Meet Finalist Sharon Goldner

Don’t miss Sharon’s play, Little Swimmers, in our Planting the Seed Festival in Prescott, Jan 2nd and 3rd!
Tickets available HERE.
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I’ve never met Sharon Goldner, but man – she seems like a hoot and a half!  Two of Sharon’s plays made it into our Semi-Finalist round, and I stewed and stewed on which one I was going to have to omit from our final line-up.

It all Starts with Celeste and the Hard Boiled Egg was one of the biggest surprises for me, as a producer.  It scored quite well in the Peer Review, and when I read it I got a few chuckles from the play’s two female characters who engage in an unexpectedly easy-to-derail lunch-time conversation.  I found the play entertaining, but didn’t realize just HOW entertaining it would be once actors got a hold of it.  I produced the reading of this play in Waco partially because I wanted to see if the script jumped off the page or landed somewhere in talky-talky land – it positively leapt off the page and had us all guffawing as two of Waco’s talented performers – Barbara Bridgewater and Susan Anderson – adopted the roles.

The piece would have been a fantastic addition to our Planting the Seed line-up, but Sharon also wrote this fantastic little play about a couple of eager sperm just waiting to catch up with Ova, and, well… who could resist producing that?

So, it is with great pleasure we are including Sharon’s play, Little Swimmers, in this year’s festival.  Let’s meet this fantastically funny writer!

LBDI:   Why did you decide to submit your work to the ONSTAGE Project?

Sharon:  I decided to submit my work to the ONSTAGE Project because it seemed like one of those rare opportunities that is too good to be true, & as it turns out: it is rare, & it is an opportunity, & it is good & it is true.

LBDI: Describe your writing space… 

Sharon:  Ah, my writing space is … on my sofa that nobody else sits on but me!. I write (*gAsP*) the old-fashioned way, from brain to pen to paper, transcribing to computer later on. It makes me feel closer to the alphabet this way. And the alphabet is every writer’s friend!

LBDI:  If you could be any cartoon character for just 24 hours, who would you be? 

Sharon:  I imagine if I could be any cartoon character for 24 hours I would have to go with Mickey Mouse. Most cartoon characters subscribe to a nudist philosophy , while Mickey sports some really nice fashion sense. Also, heis the ambassador of smiles, to young & old alike, though I suspect with all of that happiness he generates,he is probably in therapy himself.

LBDI: What was your first play titled/about? 

Sharon:  The first play I ever wrote was called Bob & Marlene’s First Date. It is about Bob and Marlene who are out on a date that is not going very well to begin with, and Marlene’s mother keeps calling her daughter with various bits of dating advice that no daughter should ever hear her mother talk about. When Ida, the mother, tells Marlene she should tongue kiss Bob, the audience laughs, but secretly they are going poor Marlene … poor
poor Marlene.

LBDI: Which playwrights do you admire and what about them inspires you? 

Sharon:  I’d be very remiss not to say that Shakespeare inspires me because when I read Julius Caesar back in the 10th grade I was like Whoa. Somebody can actually write like this?! That was a very big moment for me.  Of the modern playwrights out there today, I have to say I love the work of Rajiv Joseph. He has an amazingly weird sensibility that I relate to.

LBDI: Why do you write for theatre?  (as opposed to other written media…)

Sharon:  I write for the theater because things have a way of coming full circle. When I was a kid I would re-write fairy tales as plays on looseleaf paper and distribute the scripts to the neighborhood kids to act out. When those teenage years hit I forgot about everything that had ever given me pleasure. Then I went to college where I went on a short story binge that lasted for many, many years. I re-discovered playwriting a few years ago and after many tearful episodes of apologies for abandoning the art form that I was truly meant to create, playwriting forgave me, and we have been partners ever since, stronger than ever. There is something about manipulating the alphabet on paper to create characters and dialogue, AND then seeing it all step into real life on the stage… there is no other wow like this medium.

LBDI: What is your spirit animal? 

Sharon:  I would like to think that my spirit animal is a dolphin because I have been enamored by them since reading Meet the Dolphin in the second grade. But truthfully, my spirit animal is probably a little lap dog that likes getting belly rubs and fed treats.

LBDI: Paper or Plastic?

Sharon:  Definitely paper. I am obsessed with recycling. Can recycling be a hobby?

Sharon Goldner‘s award-winning plays have been produced (2010- present) multiple times in NYC; Brooklyn, NY; Baltimore; FL; and singularly in WI; PA; VA; OH; & MN.  Her work appears in Smith & Kraus’ Best Female Stage Monologues 2013. Currently, she has a play being workshopped in Newfoundland, Canada.   Sharon is a member of the Dramatists Guild. Additionally, over 30 of Sharon’s short stories have been published in literary journals across the U.S, and England, and she is a 3-time Pushcart Prize nominee for her short fiction.

The Planting the Seed Festival runs this week for 3 performances only
at the First Congregational Church Theater in Prescott.
Showtimes – Jan 2nd @ 7:30, and  Jan 3rd @ 2:30 & 7:30.
Tickets just $14 online or at the door!