NewsWire Finding Common Ground

A.S.K. Theater Projects is launching its Common Ground Festival '98, June 23-28, for a fourth year of envelope-bursting new theatre on UCLA's North Campus. All events are free of charge, but reservations are required (and UCLA parking is $5).
This year's line-up features works-in-progress from irreverent solo performer Chris Wells; choreographer Naomi Goldberg and Other Voices; the Austin dance/theatre troupe Johnson/Long Dance Company; Nancy Keystone's Akhmatova Project; performance pioneers John Fleck and Rachel Rosenthal; Fingered, a new work from San Diego director Steve Cosson, plus A.S.K.'s workshop production of Mariachi Quixote, a new musical play from Josƒ Cruz Gonz‡lez.
The festival will also feature "Down the Rabbit Hole," a four-day writers lab, June 23-26, led by acclaimed playwright Marie Irene Fornes. The lab is free, but enrollment is limited.
Climaxing the festival on Sunday, June 28, in the courtyard near the Freud Playhouse will be a theatre fair from 3-7 p.m., with more than 50 theatre and production companies sharing information and answering questions (including, natch, Back Stage West/Drama-Logue).
For more information or to make reservations call (310) 478-9ASK.
Off the Wire
NORTHERN CALIFORNIA-- The Dell'Arte Players present the eighth annual Mad River Festival, featuring a myriad of circus acts, June 18-July 12 in Blue Lake. The festival kicks off with Make*A*Circus, a San Francisco-based touring circus troupe, which will host a full day of family entertainment. The fest continues with performances by the Dell'Arte Players, the Bloomsburge Theatre Ensemble, Touchstone Theatre, the Independent Eye, Teatre Carlson, Jeff Demark, the Karuk Storytellers. (707) 668-5666
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA-- Acme Talent & Literary, a SAG, AFTRA, and AEA franchised agency, is currently accepting submissions for its L.A. musical theatre department for a late July audition. Only performers with strong Broadway, stock, or regional credits will be considered. Send pix & resumƒs to Steven Simon, c/o Acme Talent & Literary, L.A. Musical Theatre Department, 6310 San Vicente Blvd., Suite 520, Los Angeles, CA 90048
Bilingual Foundation of the Arts Reader's Theatre continues its free play reading series with A Little Something to Ease the Pain by Renƒ R. Aloma, June 22; Borders by Jorge Luis Albertella, June 29; Guadalupe Reina by Fabiola Diaz de Le—n, July 6, and Brujas de Mi Madre by Daniel Valdez, July 13. (213) 225-4044
Terry Tamminen brings his one-man show Will Power to the Morgan-Wixson Theatre in Santa Monica, June 20. Tamminen portrays Shakespeare on the eve of his retirement and "reminisces" about the Bard's life, his contemporaries, and the circumstances under which is plays were written, as well as answering questions from the audience. The show is a