A few weeks ago, I finished the first draft of The Believers, a new play that will premiere in Washington, D.C., next spring. As I move into revision, I've become preoccupied with a question that sits at the center of the piece: how do you teach an audience to look beyond its assumptions?

The play is populated by characters who routinely defy expectation: a wealthy rancher's wife who can be both deeply sincere and deeply performative; a teenage climate activist whose certainty masks profound vulnerability; a flat-earther who occasionally speaks with startling wisdom; an atheist who may be searching for faith more earnestly than the believers around him.

My challenge as a playwright isn't creating these contradictions. It's teaching an audience how to see them. How do I invite viewers to look beyond their assumptions about who a person is supposed to be? How do I signal, without announcing it outright, that the rich rancher's wife is more than a stereotype, that the conspiracy theorist may possess genuine insight, that the person who seems least credible may occasionally be the one telling the truth?

When I was younger, I thought my job as a playwright was to figure people out.

Now I think my job is to admit that I can’t.

Contradiction Is Character

The most interesting people I’ve ever known have all been walking contradictions. The devout Christian who can’t stop doubting. The atheist who prays. The activist who wants to save the world but can’t save herself. The man who spends his life caring for others while quietly neglecting his own needs.

Human beings are not coherent creatures, and yet playwrights are often tempted to make them so. We flatten our characters into arguments, symbols, and positions. We decide who is right and who is wrong. We sand off the rough edges that don’t fit the narrative we’ve constructed.

Consistency, however, is overrated.

A woman can be fiercely independent and desperate to be loved. A father can be both a terrible husband and a good parent. A person can tell the truth and lie in the same sentence. In fact, I’d argue that:

Contradiction is not a flaw in characterization. It is characterization.

Whenever a character feels flat on the page, I ask myself a simple question: What two seemingly opposing truths are living inside this person at the same time? Because that's where the electricity usually is.

When my play The Gulf premiered in Washington, D.C., it received a generous critical reception. One critic wrote that if there was any weakness in the play, it was that the character of Betty seemed “confused.”

He was referring to the way Betty speaks. She reaches for sophisticated vocabulary but sometimes mangles it. She uses big words alongside backwards syntax. She can sound startlingly perceptive one moment and entirely unpolished the next.

Now, some of that is me. I’ve always been drawn to unusual syntax. I like language that comes at you from an unexpected angle. “I need nothing but a sense of good direction” is infinitely more interesting to my ear than “I need nothing but a good sense of direction.” One feels stranger. More specific. More human.

But Betty’s contradictions run deeper than sentence structure.

She’s not confused.

She’s a woman whose intelligence and education don’t perfectly overlap. A woman who reaches beyond the language she’s been given. A woman capable of profound insight and occasional imprecision.

She’s a contradiction.

I wasn’t interested in writing a working-class woman who fit neatly into an audience’s expectations. I wanted her to be reaching. Curious. Intellectually hungry. Someone whose intelligence announces itself in unexpected ways. One of the things I spend the most time doing as a playwright is resisting the flat version of a character…the stereotype, the shorthand, the easy read.

Because the people I grew up around were never easy reads.

They were capable of profound insight and terrible judgment, often in the same afternoon. They could mispronounce a word and then offer an observation that stopped you in your tracks. They might not have had the language of academia, but they understood human behavior with startling precision.

The Difference Between Contradiction and Confusion

But over time, I found myself asking a different question.

What if the critic wasn’t entirely wrong? Not about Betty, but about the challenge. Because contradiction requires evidence. Here’s where next-level playwriting comes in.

If I want an audience to understand that a character is both foolish and wise, I have to dramatize both.

I can’t simply tell you a woman is intelligent; I have to let her make an observation nobody else in the room can make. I can’t simply tell you a man is compassionate; I have to let him behave compassionately.

Complexity Requires Evidence

A contradiction isn’t a collection of traits. It’s a pattern of behavior. The audience needs proof.

Otherwise what I perceive as complexity may read as inconsistency. What I perceive as dimension may read as confusion.

That’s the challenge…not creating contradictory characters, but creating enough moments of clarity that the audience understands the contradiction is intentional.

Confused people don’t know what they believe. Contradictory people believe multiple things at once.

The challenge is making sure the audience can see both truths. Drama is born in the gap between competing truths. Between what a person says and what they do. Between what they know and what they’re willing to admit. Between the identity they’ve constructed and the reality they inhabit.

A woman who wants to be seen but is terrified of exposure. A man who believes he’s free while being imprisoned by his beliefs. Someone who longs for intimacy while sabotaging every opportunity for it. Someone who craves certainty while being secretly fascinated by doubt.

The best characters don’t resolve their contradictions. They wrestle with them. Sometimes they lose. Sometimes they change. Sometimes they simply learn to carry both truths at once.

As playwrights, our task isn’t to make our characters make sense. It’s to make them feel alive.

The older I get, the less interested I am in characters who know exactly who they are. Give me the woman who is both believer and skeptic. The son who rejects the thing he most longs for. The father who is wrong about everything except the one thing that matters.

Give me people at war with themselves. I'll follow them clear to Sunday. Every. Single. Time.

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Audrey Cefaly's plays (Alabaster, Maytag Virgin, The Gulf, The Last Wide Open, Trouble) have garnered the Lammy Award, the Calicchio Prize, the NNPN Goldman Prize, the Edgerton, and a Pulitzer nomination. Her works have been produced at Signature Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Barter Theatre, Merrimack Rep, Florida Studio, Florida Rep, Gulfshore Playhouse, and countless others. Cefaly is a Dramatist Guild Foundation "Traveling Master," an Arena Stage playwright cohort, and a recipient of the Walter E. Dakin Fellowship from the Sewanee Writers Conference. She is published by Concord Theatricals, Applause Books, Smith & Kraus and TRW.

INGRAM NEW WORKS PROJECT

Nashville Repertory Theatre is seeking playwrights for the Ingram New Works Project. Submissions are now open through Friday, June 26 at 5:00PM Central Time.

What can I expect if I’m selected for the Ingram New Works lab?

Each playwright will be given the resources needed to work on their script and take it to the next level. Each play will be staffed with a director and dramaturg, and each play will be cast with actors. Before attending the festival, the playwright will take part in Zoom readings and workshops. This will give the playwright time to make changes and re-writes before coming onsite for their lab week.

For the Festival, playwrights arrive early in the week. There will be 3 to 5 lab sessions throughout the week, catered to the needs of the playwright. We realize each play has specific needs, so time will be allowed for playwrights to do readings, work sessions, re-writes, dramaturgical work, and discussions. These sessions will include work with a director and dramaturg as well as professional actors from the Nashville region. The week will culminate in a reading.

In addition to Lab sessions, weeks in Nashville also include opportunities to experience our great city and connect with the larger community of artists in Nashville.

Submission Requirements

• The first 15 pages of your script draft

  • If a musical, need to also submit 3 demos from the show, at any point

• A Purpose Statement

  • Please answer the questions in the statement: Why are you submitting, what do you hope to gain? Where is the piece in development?

  • Statement should not exceed 2 pages double spaced.

• A Bio from everyone on the creative statement

• A synopsis of the play

• ALL APPLICANTS ARE STRONGLY ENCOURAGED TO READ OUR FAQ
  https://nashvillerep.org/ingram-new-works-lab-faq

• Additional questions can be sent to Meg Sutherland, Company Manager at meg@nashvillerep.org
  
  SUBMIT: https://nashvillerep.org/ingramnewworksapplication

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ORIGINS features selected stage readings of brand-new works that will premiere on stage at CVRep.

Submissions will close when applications reach a cap of 500.

GUIDELINES

• The Origins Program is open to any original, unpublished and unproduced FULL-LENGTH play or musical which is in line with our artistic vision and mission. The goal of the program is to help writers develop unfinished work in a collaborative environment.

• CVRep is in pursuit of thought-provoking, innovative theater of substance and storytelling which highlights the diverse voices and experiences of the American culture.

• We are unable to consider plays and musicals which require more than 15 cast members.

• Playwrights must reside in the United States and be able to attend rehearsals.

Please be prepared to submit a synopsis and bio in addition to:

• 20 page sample of your script in PDF form (title page/cast breakdown do not count toward page count)

• Up to three demo tracks (if your project is a musical)

If we would like to request a full copy of your script we will contact you within 8-12 weeks. Due to the volume of submissions we receive, we are only able to respond to work that is in line with our artistic vision and goals.

We appreciate your patience as we give each submission ample time and careful consideration.

For additional information please email kgilligan@cvrep.org

SUBMIT: https://cvrep.org/origins/origins-submissions/

For additional information please email kgilligan@cvrep.org

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Audrey Cefaly (she/her)

Playwright. Southern Intimist. Tender-hearted troublemaker.

​Audrey Cefaly is an Alabama-born playwright whose work explores the quiet, aching corners of the human experience. Known for her lyrical language, emotional intimacy, and deep empathy for outsiders, Cefaly’s plays center on characters who are scarred, stubborn, and still reaching for connection. Read: The Poetic Architecture of Audrey Cefaly’s Plays

​Her critically acclaimed play Alabaster was developed through the National New Play Network and received the largest NNPN Rolling World Premiere in history. Other works include The Gulf (Lambda Literary Award winner), Maytag Virgin, The Last Wide Open, and Love is a Blue Tick Hound. Her plays have been produced at Signature Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Florida Repertory Theatre, Florida Studio Theatre, The Fountain Theatre, Merrimack Repertory Theatre, About Face Theatre, American Blues Theater, New Conservatory Theatre Center, Penobscot Theatre Company, and countless others.

Cefaly’s work is published by Concord Theatricals, TRW Plays, and Applause Books.

Her style is often described as Southern Gothic, but she prefers “Southern Intimist”—a term that better captures her commitment to poetic realism, emotional weather, and the sacredness of small stories. Her characters don’t just survive; they stay, they fight, and sometimes, they get free. Read: Walking with Tennessee Williams

She is a recipient of the David Calicchio Emerging American Playwright Prize, an Edgerton New American Play Award, the Lammy Award for LGBTQ Drama and the NNPN Goldman Prize. Audrey is also the creator of a growing collection of handmade stickers and strange love letters to the writing life via her Substack, How to Playwright.

She currently resides in Baltimore with her rescue dog Rosa and her husband Tim (also a rescue).

THE APPLICATION WINDOW FOR LOCAL LAB 16 (April 2027) is open NOW through June 15, 2026, 11:59 pm MT.

