jafei Pollitt, Denver School of the Arts
No. 2: Jessica Wood, Denver Christian High School
No. 3: Kristine Guo, Peak to Peak Charter School
No. 4: Gabrielle Moore, D’Evelyn High School
No. 5: Ashley Wright and Amelia Middlebrooks, Valor Christian High School
No. 6: Kalina Gallardo, Kunsmiller Creative Arts Academy
No. 7: Kiera Eriksen-McAuliffe, Denver School of the Arts
No. 8: Stephanie Kiel and Mady McGraw, Chatfield High School

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About the Denver Center’s 2016 Regional Youth Playwriting Workshop and Competition:

What: “Your Words Take the Stage”: A one-act playwriting competition designed for area high schools. Local playwrights and DCPA Education staff members taught 145 playwriting workshops in 60 Colorado high schools. More than 3,110 high-school students participated in those workshops, which were held in every school district in the Denver-metro area and in 18 counties, including Alamosa, LaPlata, Montezuma, Ouray and Weld.  

Why: To nurture Colorado’s young playwrights; develop theatre artists and audiences; develop new plays; and advance literacy, creativity, writing and communication through playwriting.

How: A total of 212 submissions were judged blindly by DCPA artistic, literary and education professionals. That represents a 34 percent growth in submissions from 2014. Ten semifinalists are being identified through this rolling daily countdown. At the end of the countdown, three winners will be named. They will receive a cash scholarship of $250 each AND a staged reading in the 2016 Colorado New Play Summit next month. In addition, each teacher of the three finalists will receive a $250 gift certificate for books, supplies or other teaching tools for their classrooms. One play also will be presented as a fully staged performance exercise for DCPA Education students in the summer of 2016.

These back-to-back videos begin with the three teen play readings at the 2015 Colorado New Play Summit through the full staging of the winning play last summer.

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