What does American Idol alumnus Justin Guarini have in common with veteran actresses Mia Farrow, Marcia Gay Harden and Amy Irving? All are among a bevy of name artists taking part in the 20th anniversary season of Powerhouse Theater, a summer program presented at Vassar College in association with New York Stage & Film.
The program was conceived in 1985 by actor Mark Linn-Baker, who would later star in TV's Perfect Strangers and Broadway's A Year With Frog and Toad with fellow Yale School of Drama graduates Max Mayer and Leslie Urdang. It aims to provide theater students and profession- als with a forum for developing new plays.
"The economics of theater do not work," Linn-Baker says. "As a business, it's stupid, and it's not getting any better. Sources of new material, even not-for-profit (theaters), have to pay attention to box office — in New York, certainly, and in regional. The longer you can put off that kind of commercial pressure, the more of a chance you have to develop something meaningful to the people working on it.
"And we have a devoted audience that is as excited about seeing what works and what doesn't as we are."
Granted, for some who have purchased tickets to this year's Powerhouse productions, the main attraction may have been a movie star such as Lucy Liu, who recently treaded the boards in Good Canary, a new offering written by her boyfriend, Zach Helm.
Likewise, there are bound to be Idol worshipers in the audience of Vassar's new Martel Theater July 29-Aug.1, when Guarini appears in Good Vibrations, a world-premiere musical featuring tunes by Beach Boys mastermind Brian Wilson, with John Carrafa of Broadway's Urinetown! directing.
Here are a few of the other new and developing works being taken for a spin at regional theaters:
•Winesburg, Ohio. Commissioned for Steppenwolf Theatre Company's Arts Exchange and based on Sherwood Anderson's novel, this world-premiere musical about life in the turn-of-the-last-century Midwest was just accepted into the National Alliance for Music Theater Festival, which means that New York producers will have a chance to check out an abridged version in October. The full show, which features an onstage band performing folk tunes and "song-stories" inspired by Anderson's tales, plays at Chicago's About Face Theatre through Aug. 1.
•Electridad Also playing in Chicago, this new drama by Luis Barrio has been touted as the centerpiece of the Goodman Theatre's second Latino Theater Festival. Subtitled "A Chicano take on Sophocles' Elektra," the play focuses on a woman who mourns, and seeks to avenge, her father's murder. At the Goodman's Albert Theatre through Sunday.
•RashomonComposer/lyricist Michael John LaChiusa, whose credits include Broadway's The Wild Party and Marie Christine, unveils a new musical informed by the short stories of Ryunosuke Akutagawa at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. Love, faith and intrigue are among the time-honored elements woven into a contemporary score. At the Nikos Stage in Williamstown, Mass., through Aug. 1.
•BoomersIf you haven't had your fill of baby-boom nostalgia, this "remixed" version of Kerry Meads and Vanda Eggington's 1993 musical offers a journey through the events and songs that defined the '50s, '60s and '70s. Presented by the Lamb's Players Theatre at San Diego's Lyceum Theatre, through Aug. 22.
•Paris Commune Steven Cosson and Michael Friedman of the New York-based theater company The Civilians are developing this study of the 1871 Paris uprising as part of the La Jolla Playhouse's Page to Stage Program. Drawing on historical texts and period songs, the co-authors (Cosson also directs) evoke the 19th-century cabaret scene and the social and cultural shifts it reflected. At the Mandell Weiss Forum Studio in La Jolla, Calif., Tuesday through Aug. 15.