If there were ever a field that should build solidarity but doesn’t, theater would be it. Playwrights are encouraged to compete for the privilege of association. Our bios are lists of institutions from which we borrow value; each name grants you permission to call yourself an artist. The structure of the industry invites exploitation and mistreatment. It limits the art we choose to make, as well as our relationships to one another.
Each insular world—no matter how small or seemingly insignificant—is beholden to the larger one, and reinforces the injustices that shape it. Last summer, hundreds of people pointed out the obvious: the theater world is systemically racist. Theaters scrambled to respond, and continue to come up short, as they tend to believe that a diverse staff and a diverse roster of plays are an end in itself. If this were true, We See You White American Theater would have a list of demands that is less than 30 pages long. These demands paint a pretty extraordinary picture of racism, exclusion and exploitation, but alongside it appears a tantalizing negative image. For me, it begs the question: Why are we asking institutions to be less racist, less sexist, less ableist, less greedy, instead of building the kind of inclusive structures we actually want?
Read alum Molly Hagan’s full essay on Theater and “mutual aid” here.
Category: New York
Molly Hagan on Theater and Mutual Aid
Alum Qui Nguyen Featured in L.A. Times
On April 5th, at South Coast Rep in Costa Mesa, California, OHIO MFA playwriting alum Qui Nguyen — a pioneer of “geek theatre” — will open his new play Poor Yella Rednecks. The play is a sequel to his highly lauded Vietgone, and commissioned by SCR and Manhattan Theatre Club.
Qui is a co-founder of the Obie Award-winning Vampire Cowboys Theatre Company, known as the first and only professional theatre company to be sponsored by New York Comic Con.
Poor Yella Rednecks is the sequel to Nguyen’s Vietgone, which premiered at South Coast Rep in 2015. Rednecks begins previews Saturday and opens a week later. The plays, co-commissioned by SCR and Manhattan Theatre Club, follow the love story of Nguyen’s mother and father, Tong and Quang, who met in the Fort Chaffee refugee camp in Arkansas after they escaped Vietnam during the fall of Saigon. Poor Yella Rednecks, which Nguyen lovingly nicknamed Vietgone 2, zeroes in on the challenges the couple face as blue-collar immigrants, recently married and starting a family. (L.A. Times, March 28, 2019)
Qui writes for TV and film, in addition to continuing to be one of the most sought after playwrights in the country:
“I started in TV, then I went to Marvel, and then I went back to TV for a while and did AMC and Netflix, and now I’m back in film for Disney,” he says. “I feel like I’m late to the game, so I’m hungry to succeed.” (L.A. Times, March 28, 2019)
Writing for likes of Marvel and Disney hasn’t slowed his pace as a playwright: major theaters such as Center Theatre Group in L.A., Goodman Theatre in Chicago, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, and Atlantic Theater Company and Playwrights Horizons in New York continue to commission him.
For more about Qui’s climb to national recognition:
- New York Times profile of Qui in 2016
- NBC News on Vietgone in 2017
- L.A. Times review of Vietgone at South Coast Rep in 2015
And more about his latest play, Poor Yella Rednecks, opening next week:
What is “Geek Theatre”?
Cristina Luzárraga’s LA MUJER BARBUDA wins Inaugural ScreenCraft Stage Play Competition
Congrats to alum Cristina Luzárraga (MFA ’18) ! Her play La Mujer Barbuda, part of last year’s Seabury Quinn Jr Festival, was chosen by esteemed judges such as David Lindsay-Abaire, Donald Margulies, and as the inaugural ScreenCraft Stage Play Competition. According to the ScreenCraft announcement:
“We are excited to announce the winner of the 2018 ScreenCraft Stage Play competition. Selected from nearly 700 entries, La Mujer Barbuda by Cristina Luzárraga has been named the winner…
La Mujer Barbuda explores the intersecting lives of two women, separated by time and space, and united in the struggle to thrive as a mother in a man’s world. Maggie is an American airline pilot and new mother. When she tries to pump breast milk in the cockpit, she almost perishes in a plane crash. Magdalena is a 17th-century Italian weaver and new mother. When she suddenly grows a beard and nurses a baby at age fifty-two, she sets off a domestic and civil crisis. The judges responded to the unique premises and gripping scenes as the parallels between the two lives unfurled.”
Cristina was also recently initiated as an EST Youngblood:
Cristina Luzárraga grew up in New Jersey and still resides there, believe it or not. She’s an alum The Second City Conservatory in Chicago, the town where she once (foolishly?) dabbled in comedy performance of all kinds. Her work has been developed at Towne Street Theatre, Chicago Dramatists, The New Colony, and Tantrum Theater. Her full length plays include Critical Distance, Millennialville, and La Mujer Barbuda (2018 Princess Grace Award finalist). Her short plays have been published in anthologies by Smith and Kraus. She co-wrote and adaptation of Aphra Behn’s The Rover that was produced by Ohio University where she recently earned an MFA in playwriting.
