Today on the DCPA NewsCenter, we continue our daily countdown of the 10 Colorado student playwrights who have been named semifinalists for our fifth annual statewide playwriting competition. On Wednesday, Jan. 17, we will announce the writers whose plays will be read at the 2018 Colorado New Play Summit. (Details below.)

SCENESTERS NO. 2:
ASHLEY WRIGHT AND AMELIA MIDDLEBROOKS

• Class: Seniors
• Teacher: Kurt Muenstermann
• Your play title: Forces of the Universe Anonymous
  
• What is your play about? Life, Death, Time and Love are sick of their jobs and sick of humanity. Their interactions with humans have left them dejected and bitter. Life begins leading group-therapy sessions that are attended reluctantly. Slowly, each character begins to make discoveries about their views on relationships between themselves and humanity as a whole.

Return writer: Read Amelia’s 2017 Scenester profile

• What was your inspiration for writing your play? Ashley: “I was inspired in part by The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. The narrator of the book is Death, and though I haven’t read it since seventh grade, the way he was characterized has always stuck out to me as unique and profound. The idea of adding in other characters besides Death came from Amelia.” Amelia: “I love the animated movie The Book of Life for its beautiful art style and captivating story, which similarly characterizes Death and Life. Putting those two seeds of inspiration together is what grew this story.
• Favorite words that appears in your script: Collide … and pocket-watch.
• Killer casting: We both would enjoy seeing Scarlett Johansson play Love. She would be able to portray both sides of the character: Love is flirty and sexy on the exterior, but beneath the surface, vulnerable and protective.
• What did you learn from writing this play? The forces of the universe (Life, Death, Time and Love) are not as separate as we may have once believed. Life creates love, love needs time, and while time ultimately does lead to death, it does not cancel out the reality of the life, love, and time of that individual. In the process of writing this play, we had to think hard about what the essences of these characters are. What is Love, really? Or Life, or Death, or Time? It is in one sense a great mystery but in another it is so apparent that by simply watching people come and go on a street one can see heartbreaking and heartwarming moments of each.

Video: Winning DCPA student playwrights’ plays are performed

About the 2017-18 Regional High-School Playwriting Workshop and Competition:

What: A one-act playwriting competition designed for area high schools. Local playwrights and DCPA Education faculty taught 146 playwriting workshops in 57 Colorado schools. A record 3,002 high-school students participated in those workshops, which were held in every school district in the Denver-metro area and in 20 counties around the state.

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 153 submissions were judged blindly by DCPA artistic, literary and education professionals. 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 2018 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 2018.

Sponsors: Robert and Judi Newman Family Foundation with matching gifts from The Ross Foundation, June Travis and Transamerica.

Our profiles of all 2018 Scenester semifinalists:

• Arianna Josue, Lakewood High School
• Ashley Wright (home school) and Amelia Middlebrooks, Valor Christian High School
• Joshua Martelon, Eliza Keating and Cameron Barnard, Cherry Creek High School
• Katanu Mwendwa, DSST: Conservatory Green High School
• Gemma Vincent, Gunnison High School
• Micah James Wilborn, Air Academy High School
• Julianna Luce and Trinell Samuel, Vista Peak Prep
• Noah Jackson, Girls Athletic Leadership School
• Callista Zaronias, Peak to Peak Charter School
• Emmaleth Ryan, Grandview High School

Video bonus: Last year’s playwrights at the Colorado New Play Summit

Video: We talked with the four 2017 student playwriting finalists whose plays were read by DCPA actors at the Colorado New Play Summit. Video by David Lenk and John Moore for the DCPA NewsCenter. 

More Colorado theatre coverage on the DCPA NewsCenter