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Rachel Bykowski

Playwright. Content Writer. Chicagoan.

Rachel Bykowski, a Chicago playwright, writes to explore the many facets of the female identity. Her full-length, 28 Light Years From Now, is the winner of 2020 Getchell New Play Award. Her full-length play, Tight End, has been featured with The National New Play Network (NNPN) in a workshop at the Kennedy Center for the MFA Playwrights’ Festival in 2016, was a top 20 finalist for CulturalDC’s Source Theatre Festival in 2017, and received Honorable Mention for the Jane Chambers 2017 Student Playwriting Award. Her full-length play, Rev, was the runner-up for the 2018 Todd McNerney Playwriting Award, the winner of the 2019 SETC/Stage Rights Ready to Publish Award, and is now available for purchase on Amazon. Rachel's other plays have been produced and featured in festivals across the United States. Rachel is a playwriting alumna with NNPN and a member of the Dramatists Guild. She received her BFA in playwriting from the Theatre School at DePaul University and her MFA from Ohio University. www.rachelbykowskiplays.com www.rachelbykowskiplays.com

Body-Shaming
Essay

Body-Shaming

The Epidemic Plaguing Collegiate Theatre Programs

7 May 2018

Rachel Bykowski speaks up about body-shaming in the theatre industry, and its effect on students in collegiate programs.

Yes, All Men (Need to Listen)
Essay

Yes, All Men (Need to Listen)

Making Room for Womanhood in the American Theatre

13 November 2016

Rachel Bykowski looks at Dana Lynn Formby’s American Beauty Shop and Kristiana Rae Colón’s good friday and asks: is it possible for women playwrights to tell truthful stories of the female experience and male oppression when men hold the majority of leadership positions in the American theatre?