Then there’s this, of course, when you need a good laugh…
Check out a reading of Catherine Weingarten’s play “Are you Ready to Get PAMPERED!?” in NYC July 15th!
Recent alum Catherine Weingarten has a reading of her trashy summer camp play “Are You Ready to Get PAMPERED!?” Saturday, July 15th at 6pm in Brooklyn. The reading is produced by Off With Her Head Productions and it’s apart of their Uncorseted Reading Series which promotes new plays about women and female empowerment. The reading also features OU BFA acting alum Leah Kistler!
Check it out if your in NYC!
More about the play:
For a long time Hester has lain awake at night, excited about the summer she can follow her mother’s footsteps and become a Pampered Camp counselor! The only problem is that Lake Pampered is a popular-fun-sexy exclusive all girl’s summer camp and Hester is a loser! The play was inspired by Catherine Weingarten’s experience as a summer camp counselor. The play asks messy questions about girl culture and expectations we put on young women to get hotter as Hester struggles to find her own in a pampered, prideful, popular and sexy world.
Details:
SAT JULY 15TH AT 6PM. CAFE FORTE. CROWN HEIGHTS.
More about Catherine
Catherine Weingarten is currently pursuing her MFA in Playwriting at Ohio University, studying under Charles Smith and Erik Ramsey. She graduated from Bennington College in 2013 studying under Sherry Kramer. She has taken workshops in playwriting with Samuel D. Hunter, Kara Lee Corthon and Branden Jacob-Jenkins. Catherine’s summer camp play “Are You Ready to Get PAMPERED!?” had a reading at 59E59 with Less than Rent and also was part of Dixon Place’s Bingo Lounge. Some of her other plays include: Pineapple Upside Down Cake (KCACTF:national semi-finalist), Janis and the Big BAD World (Semi-finalist at Wide Eyed Productions), A Roller Rink Temptation (NOLA Fringe), This Car Trip Suckss ( Piper Theater Productions Emerging Artist Reading Series), Karate Hottie (OU Seabury Quinn Play Fest) Love Potion Number Slut (Tiny Rhino) and You Looked Hot When You Stole that Dress from Walmart (Fresh Fruit Festival.) She has been involved with Abingdon Playwrights Group as well as New Perspective’s Women’s Work Short Play Lab. She is the recipient of the Scott McPherson award given to a graduate playwright at Ohio University that is a kind and supportive collaborator in the program. catherine-weingarten.squarespace.com
Qui Nguyen’s play at MTC gets great reviews!
Alumni Qui Nguyen’s play “Vietgone” is getting awesome reviews! Read an excerpt from its review in the Hollywood Reporter:
“The playwright — whose aesthetic is evident from the titles of such previous works as She Kills Monsters, Alice in Slasherland and Living Dead in Denmark — and director May Adrales have collaborated to deliver a wildly fun, imaginative production. Not all of it works, and the play itself could benefit from some trimming. But individual elements are terrific, such as the Vietnamese characters speaking in flawless English while the Americans talk with an exaggerated, ungrammatical drawl. There’s also a wonderfully staged montage, accompanied by Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On,” that hilariously satirizes such ’80s-era romantic movies as Ghost, Say Anything and Dirty Dancing.”
Read full review here and go see the production at Manhattan Theater Club now!
Get tickets here
More about Qui
Qui Nguyen is a playwright, TV/Film writer, and Co-Founder of the OBIE Award-winning Vampire Cowboys of NYC. His work, known for its innovative use of pop-culture, stage violence, puppetry, and multimedia, has been called “Culturally Savvy Comedy” by The New York Times, “Tour de Force Theatre” by Time Out New York, and “Infectious Fun” by Variety.
Scripts include Vietgone (South Coast Rep, Oregon Shakespeare Company, Manhattan Theatre Club, Seattle Rep), She Kills Monsters (The Flea, Buzz22 Chicago/Steppenwolf, Company One); Begets: Fall of a High School Ronin (Waterwell); War is F**king Awesome (Sundance); Krunk Fu Battle Battle (East West Players); Bike Wreck (EST); Trial By Water (Ma-Yi Theater); Aliens vs Cheerleaders (Keen Teens); Soul Samurai; The Inexplicable Redemption of Agent G (Ma-Yi Theater & Vampire Cowboys); and the critically acclaimed Vampire Cowboys productions of Six Rounds of Vengeance, Alice in Slasherland; Fight Girl Battle World; Men of Steel; and Living Dead in Denmark.
