Grantee Database
Actors' Reading Collective
Grant Year
2026-27
Grant Program
General Operating Support
Award Amount
$12,000.00
Project Description
With support from the California Arts Council, Actors’ Reading Collective (ARC), an artist-led Bay Area theatre company committed to open casting and emerging playwright development, can expand our programming and our reach at a crucial moment for the region’s artistic community.
Since the pandemic, many local theatre companies have closed, creating a loss of shared artistic spaces. In a region increasingly shaped by technology, isolation, and algorithms, people yearn for genuine human connection. ARC’s collective ensemble approach brings strangers together to feel, question, laugh, cry, and experience stories side by side without screens or filters.
ARC is committed to ensemble-based storytelling that fosters imagination, vulnerability, and conversation. At a time when society feels fractured and disconnected, ARC aims to create meaningful live experiences that let audiences experience our shared humanity and sense of community.
Organization Summary
Core Programs and Services:
T@7 was ARC’s initial program. During the pandemic, ARC’s founding actors gathered weekly on Zoom to cold-read plays aloud together. ARC soon offered rehearsed versions of these performances streamed to wider audiences. Today, T@7 readings remain a chance for the Collective to expand its craft, expand casting ranges, and test-run a wide range of scripts for consideration in other ARC programs.
Full Productions: To date, ARC has presented two full productions: the West Coast premiere of Pulitzer Prize winner Annie Baker’s The Antipodes in 2024 at Marin Shakespeare’s indoor space, and the Bay Area premiere of Amy Herzog’s Mary Jane in 2025 at the Magic Theatre in San Francisco. In early 2027, we will present our third full production, Abe Koogler’s Deep Blue Sound.
Outside the Box (OTB): Each summer, ARC presents four staged readings, including one large-ensemble play, amplifying different playwriting voices, employing dozens of actors, and exploring different directorial visions. OTB is a concentrated theatrical experience in which our audiences are invited to think like designers, directors, and dramaturgs while experiencing a wide range of stories—some familiar, others foreign—all of which matter now.
Stone-Cold Readings (SCRs) are entirely unrehearsed live reading events which take place in non-traditional theater spaces. The play, as well as the casting of all characters, is drawn from the “casting hat”, ARC and audience members read parts, and there is no cost to participate.
Salons offer the services of ARC’s seasoned actors to playwrights, literary managers, and/or artistic directors who need to hear works read aloud, allowing listeners to clearly identify the script’s merits and limitations.
Organization
Actors' Reading Collective
Address
507 Moraga Avenue
Piedmont
94611
County
Alameda
Region
Bay Area – Other
Website
