Author Bio
Lowe is known affectionately in Australia as "The Grandmother of Gay Theatre". He is also one of Australia's most popular, prolific and produced playwrights. He began his theatrical career as a lighting operator/ actor/writer in children's theatre. To pay the bills he worked as a journalist/production editor and performing arts critic on magazines as diverse as "The National Times", "The Newcastle Morning Herald", "Theatre Australia" and "Performing Arts News" before joining the staff of the national gay magazine, "Campaign". He went on to edit the magazine for almost seven years. While at "Campaign" his autobiographical gay sex romp, "Writer's Cramp", was presented by the Gay Theatre Company as a Festival of Sydney Fringe event. He followed it up with "Ego Positioning" and then formed his own theatre company which performed a new work every six weeks at the Balmain Town Hall Hotel. His work moved interstate when further work was produced at La Mama, his first time working with acclaimed director Robert Chuter. Their partnership resulted in the highly acclaimed "The Death of Peter Pan", as well as site specific adaptations of "The Great Gatsby", "A Difficult Young Man" and "The Turn of the Screw". His other plays include the internationally successful "Homme Fatale: The Joey Stefano Story" which has been produced throughout Australia as well as New York, Chicago, San Francisco and Rome; Most recently he created the all-male production of "Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest (As Performed by the Inmates of Reading Gaol). He co-wrote (with Andrew Creagh) the screenplay for Richard Turner’s film, "Violet’s Visit". His popular short stories have appeared both in Australia and overseas in anthologies such as "Flesh and the Word", "hard", "The Mammoth Book of Gay Erotica", "Men Seeking Men: Adventures in Gay Classifieds", "The First Time Volume 2" and "Boy Meets Boy". [More about Barry Lowe]

Having just slogged through 76 10-minute plays and selected 18 for this years festival I thought it would be beneficial to let those of you out there in on what goes through the producer's/reader's mind when they are receiving and reading your scripts.

Read the submission guidelines
I got a lot of submissions from people who either didn't read or didn't think the submission guidelines were important. When a festival asks for two copies of a script and you send one, they have every right to ignore your submission. I didn't, but I was very tempted. It shows a lack of respect for the organization that will hopefully be putting on your work. Also, when the guidelines stipulate that there are only certain set pieces allowed, don't send a script that needs a grand piano, 1/8 scale statue of George Washington or cream cheese covered replica of Bo Didley.

Send a cover letter
Whether you are sending by email or snail mail just your script is not enough, [MORE]

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