Qui Nguyen featured in the NY Times!
Qui’s play “Vietgone” is currently playing in NYC at Manhattan Theater Club and he was just featured in the NY Times! Congrats Qui! Go see the play in NYC!
Here’s an excerpt:
“Vietgone” may seem to be a drastic departure. The playwright calls it a “romantic comedy” about how his parents met at a refugee camp in Arkansas in 1975, having immigrated right after the Vietnam War. It’s a story that Mr. Nguyen grew up hearing and knows well, but it has also been filtered through his pop-culture-filled and irreverent sensibility.
“When my parents told me stories about Vietnam, they told me the real stories, what actually happened,” he explained. “But what I imagined was kung fu movies. Because the only things I ever saw [growing up] that had a lot of Asian people in it, were kung fu movies.”
So there is kung fu in “Vietgone,” and ninjas. As in Mr. Nguyen’s other works, everyone speaks in a modern voice and raps — and no one speaks with “an Asian accent,” part of his fight against minority stereotypes.
Read the full article here
More about Qui
Qui Nguyen is a playwright, TV/Film writer, and Co-Founder of the OBIE Award-winning Vampire Cowboys of NYC. His work, known for its innovative use of pop-culture, stage violence, puppetry, and multimedia, has been called “Culturally Savvy Comedy” by The New York Times, “Tour de Force Theatre” by Time Out New York, and “Infectious Fun” by Variety.
Scripts include Vietgone (South Coast Rep, Oregon Shakespeare Company, Manhattan Theatre Club, Seattle Rep), She Kills Monsters (The Flea, Buzz22 Chicago/Steppenwolf, Company One); Begets: Fall of a High School Ronin (Waterwell); War is F**king Awesome (Sundance); Krunk Fu Battle Battle (East West Players); Bike Wreck (EST); Trial By Water (Ma-Yi Theater); Aliens vs Cheerleaders (Keen Teens); Soul Samurai; The Inexplicable Redemption of Agent G (Ma-Yi Theater & Vampire Cowboys); and the critically acclaimed Vampire Cowboys productions of Six Rounds of Vengeance, Alice in Slasherland; Fight Girl Battle World; Men of Steel; and Living Dead in Denmark.
Ira Gamerman has new short play at Serials in NYC this month!
Alum Ira Gamerman has gotten a new short play “Jeffs Jewish Dating Service” in the highly competitive “serials” live theater competition series produced by the in-house acting troupe, the Bats, at the Flea Theater in NYC.
Here is how they describe this fun play competition on their website:
#serials@theflea is a raucous late night play competition featuring The Bats and some of NYC’s hottest young playwrights and directors. This event, which runs Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 11:00pm includes 1 FREE beer with the purchase of a ticket. All tickets are only $12.
In #serials@theflea, five teams of Bats perform original ten-minute episodic plays. The audience votes for its three favorite plays, which return the next week with a new installment. The teams with the two least popular stories must likewise come back the following week, but with entirely different serialized plays.”
Ira’s play runs this Thursday through Saturday (14th-16th) and next Thursday-Saturday(21st-23rd). Buy tickets here!! Congrats Ira!
More about Ira:
IRA LAWRENCE GAMERMAN is a Baltimore-bred AustraliAmerican Playwright, Podcaster, Script Consultant, Screenwriter, Musician, and Educator based in NYC.
Ira’s theatrical work has been performed at The Kennedy Center, Samuel French OOB, Ensemble Studio Theater, Short & Sweet Sydney, Collaboraction (at the Steppenwolf Garage), F*It Club, Source Festival, Single Carrot, The Australian Broadcast Corporation, and The Chicago New Media Summit (among many other places around the globe). In 2006, City Paper voted Ira “Best Playwright Of Baltimore”. In 2009, Dated: A Cautionary Tale For Facebook Users was a New York Innovative Theater Award nominee for best short play. Ira has received playwriting grants from the Maryland State Arts Council and Chicago Union League. BILLY BITCHASS will be published in THE BEST 10 MINUTE PLAYS OF 2016 by Smith & Kraus.
Ira holds a BA in Theater from Towson University, an MFA in Playwriting from Ohio University, and studied Devised theater at the (now defunct) Dartington College Of Art in the UK. He is a script consultant for Serbian Filmmaker Milica Zec (Sundance New Frontiers 2015). Ira has been published by Consequence Of Sound, High Times, Eleven Magazine, and Howlround. His work on The Wire remains his favorite acting gig to date.
