Todd Cardin Honored by NFCPA

Philadelphia playwright Todd Cardin nominated for award.

Philadelphia, PA (PRWEB) October 2, 2006 -- Todd Cardin of ETC Theater was nominated for NFCPA for excellence as a playwright. Cardin received the nod for his script Pictures of Lily which was performed by ETC Theater in spring of 2006.

The earliest playwrights in Western literature with surviving works are Ancient Greeks with some of the earliest plays being written around the 5th century BC. These playwrights are notable as they established forms that are still relied on by modern playwrights. Notable among them are Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, and Aristophanes.

Shakespeare wrote classical tragedies and comedies which a lot of other work is based on. For example, Kiss Me, Kate is based on The Taming of the Shrew, and Romeo and Juliet has been remade more times than can be counted. Tom Stoppard created the play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead in 1966 which is a modern transformation of Hamlet.

Playwrights often do not reach the same level of fame or cultural importance that they have in the past. This may have to do with the current state of professional theatre, in which fewer new works are produced by theatres. Instead, theaters have tended towards remounting past successes. For example, Playwrights Horizons produced only six plays in the 2002-03 seasons, compared with thirty-one in 1973-74. As revivals and large-scale production musicals become the de rigeur Broadway and Off-Broadway productions, it has become much more difficult for playwrights to make a living in the business, let alone become major successes.

However, the most successful playwrights – in stark contrast to the lot of the screenwriter — are often high-status figures in their industry. This is a corollary of the more literary approach that has characterised the theatre since its roots in poetry. The form often has a greater reverence for the text and arguably is less oriented around the work of a director. The playwright’s vision often takes precedence.

In recent years this attitude has, sadly, started to be slowly overhauled. A less rigidly formal approach to text for performance is now common, informed by practitioners like Joan Littlewood and her protégé Mike Leigh.

The awards will be given this January in New York City. Todd Cardin had written four plays last year and all were considered as potential nominations.

# # #