Director Ed Decker is the Founding Artistic Director of New Conservatory Theatre Center which opened its doors in 1981. NCTC is a San Francisco cornerstone institution leading in the fields of arts education as well as Queer and Allied theatre production. A graduate of the SFSU Theatre Department, Ed is looking forward to keeping the word “new” in the company’s namesake emblematic of fresh, vital, and transformative theatre.
New Conservatory Theatre Center has announced the release of a brand-new podcast, In Good Company, available for streaming and download starting August 26, with weekly episodes made available every Wednesday.
Written by a diverse group of talented playwrights including Jewelle Gomez, Eric Reyes Loo, Laurel Ollstein, Tim Pinckney, and Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder and directed by Founder and Artistic Director Ed Decker, NCTC’s newest medium uses radio plays of the past to take steps toward the future of theatre in this kind-of-semi-true, behind-the-scenes story about a Bay Area theatre grappling with its place in society as Coronavirus spreads.
This free 10-episode series is a love letter to the resilience of art, artists, and the places they call “home”.
New Conservatory Theatre Center’s In Good Company episodes will be released weekly on Wednesdays starting August 26th on all all major podcast platforms including iTunes, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, and more.
WRITING TEAM
Playwright Laurel Ollstein is an award winning playwright/director based in Los Angeles. Most recent production They Promised Her the Moon – its critically acclaimed west coast premier at the Old Globe theatre in San Diego, directed by Giovanna Sardelli. The Northern California premiere opened March 6 of this year at TheatreWorks Silicon Valley and unfortunately had to close due to the virus on March 10. Laurel directs playwriting programs, writing and arts education in schools, and creates plays on social justice themes. An adjunct faculty member at Cal Arts, UCLA, USC, Loyola Marymount, and Otis College of Art and Design.
Playwright Jewelle Gomez is a novelist, poet and cultural worker. She’s the author of eight books including the first Black Lesbian vampyre novel, The Gilda Stories, which has been in print more than 25 years. New Conservatory Theatre Center commissioned and produced two of her plays – Waiting for Giovanni and Leaving the Blues.
Playwright Tim Pinckney’s plays include Message to Michael (Rattlestick Playwrights Theatre), Still at Risk (world premiere at the New Conservatory Theatre, NYC premiere at Theater for the New City) and Ever So Humble (world premiere Hangar Theatre, recently featured in the Plays in the House series as a benefit for The Actors Fund starring Michael Urie and Andréa Burns). Other plays include A Prehistoric Ritual, Stir Until Smooth, A Perfect Blendship and First Refusal, as well as the stage adaptation for the world premiere of Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol. TV: staff writer on Halston, an upcoming Netflix limited series, starring Ewan McGregor. Tim is represented by Charles Kopelman at Abrams Artists. www.timpinckney.com
Playwright Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder’s plays include Gee’s Bend, Fresh Kills, The Flagmaker of Market Street, The Furniture of Home, White Lightning, Provenance, Everything That’s Beautiful, and Looks Like Pretty. Her plays have been produced at the Royal Court (London), Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Denver Center, Cleveland Playhouse, KC Rep, Northlight, the Arden, B Street Theatre, and Hartford Stage, among others. She is the recipient of the Osborn Award given by the American Theatre Critics Association, a Sloan Commission, and has been featured on The Kilroy’s. Elyzabeth is the current Tennessee Williams Playwright-in-Residence at Sewanee: The University of the South. www.wilderwriting.net