Theater calls on aspiring playwrights

The Colony’s Lakeside Community Theatre has launched its first playwriting competition.

To be eligible, playwrights must live in Texas. Submission guidelines are as follows:

•  Plays must be holiday-themed for December staging.

•  Plays must be complete, original and full-length, timed to run one hour or longer. No unfinished scripts will be accepted.

•  Plays should be written for a cast of two to eight actors.

•  Include a cover page with playwright’s mailing address and a telephone number.

•  Don’t include a plot synopsis.

•  Plays must be typed and submitted electronically to artisticdirector@lctthecolony.

org by Jan. 31.

The winner will get a small stipend; his or her name included on all company advertising for the 2010-11 season; a full production of their work in December 2010; a chance to attend and speak during a “talk back” session with the audience and cast after a performance.

In 2008, Lakeside Community Theatre produced Murder at 1440 Kilowatts: A Fatal Frequency by Denton resident Bill Kirkley. The upcoming season will present Ye Gods!, written by Kirkley and Denton resident Sean Frith.

For more information, e-mail Victoria Irvine at president@lctthecolony.org or David J. Wallis at artisticdirector@lctthecolony.org.

Harpool Middle School helps fight hunger

Theater students at Harpool Middle School in the Denton school district recently participated in a charity drive.

The students took part in “Trick or Treat So Kids Can Eat,” a Halloween food drive directed by the International Thespian Society, a division of the Educational Theatre Association.

Harpool was joined by other North Texas schools with thespian societies on campus: Azle High School; Boswell High School; Coppell Middle School North; Coppell Middle School West; Garland High School; Harleton High School; McKinney Boyd High School, McKinney High School, Poteet High School, Summer Creek Middle School and Wylie East High School.

Gala to celebrate TWU educators, artists

The 2010 Visual Arts Society of Texas Gala honors prominent women artists who taught at Texas Woman’s University from the 1920s to the 1970s. 

The gala will be Jan. 22 at the Center for the Visual Arts, at 400 E. Hickory St. The gala opens the exhibit, “Pioneers in Modernism,” in the Gough Gallery at the Center for the Visual Arts. The exhibit will run through Feb. 28 in the Ray and Georgia Gough Gallery.

The exhibition will include work by Marjorie Baltzel, Edith Brisac, Carlotta Corpron, Marie Delleney, Dorothy Antoinette “Toni” LaSelle, Thetis Lemmon, Mabel Maxcy and Coreen Spellman. 

The show will feature about 40 paintings and works on paper. These women were instrumental in beginning the modernist movement in Texas.

The gala will feature a lecture and image presentation by Jack Davis of the University of North Texas. Entertainment will be songs from the era provided by pianist and singer Kathryn Kallahan. Dinner will be provided by Extreme Cuisine Catering of Denton.  

Tickets are $45 for arts society members and $60 for non-members. Tables are available: $850 for a patron table and $600 for a sponsor table. For reservations, send a check payable to: Visual Arts Society of Texas, P.O. Box 1281, Denton, TX 76202.

— Lucinda Breeding