Tired of sitting on the sidelines? Need an artistic sandbox? Ready for “real talk” that will prepare you for challenges artistic leaders face every day?
FULL CIRCLE is an annual collaboration program, designed for professional women theatrical artists who seek a creative community to prototype new ideas, enhance skills, and launch real-life projects. Members of the circle are selected for their different specialities and strengths. This is more than a networking opportunity. It is a year-long cycle of exclusive shared sessions focused on advanced work and collective mentorship. Learn more.
FULL CIRCLE Members 2019-20
Photo by Mary Lopez
Kate Bell
Kate Bell is a writer, theater-maker, musician, and teaching artist. She believes that creative practice is for everyone and that art-making can be a powerful tool to increase self-empowerment, healthy living, and positive social change. She founded Theater to the People with fellow theater artist Julia Cavagna in 2018; the bilingual project brings adults together to use theater-making as a social justice tool to think about immigration and gentrification. TTTP received a 2018 Brooklyn Arts Council Grant. Kate’s plays have been produced or developed in New York at the Downtown Urban Theater Festival at HERE Arts Center, Park Avenue Armory (Education Department Space Grant), Culture Project, The One Minute Play Festival @ The New Ohio, Theater for the New City, Red Fern Theatre Company, New Perspectives Theatre, The Bechdel Group, Naked Angels Tuesdays@9, Sanguine Theatre Company, Manhattan Theater Source, Gallery Players, Random Access Theatre, and at Baruch College (with Committed Theatre), as well as in the Washington D.C. Area by Silver Spring Stage, and in the Appalachian Play Festival at the Barter Theatre in Abingdon, VA. Kate is also a founding member of Ant and Dove, a writers collective. Past playwriting honors include Finalist for Shakespeare’s New Contemporaries Program at the American Shakespeare Center, a DUTF Audience Award, Semi-finalist for the Lila Acheson Wallace Playwriting Fellowship at Juilliard, Finalist for The Playwrights Realm Fellows Program, Finalist/Honorable Mention for the Bay Area Playwrights Festival, Semi-finalist for the O’Neill Theater Conference, and runner-up finalist for the Princess Grace Award. Her plays have been published on Indie Theater Now and in The Book of Estrogenius. She’s also collaborated with the New York Philharmonic on their Very Young People’s Concerts. Kate also loves to rock out; she plays bass and sings in the feminist post-punk trio, Creek and Kills. www.katebell.info
Jessica Feder-Birnbaum
Jessica Feder-Birnbaum is a NYC based playwright, author, writer, director and teaching artist.
​
Plays include: Toppings and Sides – part of playwright/producer Debra Kaufman’s Illuminated Dresses Project under the auspices of Women’s Theatre Festival Occupy the Stage at the Wake Forest Renaissance Center. Lady August Gregory – 365 Women a Year Theatre History Project Monologue collection; Hair Halacha – Hair Evrah (semi-finalist 5 Minute play festival) San Diego Center for Jewish Culture; Midlife Choice, performed at Tact Studios and live streamed on Visual Arts TV, also published in Cynthia L. Cooper’s Reproductive Freedom Festival Anthology (New York State Council on the Arts and the Puffin Foundation) by Indie Theatre Now; Margaret Sanger - A Woman Rebel – staged reading at Richmond Shepard Theatre. Commissioned works include writing text for Artichoke Dance Company's multi-disciplinary dance play, Dirty Secrets in which dances were created from the stories of sexual assault survivors (NYS Council on the Arts); Queen Esther’s Purim Megillah for The Grove Street Children’s Theatre; A New Light – Documentary short- Jewish Theological Seminary. Other plays, spoken word pieces, and comedy sketches have been performed at the Village Gate, the 14th St Y, Hunter College, Le Poisson Rouge, The Knitting Factory, Cornelia St. Cafe, Bowery Poets, Tonic, West Bank Cafe and The Duplex.
​
Her articles, essays, prose pieces, poems, blog posts and letters to the editor have appeared in Mitzvah Magazine, Big Apple Parents, Dancing Meatball, NYC Not For Tourists Guide, Mom Egg Review, Grandparents.com, the Mamapalooza website, Jewish Week and The New York Times.
She annually directs the Town and Village Synagogue’s multi-generational musical Purim Spiel where she is a member. Other directing credits include Bronx Arts Ensemble, A Tooth For Paul Revere an opera for young audiences, and original plays by teens and adults of Hunter College’s Project Happy.
​
She has worked as a teaching artist with all ages ranging from pre-k to senior citizens focusing on ways to use playwriting and creative dramatics to enhance learning. She has also conducted teacher-training programs at NYU and through the NYC Board of Education.
She is delighted to be part of the inaugural class of FULL CIRCLE where she will develop her full-length six character (four female/two male) play NO FEE (working title), whose basic premise is how the NYC real estate market shapes peoples’ lives. Themes include women in politics, immigration, gender/income disparity, hetero and gay relationships, class and racial coding, and stalled dreams coming into fruition.
