Playwriting

In this installation, David Dudley interviews Christopher Shinn of The New School’s MFA playwriting program about how this educational option works.

Larissa FastHorse explores the issues she deals with as a Native playwright, from finding an agent to what happens when she has to un-Native American a character.

Martha Steketee explores the development and evolution of I'm Gonna Pray for You So Hard with playwright Halley Feiffer. The play spans five years and two opening nights, features substance abuse, plenty of familial debate, and one attempt at reconciliation.

Director Seth Barrish talks about the process of directing a solo show.

Todd London's latest addition to his column, A Lover’s Guide to American Playwrights, is about his own personal resident playwright—Karen Hartman—and the “wilderness of mid-career.”

Wendy MacLeod shares her experience at the Kenyon Playwrights Conference, a June intensive where students get to workshop their writing and learn from many people in the field.

National New Play Network launches the New Play Exchange, a crowd-sourced, open-access database of plays, playwrights, and producers. Nan Barnett shares what she hopes it can achieve.

Michael “Quess?” Moore explores why he wound up in residence in New Orleans at the DISTILLERY, and what he’s continuing to learn and experience.

Commons Producer Jonathon Norton talks to playwright Will Power, the playwright in residence at Dallas Theater Center, about being on staff at a regional theatre and being a member of a community.

In her latest installment, Catherine Trieschmann explores turning forty, leaky roofs, advice for parents on how to save money on childcare, and what to do when you’re working from home with your child.

Playwright Elaine Ávila illuminates her eye-opening trip to Portugal—wittingly nicknamed Tíaland—as the winner of the DISQUIET International Short Play Competition. There, she is met with historical narratives of overcoming socialized barriers. 

In his essay, Director Evan Caccioppoli explores the future of sex in American theatre.

Most productions are not developmental for the script and that usually means the text being used is effectively final. As is often the case, the playwright is usually not in the room, and so they have no say in the changes being made to their script. As a supporter of playwrights’ rights, I often feel that I must become the de facto voice of the writer, to protect the integrity of their text.

Yet after reading about staged readings and their role in play development, I hit a roadblock. I couldn’t come up with a definition that addressed every possible scenario. More vexingly, I couldn’t figure out how to negotiate concrete meanings for words like “minimal” and “basic” that are often used when discussing staged reading elements. Despite the many points of agreement found when looking at various discussions, there are too many differences in definition to develop a clear picture of what exactly a staged reading is or how it should look.

Lou Harry offers insight on balancing the careers of a playwright and arts journalist. 

The rise of artistic multi-functionalism, and the open, assimilative, and collaborative values it implies, has coincided with the emergence of devising as a major theatrical discipline. Although devising is hardly new the process of developing work through collaboration among a group of artists has gained traction in recent years. It makes sense: both multi-functionalism and devising are solutions to an economic downturn, ways to continue creating complex and multivalent art in a scale-back climate.

Commons Producer Ronee Penoi interviews Robert O’Hara, Playwright-in-Residence at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Washington, DC.

In this installment, Mike Lew discusses the Ma-Yi Writers Lab, the fraught practice of yellow face, and what equity for people of color actually looks like.