APPLY: https://www.localtheaterco.org/callfornewplays

LLocal Theater Company discovers and develops world-premiere plays, small-cast musicals, hybrid and devised theater pieces through Local Lab. Selected project creators are provided the resources to conduct a workshop of their material, offering them a forum to explore, develop and strengthen their work in collaboration with other theater artists. At the conclusion of the workshop, the material is presented publicly followed by a curated post-show conversation with artistic staff and audience members that moves new work toward full production.

Local Lab 16 will be held in Boulder, Colorado in April 2027.

Additionally, Local conducts workshops across the United States based on the needs of the material and collaborators. Workshops have been held in Boulder, New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles and Santa Barbara.

To learn about past Local Labs, click HERE.

What do we accept?

Un-produced, full-length plays (casts of 6 performers or less) and small-cast musicals (casts of 6 performers or less). Please do NOT apply with new drafts of previously shared plays. In an effort to reduce reader bias, we ask that writers remove their names and the names of their agents and/or managers from the their scripts.

To whom do I send the script?

Please share scripts through the application portal linked above (available during application window, April 28, 2026 - June 15, 2026). If you have any questions or issues submitting, please email Co-Artistic Director, Nick Chase, at nick@localtheaterco.org.

When is the application deadline?

All applications are due no later than 11:59 pm mountain time on June 15, 2026.

Who may apply?

If you are a resident of a western state (Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming), you can apply without an invitation. Please indicate which state you reside in when sharing material.

If you are a literary agent or manager, you may also apply with up to three (3) new American plays, small-cast musicals or proposals.

Additionally, Local Theater Company reserves the right to directly solicit project creators.

Is there an entry fee?

No.

If selected, is there a fee?

No. Local Theater Company financially compensates all members of the Local Lab teams. If a workshop/presentation is conducted in a location other than where the playwright lives, travel and accommodation are provided.

How many scripts per playwright can I share?

Just one per playwright, please. Agents and literary managers can submit up to three clients’ works.

Then what happens?

Local Theater Company’s reading committee will review the works. Works move through four phases: general submission, semi-finalist, finalist, and Local Lab selection. Semi-finalists will be announced in fall 2026.

In an effort to reduce bias, applications, including project proposals, are de-identified. This means that the creator’s name or other indicating elements are removed during the first round of consideration.

Do you have a story to tell but have never written a play?

At Local, we celebrate Colorado storytellers and their stories. On Tuesdays, we hold open office hours from noon-1:30pm MT. If you have a story that you’d like to develop with us, this is the time to ask questions, seek feedback, and be in conversation with our team. Email nick@localtheaterco.org for more information or to schedule an appointment.

Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Accessibility Statement

Local Theater Company is committed to providing equal employment opportunities to all qualified persons. All decisions regarding the terms, privileges, and/or conditions of employment, in cluding but not limited to hiring, classification, recruitment, discharge, compensation, placement, promotion, transfer, renewal of employment, tenure or terms, and benefits, will be made without unlawful discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, citizenship, an cestry, age, order of protection status, marital status, disability, military status, unfavorable dis charge from the military, sexual orientation, pregnancy, gender, gender identity, housing status, parental status, source of income, certain arrest or criminal history records, genetic information, protected activity (such as opposition to or reporting of prohibited discrimination or harassment), or any other status or classification protected by applicable federal, state, and/or local laws.

Local Theater Company will reasonably accommodate qualified employees with disabilities to allow them to perform the essential functions of their jobs. If you have any questions regarding this policy, please contact Misha Zimmerman misha@LocalTheaterCo.org

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PREVIOUS ARTICLES BY AUDREY CEFALY

• How to Write the 10-Minute Play

• Stop Saying Stupid Shit

• 52 Vocabulary Words for Playwrights
  A collection of weird and unusual words for the things we do as playwrights.

• 10 Things Playwrights Wish Their Actors Understood
  A love letter

• To Speak or Not to Speak?
  4 Ways to Create Indelible Non-Speaking Roles for the Stage

• 21 Things I Know About Playwriting
  I wrote my first play twenty years ago. I wrote my second play one year later. Here are 21 things I learned in the year between the two.

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LEAN MORE ABOUT AUDREY

• @audreycefaly | Linktree

• Visit my website for more about me and the work I do!

• Purchase my plays from Concord Theatricals.

• Follow me on Facebook.

• Follow me on Twitter.

• Follow me on Insta.

I love when something unexpected happens on this channel.

When I invited today’s guest, I assumed he’d bring his lens to a well-known play out in the world, something familiar we could all look at together. Instead, he quietly turned that lens toward one of mine: The Gulf. And I have to say, there’s something both disorienting and deeply moving about watching your own work refracted through someone else’s mind like this.

Pedro is a screenwriter and script doctor with a fascinating side project. He’s been building a framework that maps dramatic tension beat by beat, tracing not just what happens in a story, but what an audience is experiencing moment to moment. It’s analytical, yes, but also strangely humane. He’s not reducing the work; he’s listening to it in a different language.

What follows is his reading of The Gulf, generous, precise, and at times uncannily perceptive. It made me feel seen as a writer in ways I didn’t quite expect. I’m so grateful he chose this play, and even more grateful for the care he brought to unpacking it.

I hope you enjoy this as much as I did.

—Audrey

SPOILER ALERT: If you haven’t read or seen The Gulf, proceed with caution.

Quick intro. I’m a screenwriter and script doctor, currently writing a novel called The Midnight Tea. For the last couple of years I’ve also been building this weird side project: a framework that scores dramatic tension beat by beat. It treats the audience as a kind of prediction machine, a brain running forecasts on what characters know, what the world is about to do, and when either one is going to blow up in somebody’s face.

The thing has a name (Narrative Pressure Architecture, or NPA if you like acronyms) and a pile of equations I won’t get into here. What it actually does is this. You feed it a play, and it gives you back a curve. The curve tells you what the audience is going through moment by moment. Not vibes. Something you can point at.

Audrey and I agreed that I’d analyze one of several contemporary plays; I chose to focus on her two-hander, The Gulf, a play set entirely on a boat, “somewhere out on the Tensaw River.”

Here’s what I found.

The problem with how we usually talk about tension

When writers talk about tension, we’re usually talking about what I’d call event tension. Will the gun go off. Will they kiss. Will the bomb go off before the timer hits zero. Event tension is the workhorse of genre. It’s what keeps you watching a thriller when the plot is dumb and the dialogue is worse. A specific thing is about to happen, and the not-knowing-when is what keeps you there.

The Gulf has some of this. The motor breaks. Kendra gets in cold water with a knife. Kendra smells the other woman on Betty. Kendra throws Betty out of the boat. All of these are event-tension beats, and they’re doing real work on you.

But they’re not the main engine. The main engine is something else, and I don’t have a clean name for it, so I’ll call it frame tension. The ground under the audience keeps getting softer. Nothing specific is about to happen, but your confidence in what kind of relationship you’re watching, what these women are to each other, whether any of it is salvageable, keeps degrading. The pressure doesn’t go down when the fight happens. It doesn’t go down when Kendra beats Betty with an oar. It doesn’t go down when Betty climbs back in, or when Kendra says you smell good to me. One event after another, and it’s still sitting on your chest.

That’s the trick. And it’s not easy.

The shape of the curve

When I score The Gulf beat by beat, the curve comes out looking like this.

It starts low. Dolores Pettaway has fifteen cats. BP got in the water. Kendra’s boots are white so you can see the blood. Low-stakes bickering. Meanwhile, the audience is picking up signal whether they know it or not. Kendra reaches for the beer Betty hands her, but she’s not really reaching for Betty. Betty brings up Dog River. Kendra shuts it down. Betty wakes up from a nap in Kendra’s lap, and the stage direction tells us Kendra is “present, but her mind is elsewhere.” That’s the first real stage direction in the play and honestly it’s doing more work than the next four pages of dialogue.

Then the curve climbs. And keeps climbing.

The boot fight is funny. Betty tells the Indigo-the-cat story about the mouse laid out like sushi under the table. Kendra catches a little red and lets it go. Betty’s reading from the parachute book, suggesting prison guard, mortician, wedding planner. The audience is laughing. The pressure is still rising underneath the laughing, which is probably the strangest thing about what Audrey is doing here. The humor isn’t a release. It’s a carrier.

Around the middle, the motor breaks. Kendra has to get into cold water with a knife to cut a tree root off the propeller. This feels, on first read, like the climb arriving at a peak. A real crisis, a real event, the thing the whole play has been building toward. Except. Watch what happens next. The crisis resolves (she cuts the root, she gets back in the boat), and the tension doesn’t drop. It keeps going up.

Then the violence. Kendra smells the other woman on Betty. She beats Betty with an oar. She throws her in the water. She shreds the book and throws it after her. This is the loudest the play gets. You’d expect a catharsis here. Some kind of breaking point that lets something out. It doesn’t come. Betty climbs back into the boat soaking wet, and somehow the pressure is higher than it was before the violence. Now there’s blood on Kendra’s hand, there’s a destroyed book in the boat, there’s a confirmed affair hanging in the air between them, and neither of them is going anywhere.

The curve actually peaks in the quiet after. Not during. The pressure is highest when they’re tenderly refusing to resolve anything. When Betty asks do you hate me and Kendra says yeah. When Kendra says I just wish I was enough and Betty says you are. When Betty asks again, one more time, how long a fish heart keeps beating after you take it out.

And then it just ends. Betty reads another list: pet psychic, meter maid, dental hygienist. Lights fade.

Nothing is resolved. And you still can’t stand up.

The two things Audrey refuses to close

The reason the pressure keeps climbing, at least the way the math is reading it, is that there are two big predictions the audience is trying to close and the play won’t let them.

The first one is: what is actually between these two women. They’ve been together six years. We get that early. Then for the whole rest of the play, you’re trying to figure out what shape the relationship actually has. Are they in love. Are they stuck. Are they trauma-bonded. Are they hunter and prey. The play keeps offering you possibilities and then taking them back. Tender exchange gets interrupted by contempt. Contempt gets interrupted by tenderness. Every time you think you’ve got a frame for what they are, the next beat cracks it.

The second one is: what Kendra is actually carrying around. She’s a woman of few words, like the character description says. She has exactly one real monologue in the whole play, the story about her father, the one about teaching her to fish on the Tensaw, answering every question with a question: What ya wanna be when you grow up, beb? Well, what do you want me to be, Daddy? Can you fly like an ole redbird? For ninety seconds she cracks open. Then she closes again, and the audience spends the rest of the play trying to figure out if that woman, the one who loved her father like that, is still in there somewhere, or if something in her died with him, or if the shallow-water fishing is just where that grief lives now.

