By JC LAM
alltherage@thestar.com.my

LAST week, our cover story featured Sheena Liam’s Asia’s Next Top Model win and how it provided her the opportunity of a lifetime to model in London. Well, for the young local playwriting community, that equivalent comes in the form of Islands and Cities: A Penang/Singapore Youth Playwriting Immersion Workshop.

Before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s clarify this: the project is still in its infancy. In fact, it is only in its first year, so, it hasn’t exactly gained international recognition with high budget influence just yet, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t full of promise!

Islands and Cities is a project, simply put, to find the best playwrights in the country and improve them. Six young and lucky playwrights from Penang and Singapore will be chosen and mentored by renowned award-winning playwright, Huzir Sulaiman, in a five-day immersion workshop held in Penang from June 5–10.

“The workshop will feature talks and visits to heritage sites as well as activities designed to get the playwrights thinking about issues faced in islands and cities,” Huzir explained. “The writers will work on their plays each day and their evolving drafts will be read aloud by the group, with feedback from me and the other participants.”

Claire Wong and Huzir Sulaiman (pic) will be mentoring and directing young playwrights from Malaysia and Singapore.

At the end of the workshop, each of their drafts will be produced into a 10-minute play each, and then have them professionally performed in a public read by experienced actors at the George Town Festival 2014 in Penang. The plays will be directed by the award-winning Claire Wong.

And mind you, having their play read in public at such an esteemed event by equally respected industry veterans would provide a huge confidence boost for these young playwrights.

“Plays are written to be performed, and it’s an important part of the development of any new play to be heard out,” Huzir added. “It will be a rare opportunity for these young writers to get professional directors and actors bring their words to life.”

For the moment, the workshop is only open to those aged 15-18 and those who are both born and living in Penang. Interested participants can send in their application to play@georgetownfestival.com with the following:

• A summary of previous theatre experience.
• A short piece on why you like to write.
• A short piece on the reason for your participating in “Islands and Cities: A Penang/Singapore Youth Immersion Playwriting Workshop”.
• An original creative writing piece (short story, play, screenplay, poem or lyrics) of up to 15 pages.

But before you run off and start work on your entry, let us offer you some words of wisdom from Huzir to help you out: “My advice to an emerging playwright is to write the play that only you can write: find your unique voice and point of view. And then work like crazy on your craft!”

R.AGE is the official media partner of the Islands and Cities project.