ATCANY2024 | No One Asked Us To Do This

ATCANY2024 | No One Asked Us To Do This

Early Bird $100 September 2, 2024 through October 14, 2024. Full Price $150 October 15, 2024 and after.

Members and Member Guests Only

The American Theatre Critics/Journalists Association 2024 annual conference No One Asked Us To Do This, celebrating theater and theater makers in New York City, will be held November 8-10, 2024. An additional pre-conference bonus screening event will be available November 7, 2024.

The conference planning committee (Scott Bennett, David John Chávez, Jay Handelman, Lou Harry, Bill Hirschman, Gerard Raymond, Frank Rizzo, and Martha Wade Steketee) is inspired by the words of veteran director Jack O’Brien. “No one asked us to do this,” O’Brien reflected when accepting his 2024 Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre. Those words, the committee feels, capture the love our members have for the theatrical art form and celebrate our efforts to foster the arts in our local communities across the country.

Days are structured to allow attendees to schedule evening and matinee performances, to be arranged by participants with press contact information to be provided to paid attendees. Note: contact with press representatives to be by ATCA members only and not by ATCA member guests.

Stay tuned to this page and weekly ATCA newsletter for the latest developments in the evolving agenda.

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PRICE

• $100 Early Bird registration for full conference, rate available September 2, 2024 through October 14, 2024 [midnight Eastern]
• $150 Full Price registration for full conference, rate available October 15, 2024 [12:01 am Eastern] through end of conference

Tickets are available as September 2, 2024 via links to purchase (Early Bird tickets) or reserve (Screening and Tour tickets), visible only to logged-in ATCA current members (Active, Associate, Affiliate, Alumni, and Emeritus member types). On and after October 15, 2024, Full Price conference tickets will be available for purchase. Free 11/7/24 Screening and 11/10/24 Palace tour tickets will be available while supply lasts.

If you are an ATCA member and wish to register for the conference, take the following steps. Make sure you’re logged in as a member, click the EVENTS dropdown menu at the far right of the page (visible only to members), select CONFERENCE REGISTRATION, and scroll to the bottom of the event page to view tickets visible only to members. Here you may purchase tickets for yourself and for any guest or guests at the member rates.

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AGENDA
[Subject to change based on availability of invited guests.]
Presenter Bios and Headshots [atcany2024] [updated 2024-11-6]

All times are Eastern. 

THURSDAY | NOVEMBER 7, 2024

venue: New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Theatre on Film and Tape Archive at 40 Lincoln Center Plaza [3rd floor screening room]

3:00 pm BONUS PRE-CON SESSION: HERE WE ARE (on video). Early conference arrivals will enjoy a special screening of a multi-camera pro-shoot video recording of the world premiere 2023-2024 Shed production of Here We Are, lyrics and music by Stephen Sondheim, inspired by the films of Luis Buñuel, with book by David Ives, directed by Joe Mantello, and choreographed by Sam Pinkleton. Screening hosted by the Theatre on Film and Tape Archive, Patrick Hoffman, Director and Curator. Attendees will take elevator to 3rd floor to check in with conference staff in the elevator lobby. Hoffman will provide an introduction to the recording process, then the video will begin at approximately 3:15pm. Recording is 2 acts, 137 minutes. We will pause for a brief intermission between the two acts, and conclude the screening by 6pm. We have the room until 7pm, but those who need to leave should be able to make 7pm show curtains. EVENT MAXIMUM 50 [expanded capacity as of 10/11/24], AVAILABLE TO REGISTERED ATTENDEES ONLY. REGISTRATION CUT OFF TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 5 AT 4PM EST [vote!]. ATCA host: Martha Wade Steketee.

6:45 pm BROADWAY LIGHT-DIMMING CEREMONY TO HONOR MAGGIE SMITH. Early conference attendees may be interested in experiencing this honor of dimming Broadway marquee lights that continues a tradition that began in the 1950s. Dame Maggie Smith passed away on September 27, 2024 at the age of 89. This follows the dimming of London West End lights in Smith’s honor on Tuesday, October 1, 2024.

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FRIDAY | NOVEMBER 8, 2024

venue: Club 135 by Industrious at 135 West 50th Street
[meeting on 2nd floor of the venue]

Lunch, coffee, tea, and drinks provided.

9:00 am PROGRAM OPENING. ATCA members meet-and-greet, welcome, introduction of new members, committee chairs, and board members, discussion of themes of the weekend.

9:30 am SESSION: Creative Voices in Theater Podcasting. Podcasters address many timely topics in the moment ahead of print coverage, or in greater passionate depth than other outlets. Several prominent podcasters covering the art and business of Broadway will join us to reflect on their craft. Robert W. Schneider of Behind the Curtain: Broadway’s Living Legends, Broadway Bound: The Musicals That Never Came to Broadway, and Fifty Key Stage Musicals: The Podcast is joined by Matt Koplik, host of Broadway Breakdown. ATCA host: Lou Harry.

