Kent Thompson, artistic director for the Alabama Shakespeare Festival in Montgomery, AL, was re-elected president of the Theatre Communications Group (TCG), the national support organization for American non-for profit theatre.

Thompson has been artistic director at ASF for more than 10 years, and is currently directing A Lesson Before Dying, a work created in ASF's Southern Writers' Project, at The Signature Company Theatre in New York City. Romulus Linney penned the play, drawing from the novel by Ernest J. Gaines. It had its world premiere at ASF in February 2000.

The actress-playwright Regina Taylor has been named to TCG's board of directors. Taylor's play, A Night in Tunisia, was developed through the Southern Writers' Project and was a world premiere at ASF in March 2000.

TCG is a service organization of more than 360 theatres throughout the United States. It was founded in 1961 to provide artistic, administrative, research, and information services to theatres and independent theatre artists. It is considered the nation's principal advocate for America's not for-profit professional theatre.

-- By Kenneth Jones