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2008 Conference

June 9 - 21, 2008 at the Alpine Playhouse in McCall Idaho (map)

Featuring 2008 Guest Playwright John Olive

The 2008 Plays

Suicide, Incorporated by Andrew Hinderaker: It's been a tough week at work.  Revenues are down, lawsuits are up, and protesters picket outside your door.  Worst of all, your boss has begun to suspect that you're trying to keep your clients alive.

The Garden of Monsters by Mara Lathrop: THE GARDEN OF MONSTERS follows the last shred of hope in the world on its perilous journey from the liberation of Dachau , to a wine bar in present-day London , to the year 2045, where a new plague threatens everyone. In a world full of fear, remorse, and a mysterious two-headed clown, can hope -- and humanity -- survive?

Faith by James McLindon: All that young Simon wants for Christmas is to receive the stigmata and become God's prophet, and if religious fervor has anything to do with it, he's a shoe-in. So when the mysterious Harbinger appears to him in the Walmart parking lot, Simon knows that she is God's angel, the answer to his prayers … or is she?

Wait by Greg Paul: Journey through an America that has yet to be, where current trends are followed to their funny and often grim conclusions: from urban breadlines to microchips to civilian relocations camps – how does one maintain one's humanity in a foreign country that was once called home?

And in the Playwrights Intensive Program...

The One True Church by Robert McAndrew: From the moment he was born, Ben was expected to have divinely inspired visions and then become the Prophet of The One True Church , just as his father and grandfather had done before him. But eighteen-year-old Ben isn't interested in being a Prophet. His older sister Lisa would love to become the Prophet and lead the church in a new direction. Her only obstacles are church doctrine, an all-male hierarchy, and The One True Book .

Blackout by Evan Sesek: Doug can't wait to welcome his son Brian home from Iraq , but younger brother Jared seems to be less than enthused. Brian was supposed to call three days ago, but they haven't heard a word. With a new blackout following the death of four soldiers, Doug struggles to decide whether to go to the airport… or answer the phone.

A Slaying Song Tonight by John Olive: A Christmas-murder-musical-comedy... jingle bells will never be the same.

Kandahar by Jeni Mahoney: A journey through the vast unknowable landscape of the human soul; inspired by Arthur Schnitzler's “ Das Viet Land .”

The Playwrights

Andrew Hinderaker (Suicide, Incorporated) Seven Devils broke a pretty respectable streak for Andrew Hinderaker: his plays and screenplays always fared well in competitions without ever actually winning. Notable recognitions included Finalist/Semi-Finalist status at Sundance, PlayLabs, and the Austin Film Festival. Andrew's plays have been performed on both coasts, and in his hometown of Chicago . He is a proud member of Chicago Dramatists, the Dramatists Guild, and the Playwrights' Center in Minneapolis.

Mara Lathrop ( The Garden of Monsters ) Mara's full length plays have received productions in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Seattle, Toronto, Rome and elsewhere. They include The Visible Horse (developed at the National Playwrights Conference), The Urn of Drew (finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize and developed at Seven Devils Playwrights Conference), Hell on Wheels (commissioned by the Philadelphia Festival theater), The Eighteenth Mitzvah (Richard Hugo House New Play Prize), Dreams of Baby (Best New Play, 1993 Seattle Times Footlight Awards), Tales From The Saltmines (commissioned by A Contemporary theater, developed at the Ojai Playwrights Conference, and finalist for the Jane Chambers Playwriting Competition), The Six Basic Rules (Mill Mountain theater New Play Prize), The Lily & Lou Show , and Ees Story Uff Poor Sea Village Gerl . She has received Fellowships from the Washington State Arts Commission, the Seattle Arts Commission, and Artists Trust. The Visible Horse is published by Smith & Kraus in the collection "Women Playwrights: Best Plays of 2001". She has taught playwriting for the University of Washinton's Certificate Writing Program and at Edmonds (WA) Community College. Upcoming: The Visible Horse will be produced by Key City Public theater in Port Townsend, WA. She divides her time between a small town in Washington state and an even smaller town in central Italy.

Robert (Bob) McAndrew ( The One True Church ) is one of four playwrights living west of the Mississippi who were nominated for the 1999 PEN Center USA West Literary Award for Drama for his play Only Child. His play Foundling won the 1999 Southern Appalachian Playwrights Conference. John Doe #2 won the 2000 Peterson Emerging Playwright Award and was awarded a Silver Medal by the Pinter Review. Screw the Widow was produced by theater Conspiracy in Fort Myers, FL in 2002. Hostage Politics won the 2007 Palm Springs International Playwriting Competition and was produced at the Black Box theater in Palm Springs, CA in March of 2008. Bob was born in Spokane, WA . He graduated from high school in Idaho Falls, ID. He received a BFA from the theater Department at the University of Utah. Bob's full-length, one-act and ten-minute plays have received staged readings and/or productions in Alaska, California, Florida, Idaho, Minnesota, Montana, New York, North Carolina, Oregon and Washington. He lives in Boise with Gwynne McElhinney, his wife extraordinaire.

