Play4Keeps Podcast | Angry/Funny and Angry/Sad: A Conversation with Kari Bentley-Quinn and Callie Kimball

“You do angry/funny better than anyone.” So says past ANPF winner Callie Kimball to friend and current ANPF winner Kari Bentley-Quinn. Today on the podcast, they discuss Kari’s ANPF 2020 play HYANNIS and Callie’s play PERSEVERANCE, which ANPF workshopped in August. Their conversation then delves into the world at large, fan-girling over Lucy Thurber, and nurturing their artist selves. 

ANPF will present virtual readings of HYANNIS, directed by Adrienne Campbell-Holt, on Thursday, October 22, at 4:00 pm PT and Saturday, October 24, at 7:30 pm PT. Tickets are available sliding scale starting at $10 (no additional fees):

https://www.showtix4u.com/events/17627

We will also be releasing our recording of Kari’s play THE WORST MOTHER IN THE WORLD on the podcast in November. Check out a five-minute preview at the link at the bottom.

Kari Bentley-Quinn is a playwright based in New York City, originally from Stratford, CT. Her plays have been presented at or developed with Lark Play Development Center, Lesser America, Halcyon Theatre, Animus Theatre Company, Theatre of NOTE, Premiere Stages at Kean University, Astoria Performing Arts Center, The Brick Theater, The Secret Theatre, Artemisia Theater, FringeNYC, and more. She is a co-founder of Mission to (dit)Mars, a theater company based in Queens, NY, where she has facilitated the development of more than 30 new plays. She has been a finalist for many awards, including the O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, the Bay Area Playwrights Festival, Dramatists Guild Fellowship, was a nominee for the Doric Wilson Playwriting Award, and a winner of the Rita and Burton Goldberg Playwriting Award from Hunter College, where she received her MFA in Playwriting.

Callie Kimball is a past ANPF winner for her play SOFONISBA, which was slated to receive its world premiere at the Theater at Monmouth in Maine in summer 2020, but was postponed due to COVID-19. She is an award-winning playwright and teacher as well as an Affiliate Artist at Portland Stage Company, an Affiliate Writer at the Playwrights’ Center, Playwright-in-Residence at Theater at Monmouth, and a former MacDowell Fellow. Her plays have been produced and developed in New York, Chicago, LA, Washington, DC  (Kennedy Center), Portland Stage Company, Lark Play Development Center, Halcyon Theatre, and many colleges and festivals across the country. Her themes range from historical dramas and classical adaptations to socio-political comedies and futuristic dystopias, with characters who live at the intersection of language and power–who struggle to break free from the constraints of class, race, gender, and systemic abuse.

 

The Worst Mother in the World