The Brooklyn Papers / Tom Callan

At Ray's Lounge in Bay Ridge on Aug. 4, Steve Ryan and Colette LeRoy perform a scene from "Brooklyn Bound," one of the winning entries of BrooklynOneTheater's "A Playwright Grows in Brooklyn" contest.

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The borough’s aspiring playwrights are given a voice and spotlight with the birth of BrooklyONETheater, which launched with a party on Aug. 4, where they announced their upcoming festival of new, one-act plays.

B1T is the brainchild of Anthony Marino, who has been involved in Brooklyn community theater for 10 years, and Tom Kane, a self-proclaimed "Wall Street guy who likes to write."

"Getting people excited about theater in Brooklyn is hard," said Marino, the B1T artistic director. "There is so much talent here and nowhere to go with it, and they deserve attention." Marino has a degree in theater performance from Wagner College and now teaches theater at PS 180 in Borough Park.

B1T’s story began when Marino and Kane started a playwright contest and sifted through 40 applicants to find the best of Brooklyn’s undiscovered talent. Since both Marino and Kane have been involved in community theater, they started to advertise the contest through word of mouth in the Brooklyn theater scene and ads in local papers.

On Aug. 4, they hosted "A Playwright Grows In Brooklyn," the launch party and awards ceremony for the inaugural 2006-2007 season. At Ray’s Lounge in Bay Ridge, the nine winning plays received awards in three categories: grammar school, high school and college, and adult.

One of the three winning adult plays is "Just My Luck," written by Nicholas Vigorito, Jr. who has been writing and pursuing theater for the past decade.

"The tagline is ’A hapless mugger chooses the wrong victim, or does he?’" said Vigorito. "The mugger has lamented his whole life about not having any luck. It’s a cute play and has a message about paying more attention to signs in your life, and it has a surprise ending."

Although Vigorito lives in Dyker Heights and grew up in Sunset Park, this is his play’s Brooklyn debut. (He said it has already been performed in Manhattan and Hollywood.)

"Graffiti," written by Italo Tinalli, a senior at Xaverian High School in Bay Ridge, and Anthony Napoli, a senior at Regis High School in Manhattan, won in the high school and college division. Napoli said he’s nervous, but excited, to see their show performed for the first time.

" ’Graffiti’ is about kids who are bored with their own lives and find a can of spray paint. Their tags symbolize their character, and every time they do something considered immoral, their tags are defiled," Napoli explained.

All of the winning adult, high school and college playwrights will have their works produced and performed during the B1T’s "A Playwright Grows in Brooklyn" festival on Sept. 15 and 16 at Ray’s Lounge. Although the space is a small comedy club stage, Marino said they are able to adapt to it.

"All we need is a floor and an audience," he explained.

Marino said they are working with already established Brooklyn theater companies, including Park Slope’s The Gallery Players and Bay Ridge’s Narrows Community Theater, among many others, to produce the festival.

"After the plays were submitted, they were tailored to which group would be the best to direct and produce each one-act," Marino explained. "And it all comes back together under the umbrella of BrooklynONE. We want everyone to work together, because there is a distance between the companies. We want to show how artistic and creative and powerful this community really is."

This grassroots community theater movement wants to act as a stepping-stone for new talent sprouting up in the borough.

Marino said B1T’s "goal is to centralize Brooklyn arts and to be able to take original productions of plays and musicals from Brooklyn to Manhattan."

For everyone working to pull the festival together, Marino said there is a driving passion when you are able to give back to your community while doing what you love.

"This is important because this is about community," said Bay Ridge state Sen. Marty Golden at the launch party. "Creativity in a community keeps it together and allows it to grow. The people in this room are on fire."

BrooklynONETheater’s "A Playwright Grows in Brooklyn" festival takes place Sept. 15 and 16 at 7 pm at Ray’s Lounge (9604 Third Ave. at 96th Street in Bay Ridge). Tickets are $10, free for seniors and children younger than 13 years old. For more information, visit the Web site www.brooklynonetheater.org.

©2006 The Brooklyn Paper