Both of these stay open through the violence. Both stay open through the tenderness. Both are still open when the lights fade. And here’s the craft point, the thing I think Audrey gets right that most writers trying this structure get wrong: the open predictions have to feel like they could close at any second, without actually closing. She plants at least a dozen possible closures. Bay Minette. Junior college. The affair getting revealed. The knife, playfully held. The daddy monologue. Betty climbing back in the boat. Each one of these looks, for a second, like the moment the play is going to release. None of them do. The refusal is the whole structure.

The thing the audience is doing without knowing it

This is the part that surprised me even running the scoring.

What I was saying about the two open predictions, that’s not actually the largest tension contributor in the play. The largest one is something else. The audience is being made to hold a model of the relationship that neither woman herself can hold.

Betty knows how she feels. Kendra knows how she feels. Neither of them can see the whole shape of what they are to each other. Betty can’t see what her affair actually did to Kendra, because she’s too busy defending her choice to move to Bay Minette. Kendra can’t see what her shutdown actually does to Betty, because she’s too busy fishing in the shallows. You, sitting in the audience, can see both. Which means you’re the only mind in the boat with access to both sides.

This isn’t a sentimental thing. It’s work. You’re doing cognitive labor they can’t or won’t, and the weight accumulates. It doesn’t discharge when they fight. It doesn’t discharge when Kendra wraps Betty’s hand. It doesn’t discharge, period.

By the end, you’ve been doing their thinking for them for over an hour. That’s what’s sitting on your chest when the lights come up. You didn’t just watch a relationship. You carried one.

Three things I’d take from this if I were writing my own

1. Open a question early. Don’t close it.

What I mean by a prediction is really just a question the audience is actively tracking. The usual mistake is to plant the question and then answer it around page 45, because all our training says exposition goes early and revelation goes at the climax. For this kind of tension, you keep the question alive for the whole running time.

Audrey plants the Bay Minette question and never closes it. She plants the affair question around the midpoint and never really closes it either. We know Betty was putting an end to it, but we don’t know if Kendra believes her, and honestly I’m not sure Kendra knows if she believes her. The daddy question gets closed only halfway. We see the father, we don’t see what his death did to Kendra. The play is basically a lattice of half-open doors, and you carry every one of them out of the theater.

2. Don’t trust the big event to release the frame.

The Gulf has a real violent event. Oar. Overboard. Shredded book. Blood. On the page this looks like the climax, and if you were planning the story structurally you’d probably put it there and feel like you’d done the job. But the curve says the tension is higher after the violence than before it. That’s because event resolution and frame resolution are two separate things.

This is probably the single move most writers miss when they try this kind of structure. They give the audience the fight and think they’ve given them the climax. But the climax wasn’t the fight. The climax was the quiet after.

3. A confined space isn’t your set. It’s your engine.

Audrey’s author note is basically four lines. A fishing boat. Late afternoon. Alabama Delta. Present day. One boat, two women, one night. On the page this looks like a constraint she’s working around. In the scoring it’s a multiplier on everything else. Every beat is amplified by the fact that these two are literally stuck in a boat together. They can’t leave each other. The motor is broken. Betty forgot the phone. The water’s cold. Every time one of them would normally storm out of the room, she can’t. She has to stay. And because she stays, so does the audience.

One last thing, because I think this might be the single best move in the play

Early on, Betty asks how long a fish heart keeps beating after you cut it out of the body. It comes up early in the play in a funny offhand way while Kendra is teasing her. Kendra jokes three-point-two seconds.

Near the very end of the play, after all of the violence, after Betty’s back in the boat, after the affair is out, after Kendra has wrapped her own bleeding hand, Betty asks again. This time she wants the real answer. Kendra says maybe a minute. Betty asks her: why does it keep beating like that?

And Kendra says, habit.

That one word is the whole thesis of the play, as far as I can tell. Why do these two stay together this late, this hurt, this done? Habit. Not love, not fear, not hope. Habit. The organ keeps beating after you cut it out. The relationship keeps beating after you’ve killed it. Kendra’s been telling us this all night in fishing metaphors and the boot metaphor and the shallows metaphor, and she finally says it plainly, in one word. Then she casts her line with her left hand because the right one is bandaged, and the lights go down.

That’s the signature. One word, at the end of a fishing story, that recontextualizes everything you just watched. Multiple unresolved questions all graze against it at the same time: what keeps them together, what Kendra is carrying, what happens tomorrow. None of them close. But habit gives you the vocabulary for why they don’t need to. And weirdly, that’s enough.

That’s what the math is reading. That’s what’s on your chest when the lights come up.

Pedro Santos is a Portuguese screenwriter and script doctor based in Tbilisi. He’s currently writing a novel called The Midnight Tea. He can be reached at santos.pedro.pires@gmail.com.

Thanks to Audrey for the invitation, and for writing a play that was rewarding to take apart.

PREVIOUS ARTICLES FROM HOW TO PLAYWRIGHT

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LEAN MORE ABOUT AUDREY

• @audreycefaly | Linktree

• Visit my website for more about me and the work I do!

• Purchase my plays from Concord Theatricals.

• Follow me on Facebook.

• Follow me on Twitter.

• Follow me on Insta.

Audrey Cefaly’s plays (Alabaster, Maytag Virgin, The Gulf, The Last Wide Open, Trouble) have garnered the Lammy Award, the Calicchio Prize, the NNPN Goldman Prize, the Edgerton, and a Pulitzer nomination. Her works have been produced at Signature Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Barter Theatre, Merrimack Rep, Florida Studio, Florida Rep, Gulfshore Playhouse, and countless others. Cefaly is a Dramatist Guild Foundation “Traveling Master,” an Arena Stage playwright cohort, and a recipient of the Walter E. Dakin Fellowship from the Sewanee Writers Conference. She is published by Concord Theatricals, Applause Books, Smith & Kraus and TRW.

Submissions end on Sun, Mar 15, 2026 11:59 PM

What is the New Play Festival?
The New Play Festival is an opportunity for playwrights to submit their plays for production. We open submissions in the Spring and have a panel of judges read them over the summer. Then, Semi-Finalists are chosen and from that point, the Centre Stage staff reads the plays and determines a Final 3.

• Submissions are open to any playwright whether from South Carolina or around the world!

• Only one entry per playwright/playwright’s representative is permitted.

• NO entries may be previously published.

• Likewise, NO entries may have previously fully realized, regionally produced performances through the dates of the Centre Stage New Play Festival 2026 (previous readings and workshops are acceptable).

• Entries may have NO more than seven (7) actors required.

• All entries must be no more than 120 pages, but one-act and full-length plays are welcome.

• Scripts must be in the Traditional or Modern format for plays as defined by the Dramatists Guild.

• Screenplays, musicals, and 10-minute plays will NOT be accepted, plays with music may be submitted.

• Playwrights are encouraged to submit a cover letter along with their script that includes a brief summary of the play and a suggestion of the unique perspective or experience provided by the playwright’s body of work.

Click here to Submit

If you have any questions please email npfsubmissions@centrestage.org

Getting personal in your writing isn’t about bleeding on the page; that metaphor flatters the writer too much. I see it more as committing a quiet, almost embarrassing administrative error…misfiling your own life where others can see it. We talk about taking risks with our art as if sharing our dirty laundry, that exposure, is the risk. But I say the risk comes in the details. The greater the accuracy, the greater the risk. Naming the thing you’ve been strategically misremembering, the motive you’ve dressed up as virtue, the small, ungenerous truth that doesn’t improve when shared (gasp). Deep writing happens when you stop auditioning your pain for sympathy and start treating it like evidence. When you’re willing to bore yourself with precision instead of seducing readers with drama. What makes it feel dangerous is not that it’s raw, but that it’s specific. And specificity, unlike confession, leaves very little room to hide. Writing my first autobiographical work helped me to heal past and present trauma (this much, I anticipated). It helped me get honest with myself. And strangely, it showed me I could depersonalize the personal. That distance let me see things in my own memories I couldn’t access when I was still protecting them. Imagine that kind of freedom. Imagine not giving a single fuck what people think. What would you write then? If you could?

The Relentless Award, established in honor of Philip Seymour Hoffman and his pursuit of truth in the theater, is the largest annual cash prize in American theater awarded to a playwright in recognition of a new play.

Eligibility/Criteria for Submission:

• Play must be unproduced, with no production commitment.

• Author(s) must have either United States citizenship, possess a green card, or currently reside in the United States and have lived here for at least four years.

• Plays with a producer, producing organization, or theater attached for future production are not eligible.

• Plays that have received more than $10,000 in commission, author fee, or other award prize money (cumulatively) are not eligible.

• One-act plays, musicals, and plays for children are not eligible.

• The author(s) must be at least 21 years old at time of submission.

The Relentless Award uses a blind submissions process (the names and identifying details about the authors are hidden from the judges.) It is imperative that all submitting writers create a draft of their submission with all identifying information (name, contact information, representation information if applicable, development history, any identity-describing author’s note/dedication) redacted.
Failure to do so may disqualify your script and render it ineligible for consideration.

Please note: our submission window will close automatically at 11:59pm EST on January 1, 2026 and no late submissions will be accepted. Due to Submittable’s 48 hour turn around time for user inquiries, we strongly urge you to allow yourself ample time before the deadline, in case of any technological or other difficulties.

Please see our FAQ here: https://www.americanplaywritingfoundation.org/faqs for more information. We highly recommend reading the FAQ before submitting, as some of the details provided are relevant to the eligibility of your submission.

SUBMIT: https://americanplaywritingfoundation.submittable.com/submit

All applications for the Relentless Award are accepted and reviewed through Submittable. Submissions are open till January 1, 2026--we look forward to reading your work!

YES, I POST SUBMISSION OPPS
https://audreycefaly.substack.com/t/submissions (bookmark this page)

LEAN MORE ABOUT AUDREY

• @audreycefaly | Linktree

• Visit my website for more about me and the work I do!

• Purchase my plays from Concord Theatricals.

• Follow me on Facebook.

• Follow me on Twitter.

• Follow me on Insta.

Audrey Cefaly’s plays (Alabaster, Maytag Virgin, The Gulf, The Last Wide Open, Trouble) have garnered the Lammy Award, the Calicchio Prize, the NNPN Goldman Prize, the Edgerton, and a Pulitzer nomination. Her works have been produced at Signature Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Barter Theatre, Merrimack Rep, Florida Studio, Florida Rep, Gulfshore Playhouse, and countless others. Cefaly is a Dramatist Guild Foundation “Traveling Master,” an Arena Stage playwright cohort, and a recipient of the Walter E. Dakin Fellowship from the Sewanee Writers Conference. She is published by Concord Theatricals, Applause Books, Smith & Kraus and TRW.

Florida Repertory Theatre, an Associate Member of the National New Play Network, is seeking submissions for its 2026 PlayLab Festival, slated for April 30 – May 1.

