The Visions and Voices Playwriting Festival is a program created to promote literacy and writing skills, as well as a love for the theatre. The festival began in 2016 as a partnership with Bedford Road School in Pleasantville, and has added more schools and grades to the program each year! Arc Stages has partnered with Pocantico Hills School, Bedford Hills Elementary, Pleasantville Middle School, Mt. Kisco Elementary, Grafflin Elementary, Todd Elementary, Temple Beth El, Thomas Cornell Academy, Traphagen School, Kenneth Clark Academy, Lincoln Titus Elementary and Sacred Heart Greenwich, with the hope to reach even more schools and students in the future. We hope to launch the High School component of Visions and Voices this year!
The goal of Visions and Voices is to introduce students to the world of the stage and self-expression, as well as to excite and inspire them to write plays. This program helps develop creativity and literacy competencies and also supports the common core through integration of our workshops and exercises with the ELA curriculum map and teaching plans of the teachers. It is a BOCES-accredited program, supported by ArtsWestchester.
Playwright John Cariani giving out Visions and Voices Playwriting Awards at our first festival.
Major Project Activities
The project engages with students and teachers over the course of several months. Visions and Voices may be delivered virtually (live streaming), if it is not possible to meet in person at the time.
Stage I – AUTUMN
Participating classes visit Arc Stages. The students see a performance of inspirational short plays (45 min), written by children who have previously participated in the playwriting program. This visit includes a talk back with the actors (15 min), a tour of the theatre (10 min) and a session of theatre games/exercises related to storytelling and playwriting structure (30 min). In Stage I, students are introduced to the Visions and Voices program, and the elements of playwriting.
Stage II – WINTER
Arc Stages visits classes at their school to present a 30 minute show about playwriting. This is an interactive musical about how to write a play. After the show, the actors/Teaching Artists go into the classrooms to work with the students on playwriting skills. The Teaching Artists help students to begin to write short plays (1-3 pages). These workshops would last a class period (50 minutes-1 hour). Teaching Artists return two weeks later for a Revision workshop, helping students to deepen their work. After students have revised, they submit their plays to Arc for consideration!
Stage III – SPRING
Classes return to Arc Stages to view the selected plays from the submissions that the students wrote. The plays are performed by professional actors on the theatre stage (1 hour show) with a talk back with the actors after the show (15 min).
The Bows
The selected playwrights return to Arc Stages for a special viewing of the selected plays and an Award Ceremony, to receive their awards for being selected playwrights. An honored guest – an award winning playwright, Broadway performer, or local government official – will present the students their awards and media will be present.
Every student who submits a play, whether it is selected to be performed or not, receives an award for having the courage to write!
Play by Adrienne Grunspan from the first Visions and Voices Playwriting Festival in 2016.
Selected Playwrights at the 2016 Visions and Voices Playwriting Festival