Set aside 15 minutes for dramas in Belfast

If you’ve ever felt trapped in a theater when a play is dragging on for too long, then consider the 15 Minute Festival, a drama event being staged Friday and Saturday on the stages of the National Theater Workshop for the Handicapped in Belfast. The festival consists of six, 15-minute original new plays performed in a 90-minute span.

It could be a nugget of gold for theatergoers who get restless after the first act of a full-length show.

It certainly was the right combination – though for other reasons – for actor Margot Kidder, who heard about the festival and agreed to act as host and to present awards to the six winning playwrights, five of whom live in New England and another from New York.

“I’m here to lend support,” said Kidder, best known for her roles in the films “Amityville Horror” and “Superman.” “I live in a fabulous little town in Montana that is equally eclectic, with artists and painters and ecoterrorists. The scene in Belfast is very familiar. So I feel right at home. I also know how extraordinary the hidden talent is in small areas like this. I see it all over the country. It has to do with being willing to try and explore new things.”

Finding talent was what Larraine Brown, festival director and theater educator, had in mind when she began thinking about a summer theater project last spring. With her colleagues David Stucky, who is a writer, and Shanti Parsons, an actor, Brown developed the idea for a festival that would highlight short, original plays.

“I was interested in original work because I didn’t want to do things that have been done over and over again amazingly well,” said Brown, who teaches theater in Belfast. “I wanted to create a showcase for writers, too, and I wanted it to be short because if it’s awful, it will be over in a few minutes.”

But “awful” is not what Brown and her compatriots encountered when, by Internet, they put out a call for short scripts . The only criteria was that the performance time be no more than 15 minutes and that they be set in a city park.

More than 100 submissions arrived, and 25 of the best were passed on to theater professionals Doug Hughes, formerly of the Long Wharf Theater in Connecticut and The Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis, and Vanessa Gilbert of the Perishable Theater Arts Center in Providence. Hughes and Gilbert read the plays and chose six winners and 12 runners-up. The winning manuscripts will receive full productions by professional and community theater artists on Friday and Saturday, and the runners-up, about half of which have Maine connections, will receive staged readings on Saturday.

Jane Clark of Orland, the only Maine resident among the six winners, will have her play “Awake” produced at the festival. Clark, who is the host of WERU’s 1980s show “The Dollhouse,” has a background in theater and has been cast in a production of “Three Tall Women” to take place in Ellsworth in January. She is also working on a screenplay.

“I wrote the play in 36 hours,” said Clark, “and got it to the post office with 10 minutes to spare.”

The festival itself came about in a last-minute fashion, too, said organizers, but it quickly garnered attention from writers and actors. Because of the immediate volume of response, the organizers found ready support from the community as well as from the Wallis Foundation, which awarded a $15,000 grant for the arts, education and community development potential for the project.

“We hope Belfast, as its art scene continues to expand, will infuse enthusiasm in similar communities around the country to create their own quality theater and arts programs,” said Jack Baker, of the Wallis Foundation.

Brown, who has performed professional theater outside of Maine as well as with the Belfast Maskers, said she saw theater as a viable tool for building community life and that Belfast, which has undergone a burst of arts activities in recent years, was a perfect setting for the project.

“There are a lot of exciting possibilities in Maine in the arts, especially with theater,” said Brown. “People come here with all sorts of dreams and visions. There is room for people to bring their vision here. There’s a lot of talent, a lot of potential. Everybody always thinks the brilliant stuff is done in metropolitan areas. It has been amazing to me to see how much good work is being done here.”

The 15 Minute Festival will take place 7 p.m. Aug. 23 and Aug. 24 at the National Theater Workshop for the Handicapped at 96 Church St. in Belfast. For tickets and information, call 338-2734.