October 31, 2011 | by Manny Strauss    0 comments

The cast of Arena Stage's production of The Book Club Play. Photo by Stan Barouh

In her childhood, Karen Zacarías must have played well with others in sandboxes, which no doubt prepared her for what the Washington area playwright calls an “unprecedented” development process for her latest work – The Book Club Play. Playwrights crave productions for their plays but the overwhelming majority face rejection. Zacarías observes that there always will be “more plays and more playwrights than there will be productions” and likens the chances for a playwright getting produced to the likelihood of a football player making it to the NFL.

Yet, against all odds, to date four Washington area theatres have had significant creative roles in developing Book Club. It all started at Theater of the First Amendment in March of 2005 as part of its First Light Development Program. Zacarías had five days to work with director Nick Olcott (who also later directed its world premiere), a dramaturg, and a professional cast prior to a reading. Next, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company did a developmental reading, followed by the world premiere at Round House Theatre in 2008. Three and a half years later, Arena Stage (where Zacarías is now a resident playwright) is currently presenting a substantially revised version of the play.

An extensive multi-year development process for a new play is quite common. However, the substantive involvement of four organizations all in the same “sandbox” and all in support of one beloved playwright is quite rare.

Although the Round House production and a subsequent production at the Berkshire Theatre Festival touched a nerve with audiences and sold well, Zacarías wasn’t satisfied. She recalls audiences were leaving the play (which takes the audience inside the interpersonal drama of a book club) saying, “I am so glad I never joined a book club.” A long standing member of a book club herself, Zacarías wanted the play to “honor their complications” rather than discourage people from participating in them.

Zacarías is a Washington theatre veteran. Her plays have been produced locally at The Kennedy Center, Imagination Stage, Round House Theatre, Arena Stage, and Theater of the First Amendment (receiving The Charles MacArthur Award for Outstanding New Play in 2000 for The Sins of Sor Juana at TFA) and nationally at The Goodman Theatre in Chicago, The Arden in Philadelphia, The Cleveland Playhouse, and California’s La Jolla Playhouse (to name a few). Any Washington area playwright (and the Facebook page for DC-Area Playwrights suggest that there are far more than 100 people who identify themselves as such) would be thrilled to receive as much attention from producing organizations as Zacarías has, but that success didn’t happen overnight. Zacarías notes that it happened over “20 years of working with theatres and developing their education departments, and writing and failing and getting up and working more.”

Zacarías’ exposure to various theatre communities provides her with perspective on her home-base. She believes that most of the ingredients are in place for a bright future for area theatre. In fact, she thinks Washington is poised to become a destination town for theatre. She asserts, “We have the directors. We have fantastic actors who live and work here. We have the most beautiful theatre buildings.” What’s left? According to Zacarías, “The last step is developing the voice of the writers of the Washington area.” (Incidentally, she also would like DC to have a signature food like Chicago has pizza.)

When not writing plays or raising her three children, Zacarías teaches playwriting at Georgetown University and thinks a great deal about how writers can get noticed so that their plays are produced:

Zacarías’ philosophy goes a long way toward explaining her accomplishments. One might even say, “She did it the old fashioned way, she earned it.”

Printer-friendly version

Send by email