PlayLab is an intensive weekend of rehearsals, readings, talkbacks, and development that brings professional playwrights, directors, actors, and audiences together to work on up to five new plays in a laboratory setting.

The deadline for submissions is Wednesday, Dec. 1, 2025. The festival’s reading committee will read and evaluate the submitted works, and the theatre will announce the selected plays and playwrights in early 2026. Each showcased playwright joins the development process to work on their play with a company of professional actors and a director in preparation for a public reading.

SUBMISSION INSTRUCTIONS

Florida Rep seeks plays that have not yet had a full professional production, but that are nearly ready for production. Those interested should submit a PDF of their play to the email address below by 5 PM on Wednesday, Dec. 1.

One play per playwright is allowed. Casts of 8 actors or fewer are preferred for budgetary reasons, though plays with larger casts are not automatically disqualified. Florida Rep asks playwrights to keep this preference in mind as they choose a play to submit for consideration.

• Email Submission to: Submissions@FloridaRep.org

Please include the following information in the body of the submission email:

• Play Title

• Playwright’s Name

• Cast Size (number of actors needed; not number of characters if doubling is used)

• Brief Synopsis

• Development History

• Link to NPX page (if applicable)

• NOTE to Literary Agents: Please submit plays as separate emails, not as multiple PDF attachments.

Florida Rep produces a wide variety of comedies, dramas, musicals, and new plays in its professional season and seeks to curate a PlayLab Festival that reflects that variety. Florida Rep will consider plays looking for Rolling World Premiere partners with NNPN member theatres. Playwrights or agents will receive a confirmation of their submission.

Florida Rep often chooses plays from its festival to be produced in subsequent seasons and seeks plays for submission that are ready to move into the late stages of development and production.

The Florida Rep Reading Committee looks forward to reading and evaluating the 2026 submissions!

More about PlayLab

Each year, Florida Repertory Theatre hosts the PlayLab Festival of New Works, a dynamic celebration of storytelling and theatrical innovation. Since its founding in 2014, PlayLab has become a vital part of our commitment to developing new voices and expanding the American theatre canon.

The annual festival features five new plays—a curated mix of works by both emerging talents and established playwrights—that reflect Florida Rep’s mission to produce a wide variety of compelling, thought-provoking theatre. Over four days, these plays are presented in staged readings, followed by talkbacks and audience conversations that help shape the work’s future. PlayLab also features a panel with all of the playwrights, where audience members get to learn more about their process and their work, and sometimes a keynote address.

What makes PlayLab unique is our focus on collaboration. We bring the playwrights to Fort Myers to work alongside professional directors, actors, and stage managers in a supportive, creative environment. These artists share their work, receive feedback, and often make meaningful revisions as part of the development process.

Florida Rep is proud Associate Member of the National New Play Network (NNPN), and the NNPN is a partner in helping nurture these voices and bring powerful new stories to the stage. Many plays and musicals showcased in PlayLab have received fully realized productions at Florida Repertory Theatre and other professional and educational institutions. To date, Florida Rep has given fully realized productions to eight plays featured in PlayLab.

Florida Rep strives to educate and empower our audiences to go out and talk about new plays, how they are created, and why they are important. PlayLabis an engaging and impactful experience for everyone involved, and we hope you join us for it.

Save the date for Florida Rep’s 2026 PlayLab Festival – April 30 – May 3, 2026.

YES, I POST SUBMISSION OPPS
https://audreycefaly.substack.com/t/submissions (bookmark this page)

LEAN MORE ABOUT AUDREY

• @audreycefaly | Linktree

• Visit my website for more about me and the work I do!

• Purchase my plays from Concord Theatricals.

• Follow me on Facebook.

• Follow me on Twitter.

• Follow me on Insta.

Audrey Cefaly’s plays (Alabaster, Maytag Virgin, The Gulf, The Last Wide Open, Trouble) have garnered the Lammy Award, the Calicchio Prize, the NNPN Goldman Prize, the Edgerton, and a Pulitzer nomination. Her works have been produced at Signature Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Barter Theatre, Merrimack Rep, Florida Studio, Florida Rep, Gulfshore Playhouse, and countless others. Cefaly is a Dramatist Guild Foundation “Traveling Master,” an Arena Stage playwright cohort, and a recipient of the Walter E. Dakin Fellowship from the Sewanee Writers Conference. She is published by Concord Theatricals, Applause Books, Smith & Kraus and TRW.

This week I’m thrilled to share a guest essay from award-winning playwright, librettist, and poet Jacqueline Goldfinger. Over the past nine months, she’s been reflecting on how artists can navigate the current economic downturn by looking back at what carried us through the pandemic. Her piece is part practical guide, part reminder to breathe, and part love letter to the small acts of creativity that sustain us when the larger systems falter.

And when you’ve finished reading, be sure to check out her newly revised edition of Playwriting with Purpose—it’s a generous, clear-eyed resource for writers at every stage.

Art and the Apocalypse (Again)

by Jacqueline Goldfinger

Over the past nine months, I’ve been thinking a lot about how we can apply the lessons of the economic downturn during COVID to the current economic crisis. Both share similar characteristics; they leave us feeling scared, powerless, and overwhelmed. They lead to cuts in commissions, development programs, and new play production slots. But they also provide us unique opportunities to connect more deeply with our art and with one another. Here’s what I’ve come up with so far:

First, we need to breathe. (I still remind myself of this every morning when I read the headlines.)

Second, we learned during COVID that granters, funders, and individual donors shifted much of their support from the arts to other worthy and important causes – like healthcare and education – in a time of crisis. While this is necessary, it also leaves us with fewer resources. Ticket sales also drop for a myriad of reasons including consumer fear of economic uncertainty. Many theaters are already anticipating this, as well as navigating NEA insanity, so when you see smaller seasons and less developmental opportunities being announced – just know there’s probably a legit reason behind it. This time around, theater leaders I know are trying to blunt economic trauma by budgeting to keep paying staff and offering medical insurance for the next four years – instead of having to let people go, like they had to during COVID.

Third, does #2 mean that we sit back and despair? No. In an upside-down world we know how to unite, engage, create, make space, take a break, and support one another. However, it does mean that – for our sanity’s sake – our goals and processes become less product-driven. Realistically, things are probably going to get worse (fewer productions, etc.) before they get better. So, write that thing that would never get produced but you’re excited about! Shift to journaling or private writing that deepens your connection with yourself. Dash off sketches for your friends to read at a dinner party or baby shower. While we should probably do more of this anyway – it’s especially important now that we don’t set ourselves up for goals that are unattainable no matter what we do.

Here are a few more COVID-coping ideas that we can turn to again:

• Micro Dosing Art: Our daily life is busy, busy, busy. Take a step back from writing for a while. Once a week Micro Dose art that has always interested you, but you’ve never had the time to explore. Look up that band your friends love on YouTube and listen to a few songs. Pick a painting you like and Google the artist – take 15 minutes to explore their other work. Remember that play you always loved? Grab the script, flip to a random scene, and read it again. Allow yourself to revel in art free of judgement or restriction.

• Embrace Shared Community Spaces: What stories can you tell with and about your immediately community – the community within walking distance (or easy driving distance) of your home? Invite friends to a picnic and ask them to bring an item that speaks to a story in their life. Eat, drink, share the items and their stories! Go to a public garden during lunch and write a one-page play about a sculpture. Playing in public is exhilarating and it grounds us, helping us appreciate the moment and celebrate the small joys in life.

• Revision: Is there a play you’ve been avoiding revising because…. [fill in the blank here]? This is your time to shine. You have plenty of time to take a step back. Reconceive the work. And take your time revising so that when submission opportunities re-open, you’ll be ready to submit. Acknowledging there will be a future beyond this unfortunate time gives us perspective and activates our emotional reserves to keep us afloat.

What are unique, sanity-saving, thoughtful tools and techniques you saw artists utilize during COVID? Drop them in the comments below.

Regardless, economic crises eventually end. So, let’s choose to ride it out together in laughter, in hope, in friendship. Let’s hold one another gently and fully and dream forward. Theatre is about connection, seeing and being seen in truth. In this moment, we have a unique opportunity to live the fullness of our art form in everyday life. Let’s take it.

Jacqueline Goldfinger is an award-winning playwright, librettist, and poet. (jacquelinegoldfinger.com). A revised and expanded edition of her Amazon bestselling book, “Playwriting with Purpose: A Guide and Workbook,” is now available everywhere books are sold. This book incorporates craft lessons, scenes for study, and concrete guidance in both the art and business of playwriting. The author takes readers through the entire creative process, from creating characters and writing dialogue to revising and producing your play. Each chapter includes incisive craft lessons, provocative writing prompts, examples from plays, tips from working artists, reading recommendations, and more. Read more at Routledge (https://www.routledge.com/Playwriting-with-Purpose-A-Guide-and-Workbook-for-Playwrights/Goldfinger/p/book/9781032825908).

PREVIOUS ARTICLES FROM HOW TO PLAYWRIGHT

YES, I POST SUBMISSION OPPS
https://audreycefaly.substack.com/t/submissions (bookmark this page)

LEAN MORE ABOUT AUDREY

• @audreycefaly | Linktree

• Visit my website for more about me and the work I do!

• Purchase my plays from Concord Theatricals.

• Follow me on Facebook.

• Follow me on Twitter.

• Follow me on Insta.

Audrey Cefaly’s plays (Alabaster, Maytag Virgin, The Gulf, The Last Wide Open, Trouble) have garnered the Lammy Award, the Calicchio Prize, the NNPN Goldman Prize, the Edgerton, and a Pulitzer nomination. Her works have been produced at Signature Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Barter Theatre, Merrimack Rep, Florida Studio, Florida Rep, Gulfshore Playhouse, and countless others. Cefaly is a Dramatist Guild Foundation “Traveling Master,” an Arena Stage playwright cohort, and a recipient of the Walter E. Dakin Fellowship from the Sewanee Writers Conference. She is published by Concord Theatricals, Applause Books, Smith & Kraus and TRW.

This year’s EST/Sloan Project Commissions are now open to submission through November 5, 2025.

The EST/Sloan Project commissions, develops and presents new works delving into how we view and are affected by the scientific world. These plays examine the struggles and challenges scientists and engineers face from moral issues to the consequences of their discoveries.

The Project is designed to stimulate artists to create credible and compelling work exploring the worlds of science and technology and to challenge existing stereotypes of scientists and engineers in the popular imagination. The Project commissions new works which may go on to further development during EST’s developmental season, including one Mainstage Production, as well as workshops and readings in an annual festival called FIRST LIGHT.

Sinvce 1998, the EST/Sloan Project has awarded commissions totaling more than $3,000,000 to more than 300 artists and theatres. Previous commissionees can be found here.

