FORESTBURGH, NY — Back in the olden days, before 2020, theatre director Matt Lenz and his husband had a second home in Forestburgh. “Then the pandemic hit and we moved here.”

They saw the challenges with which the Forestburgh Playhouse was dealing. “We had no official relationship with the playhouse,” he said. “But we envisioned an outdoor concert season with our Broadway friends” that summer, to help keep a vital arts organization alive.

That first summer led to 2021’s In the Works ~ In the Woods (ITW). It’s a festival that lets actors, writers and directors try out a show on fellow professionals and then on an audience.

Shows that were workshopped here have gone on to open in New York City.

Theatre in the works

Participants “come for a full week and have a week to rehearse,” Lenz, the artistic director and founder of ITW, said. There’s feedback. Lots of feedback. Everyone sees “where it’s working, where it’s not.”

On the weekend, when the festival opens to the public, “we present staged readings.”

There is one musical, one play, a Theatre for Young Audiences production “and the Cab Lab,” Lenz said. The last meaning “cabaret.” That’s “two solo performers” who might never have done cabaret before.

Test-driving a play or musical away from Broadway has been a thing for years. But ITW is a little different, and that difference means a lot to the participants.

First, the actors, writers and/or directors are housed, fed and their travel expenses are paid for, Lenz said. At other festivals, all the associated costs can add up to $20k or more, ruling out the struggling artist.

“We tell them, ‘We love your play, and we’ll pay you” to come here.”

It’s one less worry, and a chance to focus on improving the work.

Because of the expense, this sort of festival happens less often. “Particularly in New York City, which is very Broadway-focused,” Lenz said. “Producers take a financial risk, and they lean toward people who have a track record.”

It’s hard to get these opportunities if you’re an emerging artist, he added.

And then there’s the feedback on the performance and the necessary processes that make it happen. “We talk about the theme, the song list—those are essential elements,” he said. “We try to educate.”

Nobody’s a shoe-in, of course. There has to be a complete draft available for the team behind ITW to consider. And it should be reflective of the Forestburgh Playhouse and the performances that would work on the main stage there, Lenz said.

This time, they received 60 new musicals for submission and 70-plus new plays.

“People are spreading the word,” he said.

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For the audiences

But there’s plenty on offer for the weekend. Off-the-cuff conversations, and not just with actors—ITW chats up designers, writers on the theatre and casting directors too.

This year, “Jesse Green, a New York Times theatre critic and co-author of a biography of Mary Rodgers [a composer, screenwriter and novelist famous for “Freaky Friday,” but she also had Sullivan County creds] will do a talk and a Q&A,” Lenz said.

Three-time Tony-winning director and theatre writer Jack O’Brien will do an off-the-cuff talk.

It’s education again, but this time for the audience, to “give them a sense of what’s happening behind the scenes.”

When it comes to the readings—“Invisible” and “IN BeTWEEN,”—and the performance—“Stage Mother”—the audience is crucial.

They give feedback too. And while it’s wonderful if viewers love a show, “if the audience doesn’t like it… that’s a gift to the writer or performer too.”

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Theatre in the woods

“‘Stage Mother’ came to us through the director,” Lenz said.

The musical is based on the movie about a conservative church choir leader who inherits her late son’s drag club.

A week at ITW means the writers—the writer who is adapting the book and the composer/lyricist—can sit down together and work in the same room. “The songs are really great,” Lenz said. “This is a great story that asks to be made into a musical.”

Many ITW productions will have a future life, “but for us to have this is very exciting.”

There’s more, of course.

“IN BeTWEEN,” a musical for young audiences, is “a love letter to those kids stuck in the middle,” according to the website. Theatre kids await the annual musical’s cast list—but the director is running an hour late.

So what is there to do but tell their stories and create drama?

“Invisible” is being read for the first time in front of an audience. The play is about two Black women who hallucinate superpowers at a time when women of color had no voice. “It’s very funny and very moving,” he said.

“I’m very proud of, and of this area… One of the things that attracted me here was the tradition of theatre,” Lenz said. “There’s something in the air, something conducive to creativity. I hope it takes root and continues to grow and grow.”

For the complete list of performances and all else on offer—and to buy tickets—visit www.fbplayhouse.org/itw.