Theater Festival: From Playwright To Stage In 48 Hours

The process starts on a Thursday evening at ACT Theatre, where the festival is held. The playwrights choose a random theme and a random number of cast members. Then they get 12 hours to write their plays. The scripts are due the next morning.
As the clock ticks on, other people filter into the room. At 9:00 sharp, 14/48 organizers Shawn Belyea and Peter Dylan O'Conner saunter in. They've got seven white legal envelopes. In each envelope is a script.
Belyea: "All right directors, good morning!"
Belyea and O'Conner spread the envelopes on a table. Each director picks one, then opens it to find out what play they've chosen.
After the momentary thrill, the directors and writers buckle down. The plays have to clock in at 10 minutes, and most of the scripts are too long, so they've got to edit them down.
You can't apply to be part of the 14/48 Theater Festival. Every year the organizers — they call themselves the Steering Committee — invite theater artists they admire to participate. Committee member Shawn Belyea says they're always on the lookout for new talent.
Belyea: "The Steering Committee is active people in the theater community: producers, directors, actors, writers. And so, we are looking at people's work that we appreciate throughout the year. And hopefully people feel that 14/48 is a reward for the work they've gotten to do."
This is the Festival's 15th season. Jodi–Paul Wooster is one of its co–founders.
Wooster: "All these artists got together, and everyone was so excited. People that had never worked together were talking, all these different relationships were already being created that we realized — that was sort of our 'a–ha' moment."
Back at ACT Theatre, it's now 10:00 a.m. It's time for the directors to cast their plays. They pull the actors names at random out of two large coffee cans; one boasts a photo of Farrah Fawcett, the other Burt Reynolds. These cans hold the names of 25 actors and actresses.
The teams have about 10 hours to get the plays ready for the first of the evening's two performances. 14/48 co–founder Jodi–Paul Wooster says virgin audiences should leave their preconceived ideas about theater at home.