3Girls Theatre Presents

The 9th New Works Festival: Rebuild, Renew, Reinvent

February 24 - March 18 in Z Below
Full Schedule and Ticket Links Below

Admission to the New Works Festival is FREE at the door, seats can be reserved online in advance for ‘Tasha at a variety of ticketing levels and for $12 for the rest of the festival.

3Girls Theatre’s New Works Festival is the celebratory core of our company, uniting all of our diverse programs and projects under one roof for multiple weeks of professional performances and events by and for Bay Area woman+ theatre-makers.

3GT is thrilled to finally be in a position to invite audiences to return to Z Below for our 2023 New Works Festival: Rebuild, Renew, Reinvent. As in previous years, 3GT will fill Z Below with readings of scripts-in-development by playwrights participating in our programs and workshops, including: the Salon Series, LezWritesBTQ, 3GT Investigates, 3GT Innovators, plus a special event honoring and celebrating the contributions of 3GT's Founding Executive Artistic Director, AJ Baker. 3GT will be presenting the above in-development script readings and panel discussions in conjunction with the World Premier of ‘Tasha by artist, activist, and 3GT Playwright and Program Director Cat Brooks.

3Girls Theatre develops, promotes, and presents new plays by San Francisco Bay Area women+ playwrights. Founded in 2011 to challenge the bias that favors men’s voices over women’s, we provide an artistic home for women and assigned-female-at-birth playwrights from across the SF Bay Area at all stages of their creative and professional process. Our community, programming, and artist services provide playwrights with everything they need to develop and produce their scripts, nurturing women+ theatre artists ranging in age from 11-90+, and empowering BIPOC and LBTQI+ playwrights. 

3Girls Theatre Presents

'Tasha by Cat Brooks

February 24 - March 18

Trigger Warning: This play and the description of it deals with police violence and the use of lethal force against an unarmed young black woman. Viewer description advised.

‘Tasha is a one woman show exploring the in-custody murder of Natasha McKenna at the hands of law enforcement in Farifax, Virginia in 2015. She was a young Black woman with schizophrenia, weighing little more than 100 pounds, who was naked when tased to death 5 times in 17 minutes by 5 sheriffs wearing hazmat suits. The play, written by artist and activist Cat Brooks, directed by Oakland's Poet Laureate Dr. Ayodele Nzinga, and performed by acclaimed actor Jeunée Simon, explores her life and murder from the point of view of several characters, including Natasha’s mother, Sheriff Stacey Kincaid (Fairfax’ sherrif now and then), and Natasha herself.

The script for ‘Tasha is based on years of research and rewrites by playwright Cat Brooks, with the help of her community, including longtime creative partner and ‘Tasha dramaturg and director, Dr. Ayodele Nzinga. “Natasha started talking so loudly I had to get up and write what she was saying.” Brooks said of the script’s genesis in 2015. In 2017-2018, Brooks participated in several of 3Girls Theatre's signature script development workshops. In 2019, 3GT sent Brooks and Nzinga on a trip to Virginia to speak with some of those close to Natasha and the circumstances surrounding her death. It felt, in Brooks’ words, “unprincipled to continue [developing the script] any further without talking to the people most impacted by her death: her family and her community." These interviews with Natasha’s community were incorporated into the final script.

The much-anticipated world premier of this vital play has been delayed by the pandemic since 2020. Sadly, the themes explored have only become more relevant over the past three years. This is a play by, of, and for Black people. For Brooks, “‘Tasha will not be a success unless everyone in the San Francisco Bay Area, not just the usual theatre-going audience, has the opportunity to engage with this play.”

Admission to the New Works Festival is FREE at the door but seats can be reserved online in advance for $12.

3GT’s LezWritesBTQ Monologue Night with Tina D’Elia!

We celebrate the triumphant return of the New Works Festival with an evening of monologues curated by noted writer and performer Tina D’Elia. Always one of the most popular evenings of the festival, all of the selected works are drawn from the free writing workshops given to queer women, LBTQ and non-binary artists by Margery Kreitman during the pandemic. The workshops were sponsored and arranged by 3GT’s LezWritesBTQ Program. Wednesday, 3/1 @ 7:30pm

3GT Investigates: Stolen Bodies on Stolen Land

Morning Star Gali and J. yAyA Porras, as part of the 3GT Investigates program, look to tell the untold stories of missing and murdered Native and Indigenous women, girls and two-spirit relatives throughout California, with an emphasis on those living in urban environments. Saturday, 3/4 @ 2pm

Dramaturgy and Representation: a Conversation

During its 2022 season, 3GT launched a new pilot project, a professional development workshop for BIPOC theater artists looking to become dramaturgs. In addition to a crash course on the subject participants then enjoyed a paid role as a dramaturg on a 3GT script-in-development. This panel will feature the BIPOC dramaturgs who participated in this along with the  playwrights who worked with these fresh faces. Hosted by BIPOC Dramaturgy Workshop leaders (and acclaimed Black Bay Area dramaturgs) Amissa Miller and Leigh Rondon-Davis. Sunday, 3/5 @ 7:30pm

Meth

The testing of friendships over money and drugs in rural California is the main thrust in this piece described by its playwright Elizabeth Flanagan as a “tragedy with lots of humor.” Tuesday, 3/7 @ 7:30pm

The Next to the Last Box

Playwright Karen Caronna tells the story of Hollis, newly arrived at the Sunset Vista Villas who after finding herself attracted to Harold also finds herself competing for his affections with his wheelchair-bound wife (who also is a Villas resident!), dreaming of escape and among other things, scoring tickets to a Rolling Stones concert. Wednesday, 3/8 @ 7:30pm

3GT Investigates: Surviving Oakland

This project by Cat Brooks and Dr. Ayodele Nzinga who worked together on 'Tasha, intends to raise up the voices and untold stories of missing and murdered Black Women in connection with Oakland’s place as major stop on the global human trafficking circuit. Saturday, 3/11 @ 2pm

Clara

This biographical comedy by Linda Ayres-Frederick is a one person play based on her grandmother who fled from the Ukraine to South America before making it to the States where she lived to be 106; there will be a recipe for cherry strudel and a few secrets to survival revealed along the way. Sunday, 3/12 @ 7:30pm 

Ev’ryday Family

A non-traditional Black Family facing the everyday challenges of being Black and living in today’s America with humor, bravery and an eye toward history in this play by Meja Pannell-Tyehimba. Tuesday, March 14 @ 7:30pm

The Pennsylvanian

This “drama with Bluegrass music” by Jennifer Roberts features siblings and musicians Pixie and Macon returning to the house they grew up in as members of a family band with a manipulative father at the helm. Wednesday, 3/15 @ 7:30pm 

3GT Innovators: Burning Wild

Created by Debórah Eliezer—who herself is a survivor of California’s recent wildfires—and the Aviva Arts Ensemble in a devised performance that incorporates physical theater, dance, song, documentary video and puppetry to tell a story about land, displacement and renewal, created in response to the ecological crisis facing Northern California, and by extension, the world. Saturday, March 18 @ 2pm