COMMISSION AWARDS

New Play Commissions will be awarded to individuals, groups and creative teams for full-length plays and musicals.

We do not commission plays for children.

Commissions range from $5000 to $10,000. Commission amounts are determined on a case-by-case basis, as are deadlines for drafts, finished work, and research support (if appropriate). Although commissioned plays will be considered for developmental programming, the commission does not guarantee further development at EST.

Please note that at this time, EST is not able to further develop musicals past the commission stage.

Full-length works may be submitted and are evaluated on a script-by-script basis by the EST/Sloan Project staff. Rewrite commissions for existing scripts range from $2,000 to $5,000.

Commissions are also available for regional theaters who wish to sponsor a local play or musical focused on science and technology, either by commissioning a new script or developing an extant piece. Regional commission amounts are determined on a case-by-case basis, ranging from $2,000 - $5,000. Theaters seeking support for a project that is already scheduled should be aware that that grants are generally awarded in the summer after the submission deadline, so projects happening before that will not be eligible for consideration.

RESUBMISSIONS

We do not accept repeat submissions unless you have been expressly invited to resubmit or if you have substantially revised your proposal.

Learn more about the individual requirements for each type of submission:

New Play Commissions
Rewrite Commissions
Regional Development Grant Commissions

Please contact us with any questions.

Thanks,
EST/Sloan Project Staff
sloanproject@ensemblestudiotheatre.org

YES, I POST SUBMISSION OPPS
https://audreycefaly.substack.com/t/submissions (bookmark this page)

LEAN MORE ABOUT AUDREY

• @audreycefaly | Linktree

• Visit my website for more about me and the work I do!

• Purchase my plays from Concord Theatricals.

• Follow me on Facebook.

• Follow me on Twitter.

• Follow me on Insta.

Audrey Cefaly’s plays (Alabaster, Maytag Virgin, The Gulf, The Last Wide Open, Trouble) have garnered the Lammy Award, the Calicchio Prize, the NNPN Goldman Prize, the Edgerton, and a Pulitzer nomination. Her works have been produced at Signature Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Barter Theatre, Merrimack Rep, Florida Studio, Florida Rep, Gulfshore Playhouse, and countless others. Cefaly is a Dramatist Guild Foundation “Traveling Master,” an Arena Stage playwright cohort, and a recipient of the Walter E. Dakin Fellowship from the Sewanee Writers Conference. She is published by Concord Theatricals, Applause Books, Smith & Kraus and TRW.

The 29th Annual Ojai Playwrights Summer Conference & New Works Festival will take place July 19-August 2, 2026. Playwrights will spend the first week in community with other writers, directors, and dramaturgs, reading and discussing the plays and a second week in workshop (with actors) to develop their new plays, culminating in a public performance of their work during the Festival Weekend. All participating playwrights are expected to attend and be a part of the artist community for the entire period.

As part of our commitment to making OPC’s new play development programs more accessible, we are thrilled to share that this will again be an open submission process. OPC continues to strengthen our commitment to helping new plays move from page to stage by limiting the barriers to consideration that emerging playwrights face. In reading more broadly, we hope to widen our knowledge about who is writing today, and to share more works with the field.

WHAT PLAY SHOULD I SEND
Writers should send the play they are most excited about working on, and the most excited to learn from. There is no monolith for “an ideal OPC play” – in content, form or style. To that end: the staff and selection committee are intentionally composed of working artists who approach new play development from a wide range of perspectives and lived experiences.

THE PROCESS
Five plays will be selected as Workshop Writers for the Conference and Festival, which includes the Week One Conference and a workshop/public reading in Week Two. Three plays will be selected for our Writer In Residence opportunity which has the same experience for week one. Week Two will give playwrights writing time with dramaturgical support, along with participating in a Playwrights Panel and an opportunity to share an excerpt of the play with the public.

The Workshop Writer opportunity is a best fit for scripts that are a step or two away from production ready (i.e. multiple drafts have been completed, there’s a few more questions to answer, etc) and could make good use of time in conversation during the Conference (Week One) and a rehearsal week with a large public reading during the Festival (Week Two). Best play matches for Writers in Residence would be scripts in an earlier draft, where community and individualized dramaturgical support would be useful, with time and space to get to a draft you’re ready to send out/share with the world.

APPLICATION GUIDELINES:

Applications are open to all playwrights over the age of 18 who reside and have the legal right to work in the United States.

OPC only accepts full-length plays (60+ minute running time) that have not yet had a full professional production. We are not currently accepting musicals for this Conference.

OPC will accept only one play by each playwright for consideration. Plays that have been submitted to OPC in previous years will not be accepted.

OPC will only accept for consideration plays submitted directly by the playwrights themselves - not as a nomination/recommendation from agent or other theater representatives or recommenders.

OPC’s Application and Selection process is curated in order to continue centering equitable access, transparency for applicants, and our capacity to thoughtfully consider the applications that come in. Please take time to read carefully below.

The application window will be open from September 19 - 26, 2025.

The application form will be available on September 19, 2025, at 9 am PT on this webpage and will close on September 26 at 11:59 pm PT. Please prepare a 10-page PDF sample of your script, as well as the full PDF script for our review. Please name your files in the following manner:

The 10-page sample should be named:

[YourLastName], [YourFirstName] 10-Page Selection, [TitleofPlay], [DateofDraft], OPC2026

The full draft should be named:

[YourLastName], [YourFirstName] [TitleofPlay], [DateofDraft], OPC2026

(Example: Parks, Suzan-Lori, THE AMERICA PLAY, 6.20.2023, OPC2026)

We will narrow down the submissions based on the 10-page sample to a 2nd Round of approximately 200 plays. We will then read the full play from this 2nd Round. Applicants will be notified if they’ve been selected for this round by the end of January 2026.

Finalists will be notified of their selection status by the end of April 2026.

Application Requirements:

1. Full length play as a PDF

2. 10 page sample from the same play submitted as a separate PDF (can be from anywhere in the play, but do add a sentence to set up a scene if you chose from somewhere that isn’t the beginning). Your title and character pages do not count towards your sample limit.

3. Tell us about your play in 250 words or less. (We find a brief synopsis to be helpful, but you can also add in any information you think would help orient a reader when reading a sample from your play).

4. Where in the development process do you feel this play is in at this moment? What would success look like for your play during this Conference? (250 words or less)

5. Your cast size

Please address any questions to literary@ojaiplays.org and we will get back to you as soon as we’re able.

The application form will be submitted through our online portal, which will be live on this site on September 19.

APPLY HERE

https://www.ojaiplays.org/play-submissions

About the Summer Conference & Festival:

Founded in 1997, Ojai Playwrights Conference is one of America’s preeminent play development programs. Held annually in California’s Ojai Valley, our two week Summer Conference & New Works Festival brings together a creative community of playwrights and theater artists dedicated to mutually supportive inquiry, exploration, and experimentation.

In the first week, participating playwrights, directors, dramaturgs and OPC artistic staff gather to read and discuss the plays, and build a supportive and responsive community for the work and one another. In the second week, playwrights further develop their plays with a company of professional actors. The Conference culminates with our New Works Festival, a weekend of public workshop readings, discussions and community events.

Ojai Playwrights Conference is unique in its process of developing new plays for the American theater by offering a safe, productive, rigorous haven for playwrights and plays that are challenging, and to investigate and reimagine the values, beliefs and discourses that are fundamental to the ongoing experiment that is the United States of America.

We are housed in the generous community of Ojai. Artists stay in Ojai families' homes, week one is conducted at a family's residence, and week two is conducted at a school. We collaborate with a local education program, and all artists engage with young artists as part of an ongoing effort to learn from each other. Meals are provided, and seen as an opportunity to be in community.

Week One: Summer Conference

OPC staff and resident playwrights, directors, and dramaturgs gather to read the plays out loud and offer feedback as a collective. Playwrights who have curiosity about process, generosity of spirit, and a genuine interest in community-building are ideal participants in the Conference portion of the residency.

Week Two: New Works Festival

We welcome actors to our collective and tuck into rehearsal rooms to prepare for public readings, which land on the Festival weekend. Since our rehearsal time is limited and our readings are open to the public, we are looking for plays that are in later stages of development. The ideal play is one that is one step or two away from production ready and could make good use of time in a room for a week and a public reading.

My family, for the most part, let me watch whatever I wanted to on TV. That’s probably why I'm an aficionado of the soap opera genre but have yet to see an episode of Sesame Street. For some reason, the TV show “The Courtship of Eddie’s Father” just popped into my mind. As a little, LITTLE kid, I was fascinated by a TV show where a kid was trying to set up his widowed father with women. I’m sure there’s a better way to describe that show, but that’s my memory. There was no one Black on that show. I barely knew what a widower was because I barely knew what death was at the time. The theme song drew me in (“People let me tell you ‘bout my best friend…”), but it was the perspective of the characters that made me feel connected. I don’t know how I related, or why I related, but the magic of perspective plus authenticity is that I didn’t need to know.

Decades after I saw that little white boy trying to hook his daddy up before there was a Match.com, I became a playwright. And playwriting became my way to express my perspective and share my worldview. That expressing and sharing have become my personal reset. I thought about dozens of different ways to say it. Self-care. Written therapy. Conversations with the world. Emotional activism. Internal reboot. Happy place. Safe space. My magic carpet ride.

Perspective as a Starting Point

And there’s an element of truth to all those ways of describing what playwriting means to me. But what it all comes down to is that it’s my way to center and recalibrate. And race, no matter how uncomfortable that is for some to hear, is a big part of that identity in America.

No matter what other writing I do, there’s nothing that does it for me like writing a play. And I’ve done more than my share of different kinds of writing going back to grade school – notes, papers, essays, news stories, columns, speeches, training materials, legal memos, legal briefs, administrative hearing opinions, radio stories, short stories, a mystery novel, Facebook posts, tweets, and plays. Lots and lots of plays.

Here’s the deal: perspective is nothing more than how you see the world around you. Not how you pretend to see it. Not how you say you’re seeing it. But how you viscerally interact with the world. People like to talk a lot about authenticity without really being about it – gold-plated jewelry versus the real thing. It’s like when you get on social media and see an opinion strongly (as in “meanly”) expressed, you can usually tell when it’s a bot versus a real human being. A gold-plated opinion comes off differently than one with an authentic beating heart behind it.