10:30 am SESSION: Stereophonic and the Road to Broadway. Stereophonic, an ensemble play that captures the artistic process in a music recording studio, entranced New York audiences during the 2023-2024 season first Off Broadway at Playwrights Horizons and then at Broadway’s Golden Theatre. Playwrights Horizons artistic director Adam Greenfield, and Stereophonic director Daniel Aukin and performers Will Brill and Andrew Butler unpack the adventure of developing this play with music (about making music) and its transition to Broadway. ATCA host: Frank Rizzo.

11:30 am BREAK: Lunch provided.

12:30 pm PERSPECTIVES IN CRITICISM. ATCA’S lecture series inaugurated with remarks by Clive Barnes in 1992 continues with culture critic and journalist Adam Feldman, Theater and Dance Editor and chief theater critic at Time Out New York, where he has been a staff writer since 2003. He has written for Canada’s Globe and Mail and National Post, was contributing Broadway editor for the Theatre World book series, and has served as president of the New York Drama Critics’ Circle since 2005. ATCA host: Martha Wade Steketee.

2:00 pm SESSION: David Henry Hwang and Kelundra Smith in Conversation. David Henry Hwang‘s Yellow Face, a “laugh-out-loud farce about the complexities of race” according to Playbill, opens October 1, 2024 on Broadway, almost two decades after its Public Theater 2007 debut. The playwright will discuss his creation, its original reception, and what has changed or not changed in race relations and theatrical presentations of race. Kelundra Smith, ATCA member, cofounder of ATCA’s BEID committee and Edward Medina Prize, and director of publishing for TCG will lead the conversation and record the session for an upcoming edition of the American Theatre Offscript podcast.

3:30 pm SESSION: Charles Busch and Cole Escola in Conversation. Two multiply-talented creators and performers share observations about their art and their recent creations. Charles Busch enchanted us last season with his newest play Ibsen’s Ghost: An Irresponsible Biographical Fantasy. Cole Escola blasted onto Broadway this season with their first play Oh, Mary!. Read coverage of Escola’s “Great Day on Broadway” in The New Yorker. Who knows where this conversation might take us? ATCA host: Martha Wade Steketee.

Program day will conclude by 5pm.

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SATURDAY | NOVEMBER 9, 2024

venue: Upright Citizens Brigade at 242 East 14th Street

9:00 am PROGRAM OPENING.

10:00 am SESSION: Third Annual ATCA Edward Medina Prize for Excellence in Cultural Criticism. Presentation of the award to Christian Lewis, the third annual recipient, followed by a discussion between Lewis and 2023 Medina Prize winner Gloria Oladipo. The presentation will be available as a livestream hosted by HowlRound. ATCA hosts: Elizabeth Kramer and Nate Hinkle.

11:00 am SESSION: New Books on Women Writing Musicals and the Evolution of American Regional Theater. Theater historian and producer Jennifer Ashley Tepper on her newest  book Women Writing Musicals: The Legacy That the History Books Left Out; dramaturg, historian, and memoirist Todd London on his new edited volume of Zelda Fichandler’s speeches and essays The Long Revolution: Sixty Years on the Frontlines of a New American Theater; and dramaturg James Magruder on The Play’s the Thing: Fifty Years of Yale Repertory Theatre (1966-2016). ATCA host: Jay Handelman.

12:00 pm SESSION: Backstage at the Upright Citizens Brigade. The legendary improvisation training ground and performance company Upright Citizens Brigade has returned to New York City with new spaces, new talent, and an increased emphasis on actor/improviser training. UCB co-artistic directors Laura Canty-Samuel, Michael Hartney, and Iliana Inocencio, and improv trainer Donald Chang will discuss the hows and whys of spontaneity on stage (and maybe lead an exercise or two with interested attendees). ATCA host: Lou Harry.

Program day will conclude by 1pm.

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SUNDAY | NOVEMBER 10, 2024

venue: Palace Theatre, 160 West 47th Street

9:45 am: registered Palace Tour attendees assemble at Palace

10:00 am TOUR: The historic Palace Theatre will host ATCA conference attendees and co-owner Stewart F. Lane will provide a tour through the facilities. This is a special opportunity to experience a venue that has hosted generations of entertainment royalty (listen to Judy Garland’s tribute to the Palace) as it has been newly refurbished after a six-year renovation by PBDW Architects. EVENT MAXIMUM 50, AVAILABLE TO REGISTERED ATTENDEES ONLY. ATCA host: Jay Handelman.

Tour will conclude by 11:00 am.

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In part sponsored by: