I am thrilled to be able to highlight two very talented young men who are making their mark in New York City by writing the book, the musical scores and the lyrics to FABLE A New Musical. These men are the youngest writing team to ever be accepted by the New York Musical Theater Festival. There were chosen from a pool of more than two hundred other talented applicants from all over the world.
The co-writers of Fable are both Jersey raised and local guys and we are so proud of them!
Chris Anselmo is from Millstone Township and Harrison Kaufman is from Princeton.
Watch the video below and hear about the play in their own words.
Fable will be performed at the New York’s Pershing Square Signature Center in July as part of the 11th Annual New York Musical Festival.
It’s graduation time. When a mysterious classmate crashes their last epic night of celebration, a group of childhood friends is forced to confront the secrets they’ve been keeping from each other. Will their friendships survive the night? With an imaginative score and dynamic characters, Fable captures the moments when we are forced to change whether we like it or not. Watch what happens when the stories we were told as kids are revealed for the fictions they truly are.
Chris Anselmo
Chris Anselmo grew up in Millstone Township and attended the Millstone Schools and Allentown High School. Chris is currently an undergraduate in the B.A. Theatre program and the Music Theatre Certificate program at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. While attending Northwestern University, Chris directs both the production and music for various student and professional productions, he writes for the annual Waa-Mu Show, and serves as Music Director of the nationally acclaimed all-male a cappella group, Freshman Fifteen. Two of Chris’s original musicals (Fable, Ecclesiazusae) received their world premieres at Northwestern University during the spring of his freshman year. Recently, he was one of 11 songwriters chosen to participate in the 2013 NYMF Musical Theatre Songwriting Workshop led by Anna K. Jacobs and Andrew Lippa. Chris has worked as a production assistant for the acclaimed Johnny Mercer Foundation Songwriters Project and as an intern for Comma Music, a company that creates original advertisement music. He is also a proud member of both ASCAP and the Dramatists Guild of America. Visit his website at www.christopheranselmo.com for more information.
Harrison Kaufman
Harrison Kaufman is currently an undergraduate in the B.F.A. Drama program at New York University, studying in the Playwrights Horizons Theater School. Previously, he studied Theater and Performance Studies, as well as Playwriting, at The University of Chicago. There, he wrote and performed for Off-Off Campus, the university’s renowned sketch and improv comedy troupe, as a member of the 27th Generation. He also wrote/devised for readings, festivals, and even a translation of a French Mozart-based musical entitled “Mozart: L’Opera Rock.” He’s had his work produced at Atlantic Theater Company’s Acting School at NYU, UT/TAPS at University of Chicago, The Actors Training Center in Wilmette, IL, Arts Alliance at Northwestern University, The Barrow Group in NYC, and Frenchwoods Festival for the Performing Arts. Harrison is currently devising and performing original work every week in his studio at NYU, and two of his plays premiered in April at Tisch New Theatre Festival and The Playwrights Collective Reading Series. Harrison is a proud member of the Dramatists Guild of America. Harrison went to Princeton High School.
Chris describes the early days when he and Harrison met and began working together.
“Harrison and I met at French Woods Festival for the Performing Arts, a sleep-away summer arts camp. We were in the same bunk in 2008, and have been best friends since. Harrison and I began writing comedic songs as part of our performance shtick back at camp. A few years later, I had to complete a “senior project” during my last month of high school. I decided to write a song cycle (a collection of musical theatre songs strung together by a certain theme–this theme was growing up and moving on to college). I brought the songs to Harrison and begged him to write a musical with me–promising that it would take only a month or two tops. Two years later, here we are! For NYMF, there was a blind application process earlier this fall. Over 200 musicals submit to the literary department of NYMF and 20 are chosen as finalists. The 20 finalists are sent to Grand Jury of industry professionals (such as Michael Cerveris, Hunter Foster, and Amanda Green), who decide the 10 that will be chosen. Considering that Harrison and I are the youngest writing team to ever have our work showcased at NYMF, it is a huge honor. Many people wait their whole lives for an opportunity like this, and we couldn’t be prouder to have reached this goal at the beginning of our careers!”
Chris would like to take this opportunity to thank some of the people who have supported him throughout the years.
“I want to thank my parents for supporting and believing in me, my brother and sisters for letting me play music really loudly, my extended family, Ms. Lehman, Mr. Megill, Ms. Stuart, Ron Schaefer, David H. Bell, my friends here at Northwestern, Jen Wineman, Chris Mirto, Reed Ridgley, Jessie Gill, and everyone in my a cappella group, Freshman Fifteen!”
Chris and Harrison need to raise money for their production.
Please consider supporting the arts and all the talented people who have worked so hard on this project.
They are trying to reach a goal of $10,000 using the website Kickstarter.
“If anyone would be willing to donate to help us reach this goal, it would mean the world to us! Here is our page: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/fableanewmusical/fable-a-new-musical” Chris said.