I wrote about this in my graduate paper at the Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing at Spalding University, where I got my MFA in creative writing in 2022. In my grad paper, I wrote about how a lot of playwrights love the street cred of having a Black woman character without actually knowing, loving, or particularly respecting Black women in anything more than a superficial way. To someone watching a play that doesn't actually know any Black women themselves, it probably comes off as authentic. However, those of us who come from that actual lived experience know the difference when we see it on stage. We can tell when someone has Wikipediaed their way into writing a character. One of the clues mentioned in my paper, for example, is a play that has a Black woman but never one in conversation with another Black woman. A play that has the visuals of authenticity but lacks the perspective. I’ll be nice here and skip the examples.

Authenticity Versus the Default Gaze

All of this has crossed my mind even more as “DEI” has become the current boogeyman for acting like anything not steeped in whiteness is anti-white. As a former diversity trainer, I can tell you that the word “inclusion” got added to “diversity and equity” initiatives because too many white people got triggered by the thought that they were being left out of the conversation. As if white women, white veterans, and white employees with disabilities, for example, weren’t part of the equation. As a playwright, I got your DEI and it stands for Delightfully Engaging in Identity. And each of us contains a multitude of identities, with race being just one of them.

Several years ago, I wrote a play with a Black woman lead. The play was about her trying to make a huge decision about where to start the next chapter of her life. This play was at a weeklong theatre play lab where a white theatre patron, involved with the play lab, spent the entire week trying to convince me that my play would be so much more successful and accessible if I made all the characters white. The play already has two white characters, by the way. She meant all the characters, especially the lead. While she didn’t articulate it clearly, she was having trouble understanding why a play that wasn’t about racism required the characters to be Black. She was never satisfied with my responses, which ranged from politeness to exasperation to anger. Her satisfaction wasn’t my problem, but it later made me think about how her real problem was that she thought the perspective of white was the default perspective, and any other perspective was simply a question of style. Especially if the Black characters weren’t engaged in preconceived stories of Blackness – poverty, gun violence, baby daddy drama, etc. (Or the “bang bang” as I jokingly say to my friends when I’m talking about this.) She was unable to see that a play didn’t have to be about racism to be about race. She couldn’t see that the perspective of race WAS the story.

I’ve described this particular play as a sort of “Eat, Pray, Love” narrative, only from the perspective of a Black woman. For anyone who has ever seen “Eat, Pray, Love,” the movie, or read the memoir, think about how different the perspective would be if it were written with a male protagonist. What if it were a Black male protagonist? What if it were an 82-year-old Black male protagonist? What if it were an 82-year-old Black male protagonist who was deaf from birth? Each aspect of who a protagonist is changes the story because of their perspective. And worldviews aren't interchangeable. Specificity and universality aren’t strangers to one another, but rather, they co-parent every experience. They work in tandem with how the viewer, the reader, or the audience member meets the story.

Some might think that woman had my best interest in mind. And I might assume as much from a friend or close acquaintance. I might even have given her the benefit of the doubt if she said it once and let it drop. But she spent the entire week of the play lab pushing the point. So this was about her comfort level, not my play’s success. And this isn’t the first time I’ve encountered it, just the most persistent, to my face. Because, let’s say I did it? I’m supposed to be happy that I got a production or two because I whitewashed my play and eradicated myself and my people in the process? I’d quit writing plays before I would have to do that to get a production.

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We’re literally in the middle of that as a country now, where majority perspectives and identities are considered normal, mainstream, and worthy of protection, while other perspectives and identities are othered with the “DEI” brush to be demonized and eradicated.

I primarily write about Black women, not because I’m a Black woman and that’s all I know. Far from it. I’ve gone to a predominantly white grade school, high school, and college in Kansas; law school in Missouri; and an MFA program in Kentucky while working for decades in the predominantly white workspaces of journalism, law, education, and theatre, which doesn’t include living in plenty of white neighborhoods and having an abundance of white friends, classmates, and co-workers.

I write mostly Black women leading characters because, one, I think Black women are infinitely fascinating in any and all situations. And two, because a Black woman at the center of a story both is the story and changes the story you think you know. I’ve written about time travel and living creatures who never age. I’ve written about Black historical times with fictional characters. I’ve written about Black historical figures written during fictional events. I’ve written stories about family, relationships, work, tragedy, comedy. And usually, at the center of each story, is a Black person with a perspective that changes the entire story because they are Black, not because being Black is only marginally relevant.

The great author Toni Morrison often discussed this—how, as a writer, she didn’t believe in centering the white gaze. “I’m writing for Black people, in the same way that Tolstoy was not writing for me, a 14-year-old colored girl from Lorain, Ohio.”

Writing Without Compromise

As a playwright, I intentionally write from a place of perspective. Yes, conflict, characterization, spectacle, and arc, and a dozen other things are important. But if you don’t start with perspective, first your own, then the perspective of the characters you’re writing about, what’s your play about again?

Perspective is my starting point as a writer. But real talk, it’s everyone’s starting point. It’s not a matter of “write what you know,” but more like, “how do you know what you know until you write it?”

I’m always going to be a stan for perspective. Perspective that can be passionate, gentle, or surprising. Perspective that makes me feel something, that makes me learn something. And I will always fight and/or ignore anyone who tries to tell me that writing from the vantage point of how I see the world requires me to shift my gaze to theirs.

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Michelle Tyrene Johnson

Michelle Tyrene Johnson’s work has been staged nationally in readings and productions, including at the Obie Award-winning The Fire This Time Festival in NYC, the Pork Filled Productions Unleashed Festival in Seattle, Washington, the Florida Rep PlayLab Festival in Fort Myers, Florida, the KC Repertory Theatre’s reading series and its New Works Festival in Kansas City, Missouri, and Local Theatre’s PlayLab in Boulder, Colorado where her play was selected for a full production in the following season. Her commissioned play “Only One Day A Year” was selected for the Kennedy Center’s New Visions/New Voices Festival in 2020, was the recipient of a $30,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, and had its world premiere at Coterie Theatre in 2023. Johnson received her MFA in Writing with an emphasis on playwriting in May 2022 from the Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing at Spalding University. Johnson is a senior producer at Louisville, Kentucky’s public radio station, a writer, and a former attorney. Additionally, Johnson is a fourth-generation Kansan and a devotee of soap operas, mystery novels, real R&B music, traveling, and nice yarn. Her website is https://www.playwright-michelle-tyrene-johnson.com. Other links: New Play Exchange | YouthPlays

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Audrey Cefaly's plays (Alabaster, Maytag Virgin, The Gulf, The Last Wide Open, Trouble) have garnered the Lammy Award, the Calicchio Prize, the NNPN Goldman Prize, the Edgerton, and a Pulitzer nomination. Her works have been produced at Signature Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Barter Theatre, Merrimack Rep, Florida Studio, Florida Rep, Gulfshore Playhouse, and countless others. Cefaly is a Dramatist Guild Foundation "Traveling Master," an Arena Stage playwright cohort, and a recipient of the Walter E. Dakin Fellowship from the Sewanee Writers Conference. She is published by Concord Theatricals, Applause Books, Smith & Kraus and TRW.

New Play Lab 2026

The New Play Lab at the annual William Inge Theatre Festival is a partnership between the Kansas Arts Commission of the Kansas Department of Commerce and the William Inge Center for the Arts at Independence Community College, Kansas

The 9th Annual New Play Lab seeks to connect national established and emerging playwrights to participate at the 43rd William Inge Theatre Festival, April 23-25, 2026. Each year, 12 to 14 Playwrights are connected with professional playwrights, directors, dramaturgs and actors. For a peek at our last Festival’s New Play Lab Recipients and Guest Artists please visit www.ingecenter.org

Selected New Play Lab playwrights receive:

• A professional staged reading of their play before an audience on the main stage of the William Inge Theatre

• Feedback on their play facilitated by national theatre professionals.

• Additional playwriting classes and seminars exclusive to New Play Lab participants, including a masterclass with William Inge Theater Festival guest playwrights.

• Networking opportunities to meet with theater professionals from across the country.

• Entry to all festival events, including two meal events.

• Meal vouchers to enjoy local restaurants in William Inge’s Hometown of Independence, Kansas.

Applications Period

Applications will be accepted through October 31, 2025. Those chosen will be notified in January 2026. Note: the receipt of applications will be limited to the first 150 to apply. Only the first 150 applications will be reviewed. Therefore, applicants are urged to submit early, as the number of applicants may reach its limit before the final due date.

The submitted plays will be blind reviewed (the playwright’s name will not be revealed) by a panel of national theatre professionals.

Requirements

Submit a play

• Playwrights may submit either a 10-minute play or one-act play, no more than 30 minutes read-time. Plays that are longer than 30 minutes will be disqualified.

• Plays should require no more than 6 actors. The play may be designed to have actors play multiple roles. If that is the case, doubling must be indicated in the character list.

• Character list must include character breakdown (age, race and gender identity for the purpose of casting).

• Plays may not include the author’s name or contact information anywhere on the script.

• Playwrights may only submit one play per cycle.

Attend

• Playwrights are required to attend the Festival. If you cannot attend, you are ineligible to apply.

• Each playwright is required to attend the New Play Lab Masterclass and Workshops taught by professional playwrights during the Inge Festival.

• Each playwright is required to attend the reading of their play during the Play Lab. More details will be sent out to those accepted.

Travel, transportation, and lodging

• For pre-planning purposes, selected playwrights should at least plan to attend Thursday morning April 23, 2026, through Saturday evening April 25, 2026.

• Each playwright is responsible for their own travel, transportation, and lodging needs.

• Local lodging information will be shared with those accepted. (Complementary transportation to and from the Tulsa Airport is available upon prior arrangement.)

Conference Fees

There are no fees for the application process. Selected Playwrights will be responsible for their travel and lodging.

Benefits

• Professional Public Reading: Playwrights will receive a professional public reading of their play, as well as feedback from national theatre artists.

• Opportunities to Network: Each year the New Play Lab creates a new cohort of playwrights, in addition to opportunities to network with our professional Guest Artists

• Exclusive Seminars and Masterclass: The New Play Lab Playwrights receive at least two masterclasses exclusive to New Play Lab playwrights.

• Festival Celebration: New Play Lab Playwrights will have full access to three days of all public and private Festival events, including the other play lab readings, productions, social events, workshops, panels, meals and much more.

Application Guidelines

• All scripts must be submitted in PDF format and emailed to submissions@ingecenter.org.

• This is a Blind Review. Your title page may not have any identifying information — no author name or address — or it will be disqualified.

• Give your script file the name 2025 + Title (for instance, 2025 Bus Stop).

• Limit script length to a 30 minute read-time – not page count. (Submissions longer than 30 minutes will be disqualified).

• Character list must include character description as well as any descriptions relevant for casting.

• Applicants must enter a short synopsis of their play as it might appear in the Play Lab program. (Maximum 75 words.)