Ira Gammerman’s short play featured in Sam French OOB Fest in NYC this week!
Playwriting alum Ira Gammerman’s hilarious and dark short play “Billy Bitchass” will be apart of the 40th Annual Sam French OOB short play fest in NYC. This is a highly prestigious short play fest and out of thousands of scripts, only 30 were selected. The plays will be performed in NYC in front of an industry panel and the top plays will be published with Sam French. Ira’s play will be done this Wednesday, August 5th at 8pm at 13th street theater; it also features an Ohio MFA actress alum, Marissa Wolf!
Check it out of you’re in NY! Ira’s writing is way too funny to exist!
Click here for tickets
More about Ira
Ira Gamerman is an Award-Winning AustraliAmerican PodcastPlaywright. He creates sound and songs using affected electric mandolin and guitar with Anonymous In The Clouds, Battler, and Pronouns. His Dramatic work has been produced by The Kennedy Center, Collaboraction, Short & Sweet Sydney, Source Festival, and The Chicago New Media Summit. In 2006, City Paper voted Ira “Best Playwright Of Baltimore” and in 2009, he was nominated for a New York Innovative Theater Award for best short play. As a Podcaster, Ira writes for Radiotopia’s THE TRUTH (featured on This American Life) where his Collaborative Audio-Play “Biological Clock” won a 2013 Mark Time Award from the Fire Sign Theater for Best Science Fiction Audio Production of the Year. He also co-created and co-hosts DANGEROUSLY UNQUALIFIED: A PODCAST ABOUT LOVE with EST/Youngblood Alumni Playwright Ryan Dowler through BSD MEDIA. Internationally, Ira is Co-Creative Artistic Director of AUSTRALIAMERICAN THEATER CONGLOMORATE: EVERYTHING IS EVERYWHERE (2 Americans 2 Aussies 2 Gals 2 Dudes 2 Goys 2 Jews 2 Legit 2 Quit) with Jessica Bellamy, David Finnigan, and Siobhan O’loughlin. Ira holds a BA in Theater from Towson University, an MFA in Playwriting from Ohio University, and studied Devised theater at the (now defunct) Dartington College Of Art in the UK. As an educator, Ira has taught undergraduate theater at Ohio University and Kingsborough Community College in Brooklyn in addition to playwright-mentoring Young Playwrights Festivals at Atlanta’s Horizon Theater and Baltimore’s Center Stage. As a journalist, Ira has been published by Consequence Of Sound, Eleven Magazine in St. Louis (even though he has never actually visited St. Louis), and HowlRound. He was also an extra in Season 3 of The Wire and has the screenshot to prove it if you don’t believe him.
NY Madness, “MadLab” in NYC this week featuring a play by Cecilia Copeland!
NY Madness grew out of Ohio University’s Madness class for MFA playwrights; and this summer they are having their first ever showcase of full length plays developed from madnesses. Alum Cecilia Copeland has her play “Dinner with Frenemies” this Friday, July 3rd at 8pm. The festival runs all this week and features some OU MFA as well as BFA actors! Go check it out!
More info
Cecilia Copeland’s plays have been Produced or Presented at the Culture Project, Cherry Lane Theatre, Ensemble Studios Theatre, HERE Arts Center, INTAR Theatre, The Anarchist Theatre Festival of Montreal, Stage Left Productions, Cara Mia Theatre in Dallas, Venus Theatre in MD, the Disreputables in DC, and IATI Theatre among others. She has developed work with TerraNOVA Collective and the Lark Play Development Center. Her Full Length, “The Wicked Son”was named one of the Top Three Best New Jewish Plays by the Jewish Plays Project. Other full length works include Light of Night Production at IATI Theatre, Tiene Duende (It Has Soul) semifinalist for MultiStages New Works Competition, COURTING semifinalist for The O’Neill Playwrights Conference, BIOLIFE semifinalist for The O’Neill Playwrights Conference and The Emerging Playwrights Prize The Marin Theatre as well as a Finalist for Mabou Mines Residency. Copeland was awarded a Special Effects Grant from Metro Screen Australia for her One Act that she adapted into a Screenplay, Amusement Bomber. Her short play, The Next Time has been produced all over the world and featured in the Gun Control Plays collection curated by Caridad Svich. Copeland is the recipient of the Lennis J. Holm Playwriting Scholarship from University of Iowa for her Honors Thesis, One Woman. She is a graduate of the Writers Workshops at University of Iowa BA with Honors and Ohio University MFA. Her works have been published by PM Press, The International Center for Women Playwrights, NoPassport Press, Amazon.com, and Indie Theater Now! She is an Alumna of the Women’s New Works Playlab at New Perspectives, a Member of the Dramatists Guild of America, The Cimientos Playlab at IATI Theatre, and The League of Professional Theatre Women. Before becoming a playwright Copeland toured as a Jr Company Member of Ballet Iowa in Cinderella and the Nutcracker and later she danced for MTV and VH1. In 2013 Cecilia Copeland was named an Indie Theatre Now Person of the Year!
