Pretending
Jacob York, Creative Endeavors
In 2015, three teenagers are spending the last weekend of spring break together. Mark, KG, and Derek are your typical kids in the mid- 2010's, which means they spend most of the long weekend bored, playing video games, watching other people on livestreams, getting drunk or stoned, and trying to pass the time.
Something goes wrong, though. They accidentally create a monster when they perform an act called "Swatting". Swatting is the act of making a prank call to emergency services in an attempt to bring about the dispatch of a large number of armed police officers to a particular address. They swat someone on a video game live stream and watch, in real time, as their prank turns inside out and leaves their victim dead at the hands of a police officer with a too-quick trigger finger.
Three years later, they've moved on with their lives, but others haven't been able to leave the events behind as easily. Mistakes don't happen in a vacuum; someone has to pay.
Read TWITCH on New Play Exchange.
Development:
Digital Reading, Woven Theatre - 2020
Honors:
Semi-finalist - Ashland New Plays Festival - 2021
Semi-finalist - Burman New Play Award - Barrington Stage Company - 2020
Winner - Roots of the Bluegrass New Play Award - Kentucky Theatre Association - 2020
Trailer - Woven Theatre Digital Reading - 2020
Recommendations:
“(TWITCH) is a taut thriller that's rooted in the now. It lives at the intersection of classic
theatricality and technology. A great piece for both audiences who are very on-line and audiences who have no idea what Twitch is. Highly recommended.”
Andrew Hungerford - Former Artistic Director, Know Theatre of Cincinnati
“(TWITCH) is intelligent, resonant, funny, and human, and it doesn't shy away from hard and necessary conversations. It's tense and hard-edged and finds interesting solutions for making gaming/streaming theatrical.”
Daryl Lisa Fazio - Literary Manager, Horizon Theatre
“A taut, suspenseful script that tackles Internet culture, policing, and gun violence in bold ways, while more subtly touching on issues of race, privilege, and personal responsibility. A timely play that will leave audiences with lots to discuss long after they’ve left the theater!”
John Bavoso - Playwright / Lambda Literary Fellow
“Brutal and unrelenting in its tackling of complex issues, both digitally and in the real world. Modern in storytelling but thematically universal. A punch to the gut.”
Chandler Hubbard - Playwright
Woven Theatre, Digital Reading - Actors featured include Delaney Keith, Stephen Ruffin, Sam Kell and Diany Rodriguez