LITTLE ROCK — Nine Arkansas arts organizations and individuals will receive grants totaling $155,000 from the National Endowment for the Arts in its first round of fiscal year 2010 funding.
In the “Access to Artistic Excellence” category, the Arkansas Repertory Theatre will receive $10,000 to support “Voices at the River II,” its biennial play development program for emerging Hispanic and black playwrights. The Oxford American will get $15,000 to support publication and promotion. And Little Rock journalist Paul Reyes, a contributor to the magazine and formerly an editor at large, will receive $25,000.
Other “Access to Artistic Excellence” grants will go to the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville ($20,000) to support the development of a townscape plan for the city of Farmington; Fayetteville’s Walton Arts Center ($30,000) to support its “15 Days of Arts & Nature series”; and Fayetteville novelist Padma Viswanathan ($25,000).
The Fort Smith Symphony will receive $10,000 under the endowment’s “Challenge America: Reaching Every Community Fast Track” heading to support its “Earquake!” concert series for elementary school students that incorporates sessions with composer Kevin Puts and performances by students of Western Arkansas Ballet.
Other “Challenge America” grants: $10,000 to John Brown University in Siloam Springs toward its “Giving Voice: A Festival of Writing and the Arts” and $10,000 for the Ozark Foothills Filmfest.
A complete description of the grants are available at the Web site, arts.gov/ grants/recent/10grants/ states1/10_states1. php?STATE=AR.
Seeking ‘Voices’
March 1 is the deadline for blacks and Hispanics “with a passion for playwriting and the written word,” currently enrolled in Arkansas universities and colleges, to submit scripts - plays, one-acts, and works in progress - for the Arkansas Repertory Theatre’s “Voices at the River II.”
The biennial play development program will include a two-week residency in July 2010 for play development and readings, mentoring, critiques and panel discussions with directors, actors and Rep staff.
Send drafts or scripts to Sheridan Essman, Arkansas Repertory Theatre, P.O. Box 110, Little Rock, Ark. 72203-0110, or e-mail them in PDF format to sessman@therep. org. Call (501) 378-0445, Extension 211; submission criteria are available at the Web site, therep.org.
Underwriting for the project comes from the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation.
Rogers River tryouts
Rogers Little Theater will hold auditions for the musical Big River - music and lyrics by Roger Miller, book by William Hauptman, based on Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - at 7 p.m. Jan. 4-5 at the Victory Theater, 116 S. Second St., Rogers.
Audition materials are $5 per packet, available at the theater or at the Matthews, Campbell, Rhoads, McClure, Thompson and Fryauf law firm, 119 S. Second St.
Singing and nonsinging parts are available. Production dates are Feb. 12-14, 18-21 and 25-28. Call director Ed McClure at (479) 903-6546 or e-mail him at [email protected].
Children’s classes
Rogers Little Theater’s RLT Spotlight Studio will offer eight-week performing arts classes for children, with a winter session starting Jan. 11 and a spring session starting March 29 at the studio, 204 W. Walnut St., Rogers.
Partial funding for the program comes from a grant from Cox Communications.
Cost of each class is $125, $100 for children signing up for two or more classes and for families who have two or more children registering. Call (479) 631-8988 or visit the Web site, rogerslittletheater.org.
Style, Pages 47 on 12/20/2009