Rachael Carnes
​
Rachael has productions across the U.S., U.K., Canada and Asia, and invitations to the Inge Theatre Festival, the Midwestern Dramatists Center, the Mid-America Theater Conference, the American Association for Theatre in Higher Education Conference New Play Development Series and the Sewanee Writers’ Conferences, as well as the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Playwriting Intensive. Rachael’s award-winning play Partner Of— is published by the Coachella Review, and was featured in the 2019 Samuel French Off-Off Broadway Festival in New York City. (One of 30 plays chosen from more than 900.) Her play Egg in Spoon will be published in the Coachella Review and her plays Ice Front and Curbed will be published in the Silk Road Review. Rachael’s full-length play Canopy enjoyed staged readings at the WriteON Festival in Cambridge, U.K. and the Parsons Nose Theatre in Pasadena, and her play Practice House had a staged reading at Oregon Contemporary Theatre, and is a semi-finalist for the 2019 New Dramatists Princess Grace Award. Rachael is the founder and editor of CodeRedPlaywrights, a consortium of writers across the country, responding to gun violence. She and her family live in Oregon.
Siobhán Carroll
Siobhán Carroll is an actor and theatre artist originally from Cleveland, Ohio. Before moving to New York Siobhán was a Boston area actor. Some of the companies she has had the privilege of working with are Commonwealth Shakespeare Company, New Repertory Theatre, Central Square Theatre, Anthem Theatre Company, and Bridge Repertory Theatre. Siobhán received her BFA from Boston University.
Sam Garland
Sam Garland is an actor, writer, director, and producer. She’s in development on her webseries Life Coach: Hot Mess, which follows a heart broken life coach who abandons self-improvement for boozy bad decisions, helping her clients find themselves by giving less of a f*ck. The project was a Kickstart Diversity Recipient of the incubator Big Vision Empty Wallet and was presented to networks as part of their final showcase.
​
Her short film Ella at the Library toured the festival circuit for two years, and her latest short First Date Last Call has just completed post production. She is writing her first feature film, In Her Words, about the crushing voices of anxiety and self-doubt that plague the best of us, and how keeping silent about past abuses gives them continued power over our present lives.
​
She is a member of the writing group Ant & Dove, and is honored to be joining Clutch Production’s Full Circle collective.
More at SamGarland.com.
Rachael Harrington​
Rachael Harrington is a storyteller and director whose work has taken her around the globe. As a storyteller she creates performances and workshops in arts venues, schools, pre-schools, and community settings. She is a member of National Storytelling Network, is a guest lecturer at Rutgers University, and is published in Voices, the NJTESOL Journal. As a director, Rachael loves focusing on comedy and has had work shown at Charleston International Film Festival, Symphony Space, and was selected as part of the Stage Director and Choreographers Foundation Observership Class.
Ashley Lara
​
Ashley Lara's work has been performed internationally in the UK and US. Most recently her play Chasers was performed at the Emerging Artists Theatre (EAT) New Works Festival in 2018. Her play The Cruller Twist was awarded “Best Short Play” at the High Stakes Theater Short Play Festival in 2017. She has also been featured in The New York Times and TimeOut NY for her work with She Makes Me Laugh, a monthly all-female comedy showcase at the People’s Improv Theatre (PIT). She also volunteers for Film Fatales, an international organization dedicated to gender parity within the film industry. She holds a Master of Research in Playwriting from the University of Birmingham, United Kingdom.
Benefits:
-
SPACE - Each Full Circle member will have access to 2 hours of dedicated collaboration space per quarter (8 hour per year). Clutch will facilitate and organize the space. These shared collaboration sessions are generated and lead by members of the circle. They are intended for practical skill enhancement and mentorship. Sessions could include:
-
Directors workshopping a new concept with the help of actors
-
Actors working on scenes or monologues with side-coaching or feedback from directors or other artists
-
Playwrights and actors reading new scenes
-
Playwright and an actor or musician devising the concept for an original show
-
Actors working on self-taping
-
Teaching artists test-running a new class or exercise
-
Practice editing skills on reels or small film projects
-
Brainstorm the budget for upcoming project
-
Resume, cover letter, or online branding refresh
-
-
ACCESS TO CLUTCH’S CORE COLLECTIVE for consultations on projects and goals
-
PUBLIC SHOWING - Opportunity to be featured at Clutch’s quarterly event Movers&Shakers as well as an invited sharing of works in process
-
COMPLIMENTARY TICKETS to each Clutch production
-
LISTING of your name and photo on ClutchProductions.org
Annual Membership Cost*: $250
SUBMISSIONS DUE JUNE 10, 2019!
Interested artists should email clutchproductionsnyc@gmail.com with a resume and statement that explains how working with a collective would be valuable for their process and future goals.
Full Circle is not a class or educational opportunity open to students. It is designed for emerging, working professionals. *Membership cost covers a portion of space fees, materials, and equipment. A portion of membership monies will also be allocated to Clutch’s playwright commission fund.
​