The Mark Taper Forum's Next Step program for new play development presents readings of four new works March 29-April 21: Culture Clash's Chavez Ravine, Sandra Tsing Loh's I Worry, Lisa Loomer's Living Out and Alec Mapa's DRAMA!.

The productions, each lasting a weekend, play at The Evidence Room in Los Angeles.

Latino comedy troupe Culture Clash already tested out their Chavez Ravine with Mark Taper audiences back in November 2001 at the 14th annual New Works Festival. This piece is set in 1949 in the famous, but now destroyed, Mexican American neighborhood of Chavez Ravine. With a film noir atmosphere, Culture Clash revisits the sleepy hillside neighborhood which today lies under Dodger Stadium and its parking lots. Lisa Peterson directs Chavez Ravine, playing March 19-31.

Loomer, Mapa and Loh are all solo writer-performers. In I Worry, Loh, the author of Bad Sex With Bud Kemp and Aliens in America, talks about the list that rules her life — her list of worries. Loomer, who wrote The Waiting Room and Expecting Isabel, looks at Los Angeles' child care and American-Latino relationships as see through the eyes of a West Side Caucasian mommy and her East Side Hispanic nanny in Living Out. It's the last days of pre-AIDS gay life for Mapa as he remembers his teenage years in San Francisco in DRAMA!.

Chay Yew (Red) directs DRAMA!, playing April 12-14. Neel Keller directs Living Out April 5-7. I Worry performs April 19-21. Tickets are $10. The Evidence Room is located at 2220 Beverly Boulevard. For reservations, call (213) 628-2772.

— By Christine Ehren