Ira Gammerman has a short play in the 40th Annual Samuel French Off Off Broadway Short Play Fest this summer!
Ou Playwriting Alum Ira Gammerman’s short play “Billy Bitchass” will be apart of the 40th Annual Samuel French Off Off Broadway Short Play Fest! Billy Bitchass is about” A boy with no name runs away with a puppy who can’t understand sadness.” The festival consists of thirty short plays ranging from 10 to 30 minutes and will take place in NYC this August! The festival received over a fifteen hundred submissions this year and is highly selective in picking material they believe stands out and is unique in form and content. Congrats Ira! Your funny, unique and crazy writing is addictive! If you are in NYC this August, go check it out!
Here is a list of all the finalists selected for the festival!
Here is a quote from his recent interview about the play(Spoiler Alert: seems like this play started from a Madness, the short play fest MFA playwrights do every week)
OOB: How did you come to write your OOB play? Was there a particular inspiration behind its creation? How has it developed?
IG: I had a short play I wrote in grad school called Bitchass about a kid talking to a guy in a dog costume about being bullied. I always knew it was a special play, but it wasn’t quite finished.
To read the whole interview with Ira about his play click here !!
More about the festival:
The Samuel French Off Off Broadway Short Play Festival offers a prize of publication and licensing for six short plays in the notable OFF OFF BROADWAY FESTIVAL PLAYS series. In addition, the 30 semi-finalists each receive a full production in one of New York City’s leading Off Broadway theatres.
Though many of the works that play in the Festival have been developed under the wing of theatres, universities, and writer’s groups, many of the plays that are produced as part of the Festival are world premieres. The application period for the Festival begins in January and lasts until late February. Playwrights may submit up to three unpublished plays or musicals that may be performed in 30 minutes or less. On their application, playwrights must cite the organization that will produce their play (at this early stage it is often the playwright themselves) and a liaison for Samuel French to contact with Festival information. Submissions are whittled down by the Festival’s editorial staff, and the Final Thirty are chosen to present their play during Festival week.
Festival week consists of 4 performance sessions in which 7 to 8 scripts are presented in front of a judging panel comprised of professionals representing various parts of the theatre industry. At the end of each session, the judges deliberate and 1 to 3 plays are selected to move on to the Festival Finals.
Finals take places on the Saturday of the Festival Week. During the Finals, the Festival staff will watch the final ten to twelve plays and select six authors to be a published in a the OFF OFF BROADWAY FESTIVAL PLAYS series, which is published and licensed by Samuel French, Inc. Sunday acts as a showcase of all the winners, and Samuel French invites many industry professional to attend.
About our Alumni Playwrights
The Festival has served as a doorway to future success for many aspiring playwrights, and has helped launched the work of notables as Theresa Rebeck, Shirley Lauro, Sheila Callaghan, Bekah Brunstetter, Steve Yockey, Saviana Stanescu, David Johnston, and Daniel Pearle. In many cases, Festival participation has sparked agent contracts for Festival finalists. Many past Festival playwrights have gone on to win major playwriting awards and honors, as well as to have major theatrical productions of their works staged.
More about Ira
Ira Gamerman is a New York Innovative Theater award-nominee with an MFA in playwriting from Ohio University. His theatrical work has been produced by The Kennedy Center, Collaboraction, and Short & Sweet Sydney. In 2006, City Paper voted Ira “Best Playwright of Baltimore.” His podcast writing won a 2013 Mark Time Award for Radiotopia’s THE TRUTH and his episodes have been downloaded over 40,000 times. Ira co-created, co-produces, and co-hosts DANGEROUSLY UNQUALIFIED: A PODCAST ABOUT LOVE (the original serialized Baltimore-centric podcast from Ira G and America’s Favorite Amateur Dating Coach: Ryan Dowler). He composes music as Ira Lawrences Haunted Mandolin. His debut album was recorded at Galaxy Smith Studios in Brooklyn: iralawrence.bandcamp.com. Ira Just returned from the Philippines where he developed “EVERYTHING IS EVERYWHERE LIE TO YOUR FACE” at the Karnabal Festival with his AustraliAmerican theater collective Everything Is Everywhere . Ira reviews music for High Times Magazine.
Visit him online at everythingiseverywhere.com .
OHIO 