A "pop-up" newsroom called Engine28, designed to give extensive and thorough coverage of theater in Los Angeles, goes live online today at www.engine28.com. A reporting staff from 28 media outlets across America will produce reviews, analysis, forums, podcasts and videos. Material will include coverage of several coinciding theater festivals and conferences: the RADAR L.A. Festival, the 2011 Theatre Communications Group (TCG) National Conference and the Hollywood Fringe Festival.
The period of "pop-up" operation will run from June 15 to June 20 as part of USC Annenberg's seventh National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Arts Journalism Institute in Theater and Musical Theater.
"Rather than simply talk about new models for arts journalism at this year's NEA Arts Journalism Institute, we decided to create some," said Douglas McLennan, digital editor and chief architect for Engine28.com. "Engine28 is an exercise in 'what if' arts journalism. What if you could throw a large group of journalists at a subject and invent creative ways of covering it? Engine28 will be a real-time laboratory for journalism about the arts."
"Think all-star team. That is Engine28. We figured that with two exciting theater festivals and two conferences happening in town, we could respond to them best by doing what journalists do, which is reporting," said Sasha Anawalt, director of the USC Annenberg NEA Arts Journalism Institute. "Although Engine28 will be public, we are still about arts journalism training. And to this end, we will still see many shows together and have joint sessions, but our main emphasis will be on individual attention given to the Fellows by our editorial staff, sitting shoulder to shoulder with them in the newsroom and working on stories together."
Engine28's editor-in-chief is Jeff Weinstein, former arts editor and columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer and Village Voice. The editorial staff includes Susan Brenneman of the Los Angeles Times, Rebecca Haithcoat of LA Weekly, Edward Lifson, formerly of NPR, Steven Leigh Morris, critic-at-large for the LA Weekly, Laurie Ochoa, co-founder of Slake, Dominic Papatola, lead theater critic for St. Paul Pioneer Press, Michael Phillips, film critic for the Chicago Tribune, Howard Shapiro, theater critic and editor for the Philadelphia Inquirer, Suzi Steffen of Stage Directions and MyEugene.org, and independent PBS producer/director Jennifer Maytorena Taylor.
Engine28 reporters and critics include: Christopher Arnott with The New Haven Advocate and New Mass Media, Inc., Martin Brady with Nashville Scene, Anthony Byrnes with KCRW, Linda Fowler with nj.com and Advance Publications Inc., Nancy Fowler with St. Louis Beacon, Ben Fulton with The Salt Lake Tribune, Rachel Lee Harris with The New York Times, Lou Harry with Indianapolis Business Journal, Gerry Christopher Johnson with Philadelphia Weekly and Philadelphia Tribune, Maura Judkis with TBD.com, Jenny Lawton with PRI and WNYC, Kerry Lengel with The Arizona Republic, Rebecca Milzoff with New York Magazine, Jesse North with Stage Rush, Kathryn Osenlund with CurtainUp.com, Julie Potter with San Francisco Bay Guardian and In Dance, Walter Ryce with Monterey County Weekly, Laura Spencer with NPR and KCUR, Grace Suh with The Pitch and The Flickcast, David Timberline with Style Weekly, Benjamin Waterhouse with Willamette Week.
The period of "pop-up" operation (June 15-20) coincides with the RADAR L.A. Festival, an international festival of contemporary theater produced by REDCAT (Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater) in collaboration with Center Theatre Group and The Public Theater's Under the Radar Festival (New York), the 2011 Theatre Communications Group (TCG) National Conference, hosted by the LA STAGE Alliance, as well as the first days of the second annual Hollywood Fringe Festival.
For more information about the NEA Arts Journalism Institute in Theater and Musical Theater, visit annenberg.usc.edu/nea.