If you have any questions, feel free to email program coordinators directly: submissions@ingecenter.org

The National Playwrights Conference is delighted to accept script submissions from playwrights of all stripes. We remain committed to the open, blind submissions policy that has been in place since the inception of the Conference. To that end, we don’t require those submitting to have an agent or letter of nomination to apply—rather, we only ask that you have the right to work in the United States.

If you are interested in submitting a play, the 2026 NPC Application Guide is available here for your reference. The application itself will be hosted on Submittable, which you’ll be able to access through this webpage when applications open. Be sure to sign up for email updates, too, to stay in the loop about NPC applications. Our eligibility requirements and a rundown of application materials can be found below.

Eligibility Requirements:

• You must be 18 years of age or older and have the right to work within the United States

• You must be the sole author of the play you are submitting to NPC, and the exclusive owner of all rights to the play. You may submit an original or adapted work, provided that the rights to any material not in the public domain have been granted in writing and a copy of the release is submitted with your script.

• Cast size: This year, the maximum cast size for NPC is no more than 10 total actors per play. We will not accept or consider plays that require 11 or more actors. We wish to be transparent that this is a new requirement due to space limitations on the O'Neill campus. We find that plays that require 6 or fewer actors are the most successful at NPC. Please see the FAQs below for additional information.

• Your play must not have had a professional production, or be licensed or optioned to have a professional production, prior to July 31, 2026. If you have any questions about this, please visit our website FAQs for more information. If your question is not answered there, please reach out to the O'Neill literary office at litoffice@theoneill.org.

• If your play has previously received—or is scheduled to receive—a developmental workshop, reading, or staged reading prior to July 31, 2026, you must disclose that information in your NPC application.

• If your play receives a workshop, reading, staged reading, or is optioned after submitting your application, please inform the literary office via email at litoffice@theoneill.org as soon as possible. Failure to disclose additional development could affect your application’s standing.

• If selected for NPC, we understand that you may need to honor outside commitments and/or employment obligations during your residency. However, please be prepared to be fully available during the week that your play is in rehearsal.

• Please note that all O’Neill artists, staff, and volunteers—including selected NPC playwrights—are required to submit a negative COVID-19 PCR or rapid antigen test to the Company Management Office within 24 hours of their arrival to the O'Neill campus. Please visit our website for more information about our COVID-19 policies.

• While we welcome all genres and styles of dramaNPC does not develop works of musical theater. You may submit those to the National Music Theater Conference.

• Although we do welcome one-acts and solo shows, pieces submitted to NPC should be approximately 60 minutes in length and designed to be the main event of an evening. We do not develop ten-minute plays.

• While we accept work that has been submitted to NPC in previous years, we strongly recommend that you share a new piece with us each season.

• Only complete applications will be accepted. If we discover an error or omission in your application, the O'Neill will contact you through Submittable. You will have 48 hours to correct your materials. If your application is not corrected, it will be withdrawn from consideration, and your fee will not be refunded.

The administrative fee for NPC 2026 is $15 per script submission. This helps offset the costs of the application process itself: its organization, staffing, administration, and submission platform. In 2022, the O’Neill committed to reducing application fees for all of its professional programs with the ultimate goal of reaching a final fee of $15 by Fall 2024. Still, we understand that this fee can pose a barrier to entry. A number of fee waivers are available on a first-come, first-serve basis: if you would like to request a fee waiver for NPC 2026, please use this Request Form before you begin your application.

Submissions will be accepted by American Blues Theater from August 1, 2025 to August 31, 2025 at 11:59 PM CT.

We proudly announce our 2026 Blue Ink Award competition and seek submissions of new plays. The winning script will be selected by Executive Artistic Director Gwendolyn Whiteside and the theater’s award-winning Ensemble & Artistic Affiliates. The 2026 winning playwright receives a monetary prize of $3,000. Cash prizes are awarded to finalists and semi-finalists too. Over $10,000 in cash and prizes were distributed to playwrights in 2025. There is no fee to submit.

The Blue Ink Award for playwriting was created in 2010 to support new work. Since inception, we’ve named 14 winners, 148 finalists, and 233 semi-finalists. A few of our previous winners include Benjamin Benne, Inda Craig-Galván, Nathan Alan Davis, Kristoffer Diaz, Yussef El Guindi, Idris Goodwin, Alyssa Haddad-Chin, Jamie Pachino, and Elaine Romero. Winning scripts have gone on to receive premiere productions in Chicago, New York City, Los Angeles, Boston, San Diego, and other cities.

Submissions will be accepted by American Blues Theater from August 1, 2025 to August 31, 2025 at 11:59 PM CT. Playwrights may only submit one (1) manuscript each year for consideration, and plays must be submitted digitally atAmericanBluesTheater.com.

Please forward this e-mail and the attached guidelines to any playwright that may be eligible and interested in this opportunity.

For more information about American Blues Theater, please visit our website: AmericanBluesTheater.com.

Read the GUIDELINES for the 2026 Blue Ink Award competition.

Send any questions to – Info@AmericanBluesTheater.com.

Learn more about our 2025 Blue Ink Award winner, finalists, and semi-finalists >>

Learn more & submit: https://americanbluestheater.com/single-tickets/new-play-development/

Submissions should be:

• Full length plays that stand alone as an evening of theater.

• Complete drafts - not incomplete drafts or treatments.

• Plays that have never had a professional AEA production; readings and workshops are fine.

• And most importantly: plays you are interested in actively advancing in a developmental environment.

Submissions should NOT be:

• Incomplete drafts or treatments​

• A play that you consider “done” or “finished”

• A play that has received a professional AEA production

• A play that you “just want to hear read out loud”

MORE INFO:

https://www.sevendevils.org/submit.html

The southwest’s premier new theatre works festival.

Trust us, it’s a process.

January 9, 2026 to January 25, 2026

Judith Hardes Theatre and Mezzanine Terrace

Hosted annually by The Phoenix Theatre Company, the Richard P. Stahl Festival of New American Theatre amplifies new voices and expands the canon of American theatre. The 2026 Richard P. Stahl Festival of New American Theatre will continue honoring our longstanding commitment to the development of new works, playwrights, and performers and include a variety of events that allow artists of all kinds to see their work come alive onstage. Next year’s festival will run January 9-25 and will feature: a play reading, two musical readings, two Composer Lyricist Cabarets, Choreography Lab, and the 24-hour Theatre Project. This is an opportunity to witness how a production goes from the page to the stage!

Submissions for the 2026 Richard P. Stahl Festival of New American Theatre will be open July 15, 2025 – August 1, 2025. Please see Submission Guidelines and FAQs for more details.

How To Submit

Review our main page for information and frequently asked questions. Then, upload your submission through the appropriate submission link on the main page. There is a $10 submission fee that will be waived for members of Writers Guild of America or Dramatists Guild. However, the $10 submission fee is NOT required for the Composer/Lyricist Cabaret.

All eligible submissions are welcome, and we're actively seeking submissions from artists with an Arizona connection to champion local creators. Due to time constraints, we are capping submissions for each category at 300 applications. Please submit early to ensure your work can be considered.

Artists for next year's Festival will be selected sometime in Fall of 2025. Submissions that reached the final round for the 2025 Richard P. Stahl Festival of New American Theatre will also be considered for the 2026 Richard P. Stahl Festival of New American Theatre.

If you have any questions or experience any difficulties, please email us at newworks@phoenixtheatre.com.

Submit for the 2026 Richard P. Stahl Festival Of New American Theatre

Please review the submission guidelines before submitting.

For guidelines for full length plays, musicals, and composer/lyricists submissions, click HERE.

Play Submission Form

Musical Submission Form

Composer/Lyricist Cabaret Submission Form

For guidelines for 24-Hour Theatre Project submissions, click HERE

24-Hour Director Submission Form

24-Hour Playwright Submission Form

Selections for the 28^th Annual Richard P. Stahl Festival of New American Theatre will likely be made in Fall of 2025.

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• @audreycefaly | Linktree

• Visit my website for more about me and the work I do!

• Purchase my plays from Concord Theatricals.

• Follow me on Facebook.

• Follow me on Twitter.

• Follow me on Insta.

Audrey Cefaly (she/her)

Playwright. Southern Intimist. Tender-hearted troublemaker.

​Audrey Cefaly is an Alabama-born playwright whose work explores the quiet, aching corners of the human experience. Known for her lyrical language, emotional intimacy, and deep empathy for outsiders, Cefaly’s plays center on characters who are scarred, stubborn, and still reaching for connection. Read: The Poetic Architecture of Audrey Cefaly’s Plays

​Her critically acclaimed play Alabaster was developed through the National New Play Network and received the largest NNPN Rolling World Premiere in history. Other works include The Gulf (Lambda Literary Award winner), Maytag Virgin, The Last Wide Open, and Love is a Blue Tick Hound. Her plays have been produced at Signature Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Florida Repertory Theatre, Florida Studio Theatre, The Fountain Theatre, Merrimack Repertory Theatre, About Face Theatre, American Blues Theater, New Conservatory Theatre Center, Penobscot Theatre Company, and countless others.

Cefaly’s work is published by Concord Theatricals, TRW Plays, and Applause Books.

Her style is often described as Southern Gothic, but she prefers “Southern Intimist”—a term that better captures her commitment to poetic realism, emotional weather, and the sacredness of small stories. Her characters don’t just survive; they stay, they fight, and sometimes, they get free. Read: Walking with Tennessee Williams

She is a recipient of the David Calicchio Emerging American Playwright Prize, an Edgerton New American Play Award, the Lammy Award for LGBTQ Drama and the NNPN Goldman Prize. Audrey is also the creator of a growing collection of handmade stickers and strange love letters to the writing life via her Substack, How to Playwright.

She currently resides in Baltimore with her rescue dog Rosa and her husband Tim (also a rescue).

FULL-LENGTH PLAY SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

SUBMISSIONS ARE NOW EXTENDED TIL AUGUST 1!!!!
Please review all the guidelines below

AN IMPORTANT NOTE: SUBMISSIONS ARE OPEN TO ARTISTS OF ALL BACKGROUNDS, DENOMINATIONS, FAITHS, CREEDS, RELIGIONS, and other IDEALS. We believe that Jewish identity and culture are specific manifestations of universal human cravings for spiritual, ethical, moral and worldly joy. “Matrilineal descent” is neither important nor necessary.

SUBMISSION DEADLINE: The Jewish Plays Project now accepts scripts for new Jewish plays on an open, rolling basis. However, our reading period for the current cycle closes July 15th, 2025. Plays submitted after this date will be held for the next cycle.

SUBMISSION PROCESS: Fill out the Submission Form and attach a play to the form as a PDF. You must submit your play with your name and other identifying information removed (we review all plays blind). We do not charge a fee to submit (cause we kinda think submission fees are “yucky”. That’s a technical term).

