Eight Plays for Children

The New Generation Play Project was a daring experiment in American children's theatre. Begun in 1989 by a consortium that included the Seattle Children's Theatre, The Children's Theatre Company of Minneapolis, Stage One: The Louisville Children's Theatre, and the Honolulu Theatre for Youth, the NGPP raised half a million dollars to commission major American dramatists to create new works for young people and to produce these plays over a several-year period.

This book provides the full text of the plays produced through the NGPP:

• Constance Congdon, Beauty and the Beast
• Velina Hasu Houston, Hula Heart
• Tina Howe, East of the Sun and West of the Moon
• Len Jenkin, The Invisible Man
• Mark Medoff, Kringle's Window
• Eric Overmyer, Duke Kahanamoku vs. The Surfnappers
• Michael Weller, Dogbrain
• Y York, The Witch of Blackbird Pond

In his introduction, Coleman Jennings describes the work of the NGPP, some of the controversies surrounding its selection of playwrights who do not ordinarily write for young audiences, as well as the playwrights' reactions to the project, and the critical reception of the plays. Suzan Zeder, one of the nation's leading playwrights for family audiences, supplies the foreword.