James McLindon (Faith) In the past year, James McLindon has had three full-length and six one-act plays produced in theaters across America, eight of them world premieres. Distant Music , a finalist for the Kaufman and Hart Prize for New American Comedy, enjoyed four productions in 2007 (“Don't miss this intriguing new play,” Boston Globe ). Dusk premiered in Los Angeles last June (“An issues play with a poetic soul … Recommended,” L. A. Times ) and A Brief History of Penguins and Promiscuity premiered there this past January (“Intelligent … Plenty of laughter … Recommended” L.A. Times ). This summer, he will be workshopping another new full-length play, Saving Grace, at the PlayPenn Conference in Philadelphia. His other plays have been developed and/or produced by theaters across the country including the Abingdon theater, hotINK Festival, Irish Repertory, Penguin Repertory, and HRC Showcase theater in New York; Victory Gardens, Prop Thtr, and Stage Left in Chicago; Theatricum Botanicum, Grove theater Center, and Circus Theatricals in Los Angeles; and the Ashland New Plays Festival in Oregon.

John Olive (Guest Playwright - A Slaying Song Tonight) is an award-winning and widely produced playwright, a novelist, a screenwriter and a popular teacher of creative writing. His plays include STANDING ON MY KNEES, CARELESS LOVE, EVELYN AND THE POLKA KING, THE VOICE OF THE PRAIRIE, THE FIERCE CLOCKWORK OF DESTINY, KILLERS, THE SUMMER MOON, GOD FIRE, others. Producing theaters include: Steppenwolf, The Old Globe, South Coast Rep, ACT/Seattle, The Oregon Shakespeare Festival, City theater, Manhattan theater Club, Wisdom Bridge theater, The Guthrie theater, Actors theater of Louisville, Arden theater, among many others. Currently John enjoys a productive relationship with Seattle Childrens theater. SCT projects include SIDEWAYS STORIES FROM WAYSIDE SCHOOL, JASON AND THE GOLDEN FLEECE, THE TRUE CONFESSIONS OF CHARLOTTE DOYLE, JOHNNY TREMAIN. His newest play with SCT, PHARAOH SERKET & THE LOST STONE OF FIRE, opens in January. John has written screen and teleplays for Amblin Entertainment, Disney, ShadowCatcher Entertainment, Lorimar, Columbia Television, among others. He has published short stories and is preparing a young adult novel, Smartass , for publication, as well as a nonfiction book about creating bedtime stories for young children, Tell Me A Story In The Dark . John has won fellowships from the Bush Foundation, The McKnight Foundation, The National Endowment for the Arts, as well as a Kennedy Center Award for New Plays. He teaches at the Loft and at the University of Minnesota . John lives in Minneapolis with his wife Mary and their son Michael.

Greg Paul (Wait) lives in beautiful Brooklyn , New York with Lisa Dove, his lovely wife, and Hawken and Finn, their changeling sons. Greg was lucky enough to be an actor in the first season of the Seven Devils Playwrights Conference and now he is thrilled to be returning, this time as a playwright. He is a professor of theater at Baruch College, as well as a teaching artist with the Manhattan New Music Project, where he writes music theater pieces with special needs students. His plays have been produced at such venues as Special Music School , Jalopy Music theater, The Old Stone House and HERE Arts Center . He is also a proud and long-standing member of the Juggernaut theater Company and its Playwriting ArtsGym. He would like to thank Jen, Sheila, Paula and all the great folks here at Seven Devils for this rare and wonderful opportunity.

Evan Sesek (Blackout) is a freshman at Boise State University where he is majoring in theater Arts with an emphasis in Dramatic Writing and Performance. He has worked professionally for several years with The Idaho Shakespeare Festival, and most recently played Tony in the Boise State mainstage production of You Can't Take It With You . He is extremely excited to be involved with Seven Devils again, and would like to thank his family, Dano Madden, and Sam Hunter for their endless inspiration and motivation.

Jeni Mahoney (Kandahar) Jeni's plays has been seen across the U.S., in London and as far a field as Wagga-Wagga Australia . Recent credits include: RUNNING IN CIRCLES SCREAMING at Washington 's 2008 Source Theater Festival, and the upcoming publication of COME RAIN OR COME SHINE will be featured in Best Short Plays 2005-2006 (Applause) and LIGHT (playscripts.com). Jeni's plays, including: THE FEAST OF THE FLYING COW... AND OTHER STORIES OF WAR, THE MARTYRDOM OF WASHINGTON BOOTH, MERCY FALLS , LIGHT and BAD WATER JUJU have been variously presented at: the National Playwrights Conference, InterAct Theater, the Prop Theater's Midwestern New Play Festival, And Toto Too, L.A. Theater Center , Lark Theater's Playwrights Week, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, NYU's hotINK Festival, Chicago Womens Theater Alliance, and Village Rep among others. Her one-acts THROW OF THE MOON (written with Ben Sahl) and AMERICAN EYES were commissioned and produced by Gorilla Rep and can be found in "Plays and Playwrights 2001" edited by Martin Denton. Jeni teaches Playwriting Playwrights Horizons Theater School, a studio school of New York University's Tisch School for the Arts. She is a member of the Dramatists Guild of America.