The 11th annual Mississippi Delta Tennessee Williams Festival, set for October 9-11, 2003, in Clarksdale, continues the celebration of America’s great playwright in his childhood home. The focus of this year’s program will be two of Williams’s one-act plays, 27 Wagons Full of Cotton and The Unsatisfactory Dinner, and the film Baby Doll. 
     The festival will feature performances and readings by Blue Roses Productions of New York City, a screening of the movie Baby Doll, presentations by Williams authorities and friends, a session with papers by scholars, porch plays, and gourmet dinners in the historic Williams neighborhood and Uncle Henry’s Place on Moon Lake. Also scheduled in conjunction with the festival are workshops for teachers and for student actors and a drama competition, with prizes totaling $4,000 for the winners. 
     Actress Carroll Baker, who was nominated for an Academy Award for her role as Baby Doll, has been invited to share her reminiscences, and Delta blues musicians will be performing the playwright’s songs, Blue Mountain Ballads. 
     Opening the festival in the renovated downtown passenger depot, Clarksdale Station, will be Kenneth Holditch of New Orleans with "Tennessee Delta: Cotton, Rising Tides, and Blues." Following this presentation will be an optional field trip down U.S. 1, the famous River Road, through Sherard, Gunnison, Perthshire, and Rosedale, to the Burris Mansion in Benoit where Baby Doll was filmed. 
     Speakers will be introduced at a reception and dinner Thursday night at the vintage Belle Clark Mansion, restored antebellum home of Clarksdale founder John Clark. 
     Among the speakers and panelists are theatre directors and drama professionals Robert Canon of Sardis, Erma Duricko with her company from New York, Jay Jensen of Miami and scholars Colby Kullman of the University of Mississippi, Henry Outlaw and William Spencer of Delta State University, and Ralph F. Voss of the University of Alabama. Actress and director Erma Duricko will perform. She and drama coach Jay Jensen also will conduct an acting workshop for high school students. Williams’s brother, Dakin, will give his annual poetry reading and commentary. 
     Scholars are invited to submit papers for possible presentation at the festival. Papers on any topic related to Williams and his work are eligible for consideration. Presentations should be 20 minutes maximum. Authors whose papers are selected for presentation will receive free lodging during the festival and a waiver of the registration fee. The deadline for submissions is August 30, 2003. To enter, send a completed paper (7-8 pages) or an abstract (250 words) to Colby H. Kullman, Department of English, The University of Mississippi, University, MS 38677. 
     The Tennessee Williams Festival Acting Competition, hosted by Coahoma Community College, is open to high school students in Mississippi. The competition includes two acting categories, monologues and scenes. All material must be drawn from the plays of Tennessee Williams. Each monologue is to be two minutes or less, and each scene is to be between five and ten minutes and involve any number of characters. 
     Cash prizes are given for winning monologues and scenes, which will be performed for the festival audience. Prize money will go to schools of the winners for use with drama activities or library books related to theater and literature. Students, with their teacher-sponsors, will be given the opportunity to decide how the prize money will be spent. 
     For information on the 2003 festival and drama competition, write Tennessee Williams Festival, Clarksdale/Coahoma County Chamber of Commerce, P.O. Box 1565, Clarksdale, MS 38614-1565; telephone 662-627-7337.