CONTACT OUR STAFF WITH ANY QUESTIONS

SPECIAL NOTE: THE JPP HAS MOVED ITS SUBMISSIONS TO THE SUBMITTABLE PLATFORM. WATCH THIS VIDEO FOR MORE INFORMATION AND INSTRUCTIONS

Humor in Dark Times: A Jewish Tradition

Let’s face it – things are tough right now. Look locally, look globally, look left, look right, there are concerning things in all corners. That’s dark.

Sadly, its not the first time that Jews have been through times like these. To be honest, its not the first time humanity has been through times like these. And that’s when Jews look for a good joke.

For generations, Jews have used humor to take the edge of the darkness. And we at the JPP could use a good laugh. We’re always looking for comedies, but this year, we are going to go past that. We’re putting them at the top of the heap.

COMEDY IS NOT THE ONLY OPTION. We will still remain dedicated to a range of styles and contents and forms; we still will embrace challenging and dramatic subjects that are a hallmark of great playwriting – but we’re actively interested in the funny. And we know you can deliver.

ELIGIBILITY

The following must be true of a submitted play or musical:

1. It contains significant Jewish themes, characters, content, or points of view.

2. It is in English, or primarily in English—we love plays that play with language as a theatrical tool, and plays that explore the differences in language. It just needs to be primarily accessible to an English speaking audience. (We welcome translations.)

3. It is full length, meaning over around 75 minutes in length. (For a guide, that usually means 60 pages or more. We DO NOT review 10 or 20 minute plays.)

4. It has not had a full production in the NY Metro region or a major regional theater (LORT C or above).

5. It has never been published in any form.

   NOTE: We are most interested in submissions that embrace and depend on Jewish identity at their dramatic core, while avoiding stereotypical forms that rely on cultural or ethnic shorthands in lieu of dramatic development. This holds true whether dealing with the historical gravity of the Holocaust or employing stereotypical tropes for comic effect.

CONTACT OUR STAFF WITH ANY QUESTIONS

Submit: https://jewishplaysproject.org/artists/guide/

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PREVIOUS ARTICLES BY AUDREY CEFALY

LEAN MORE ABOUT AUDREY

• @audreycefaly | Linktree

• Visit my website for more about me and the work I do!

• Purchase my plays from Concord Theatricals.

• Follow me on Facebook.

• Follow me on Twitter.

• Follow me on Insta.

Audrey Cefaly (she/her)

Playwright. Southern Intimist. Tender-hearted troublemaker.

​Audrey Cefaly is an Alabama-born playwright whose work explores the quiet, aching corners of the human experience. Known for her lyrical language, emotional intimacy, and deep empathy for outsiders, Cefaly’s plays center on characters who are scarred, stubborn, and still reaching for connection. Read: The Poetic Architecture of Audrey Cefaly’s Plays

​Her critically acclaimed play Alabaster was developed through the National New Play Network and received the largest NNPN Rolling World Premiere in history. Other works include The Gulf (Lambda Literary Award winner), Maytag Virgin, The Last Wide Open, and Love is a Blue Tick Hound. Her plays have been produced at Signature Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Florida Repertory Theatre, Florida Studio Theatre, The Fountain Theatre, Merrimack Repertory Theatre, About Face Theatre, American Blues Theater, New Conservatory Theatre Center, Penobscot Theatre Company, and countless others.

Cefaly’s work is published by Concord Theatricals, TRW Plays, and Applause Books.

Her style is often described as Southern Gothic, but she prefers “Southern Intimist”—a term that better captures her commitment to poetic realism, emotional weather, and the sacredness of small stories. Her characters don’t just survive; they stay, they fight, and sometimes, they get free. Read: Walking with Tennessee Williams

She is a recipient of the David Calicchio Emerging American Playwright Prize, an Edgerton New American Play Award, the Lammy Award for LGBTQ Drama and the NNPN Goldman Prize. Audrey is also the creator of a growing collection of handmade stickers and strange love letters to the writing life via her Substack, How to Playwright.

She currently resides in Baltimore with her rescue dog Rosa and her husband Tim (also a rescue).

At New Dramatists, each resident playwright acts as the artistic director of their own seven-year new play laboratory, utilizing a menu of programming resources to pursue their artistic, process and development goals. Their Lab work is housed in a mindfully cultivated environment, free from financial and critical pressures, with guidance and support from a dedicated staff who encourage expansive, creative, and strategic thinking. Writers map their own journeys with complete creative authority.

APPLICATION WINDOW OPENS JULY 21, 2025

The button to “Begin Application” will be posted on here at 10am EDT on Monday, July 21, 2025: https://newdramatists.org/admissions

ABOUT

What is New Dramatists?

New Dramatists pursues a singular mission: To provide playwrights with time, space, and resources in the company of gifted peers to create work, realize their artistic potential, and make lasting contributions to the theatre. We offer our playwrights an artistic home and self-guided laboratory for seven years, free of charge. Our playwright company consists of early and mid-career writers collectively embodying an artistic, cultural, ethnic, and geographic diversity rarely found in the American theatre.

Who is New Dramatists for?

Any playwright who is writing for the live theatre, who can submit two full-length plays, and for whom the resources of time, space and the company of other playwrights is essential and instrumental to their writing and art-making practice.

What do we offer?

• A self-guided seven-year artistic residency, where playwrights are the host artists.

• A community of fellow playwrights and a vibrant extended artistic network.

• Access to resources supporting creative exploration, project development, and new work processes.

• Opportunities to gather as a cohort, including semi-annual All-Writers’ Meetings.

• Annual check-ins with artistic staff to discuss your artistic journey and residency goals.

• Flexible, playwright-driven artistic development opportunities through The Playwrights’ Laboratory (virtual and in-person), including readings, workshops, and retreats.

• Financial compensation for playwrights and collaborators as temporary part-time employees during creative working sessions in the Playwrights’ Lab.

• Assistance with casting, directors, and other collaborators.

• Access to writing, meeting, and workshop spaces. (Current residency location: Houghton Hall Arts Community, E. 30th Street.)

• Ad hoc advocacy for your plays and broader field advocacy for new play and playwright development.

• Inclusion of your work in the Michaela O’Harra Manuscript Library.

• A personalized profile page on the New Dramatists website.

• In the Works Bulletin — a September-to-June emailed newsletter.

• ETC — a monthly email of opportunities for playwrights.

• Notifications about and nominations for external grants and award opportunities.

• As available via funding sources, when developing work through New Dramatists:

  • Additional financial compensation for childcare and/or substitute teaching expenses for playwrights.

  • Travel expense reimbursement (in full or in part) for national playwrights.

  • Additional childcare compensation for collaborators participating in working sessions.
    (Currently supported by the Howard Gilman Foundation, The Lilly-Ruhl Fund, and Shelby Jiggetts-Tivony.)

• As available, partial or full reimbursement of NYC housing expenses for national residents traveling for ND-related projects or events.

• All services provided free of charge.

ELIGIBILITY

Any playwright who is a U.S. citizen or who resides in and has the legal right to work in the United States may apply for the 7-year residency at New Dramatists as long as they can meet the submission requirements of 2 full-length plays and a biography or resume.

Residency Requirements

All resident playwrights are required to show documents for I-9 form verification; these documents will be reviewed (as necessary) throughout a writer’s seven-year residency.

Please note New Dramatists is not in the position to be a visa sponsor.

Playwrights outside the tri-state area must have the availability to spend time in New York City and utilize New Dramatists’ services, and the readiness to participate both in-person and virtually in our dynamic artistic community.

Please note New Dramatists' ability to provide reimbursement for travel and/or housing is dependent on the status of dedicated funding. Staff work with each resident to customize residencies that meet individual goals, and we will discuss current available travel and housing resources as part of that process.

ADMISSIONS TOWN HALL

View the information session held on Thursday, July 10, 2025 with New Dramatists staff members Emily Morse, Connie Hall, and John Steber; intern Erica Pajonas; and recent alum Kara Lee Corthron who has served on the admissions committee.

HOW TO SUBMIT

It is in your best interest to gather the documents required to upload to the application—two "blind" scripts and your bio/resume—early in the window, and submit your application in one session. You may be able to pause and return to your application as long as you continue working in the same browser, but this is not our recommendation. Once you complete the final step to “Submit Your Application”, you will no longer have access to your application.

APPLICATION WINDOW OPENS JULY 21, 2025

The button to “Begin Application” will be posted on here at 10am EDT on Monday, July 21, 2025: https://newdramatists.org/admissions

The application window closes automatically at 11:59pm EDT on Monday, August 4, 2025. Sessions will time out at this point and NO ADDITIONAL APPLICATIONS, including those in progress, will be accepted after the window closes. PLEASE DO NOT WAIT TO SUBMIT YOUR MATERIALS UNTIL THE LAST DAY.

Please email our Literary Services Manager Connie Hall admissions@newdramatists.org with any questions.

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Audrey Cefaly (she/her)

Playwright. Southern Intimist. Tender-hearted troublemaker.

​Audrey Cefaly is an Alabama-born playwright whose work explores the quiet, aching corners of the human experience. Known for her lyrical language, emotional intimacy, and deep empathy for outsiders, Cefaly’s plays center on characters who are scarred, stubborn, and still reaching for connection. Read: The Poetic Architecture of Audrey Cefaly’s Plays

​Her critically acclaimed play Alabaster was developed through the National New Play Network and received the largest NNPN Rolling World Premiere in history. Other works include The Gulf (Lambda Literary Award winner), Maytag Virgin, The Last Wide Open, and Love is a Blue Tick Hound. Her plays have been produced at Signature Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Florida Repertory Theatre, Florida Studio Theatre, The Fountain Theatre, Merrimack Repertory Theatre, About Face Theatre, American Blues Theater, New Conservatory Theatre Center, Penobscot Theatre Company, and countless others.

Cefaly’s work is published by Concord Theatricals, TRW Plays, and Applause Books.

Her style is often described as Southern Gothic, but she prefers “Southern Intimist”—a term that better captures her commitment to poetic realism, emotional weather, and the sacredness of small stories. Her characters don’t just survive; they stay, they fight, and sometimes, they get free. Read: Walking with Tennessee Williams

She is a recipient of the David Calicchio Emerging American Playwright Prize, an Edgerton New American Play Award, the Lammy Award for LGBTQ Drama and the NNPN Goldman Prize. Audrey is also the creator of a growing collection of handmade stickers and strange love letters to the writing life via her Substack, How to Playwright.

She currently resides in Baltimore with her rescue dog Rosa and her husband Tim (also a rescue).