Parity Productions Announces Amanda L. Andrei and Jonathan Alexandratos as Winners of 2020 Annual Parity Commission

Theatre production company Parity Productions, the only New York Theatre Company that ensures they fill at least 50% of the creative roles on their productions-playwright, directors, and designers-with women and trans and gender nonconforming (TGNC) artists and offers free advocacy programs to encourage the rest of the theatre industry to do the same, has awarded two commissions to Jonathan Alexandratos for Turning Krasniqi and Amanda L. Andrei for Black Sky. The ceremony took place on Wednesday, October 7th over Zoom.

The awards were presented by last year's Parity Commission-winning playwrights, Shualee Cook and Gina Femia.

Each year, Parity awards two commissions, one to a woman (cis or trans) and one to a TGNC playwright who have demonstrated a dedication to the craft of playwriting and a singular talent for storytelling. The selected playwrights receive $2,500 each and extensive developmental support for their play, with an option for Parity to produce their work.

"We are thrilled with two latest additions to our Commission family of plays by women and TGNC playwrights," says Parity Founder and Artistic Director, Ludovica Villar-Hauser.

"We look forward to developing these two extraordinary works that function so beautifully in harmony with our mission. We are also beyond grateful in this year, which is so challenging for so many-in particular the small not-for-profit theatre companies and theatre artists-to award not only our 7th and 8th Parity Commissions, but also to recognize seven Honorable Mentions: Katherine Gwynn for Skin Song, Jessica Kahkoska for In Her Bones, Rachel Linton for Fandom for Robots, Lindsay Partain for Sabrina and the Thunderbird, Deneen Reynolds-Knott for Babes in Ho-lland, Mallory Jane Weiss for Pony Up, and Natalie Zutter for Split Second."

Parity has not yet set an application period for the 2021 Commission, but that information will appear on their website when details are determined.

Those interested can support this year's Commission winners and other Parity artists by purchasing (at buy-now prices) or bidding on Parity Productions' auction items at bit.ly/ParityACCAuction until October 14th at 11:59pm Eastern. All funds raised through Parity's auction support their work with women and TGNC theatre artists.

Jonathan Alexandratos (they/them) is a Non-Binary writer based in New York City. Their stage work is interested in how ancient Queerness lives in the present. This often means exploring pop culture as a cathartic device in modern, Queer relationships. Recently, their solo show, TOYS 101, about the intersection of toys (dolls, action figures) and gender non-conformity, was produced via Zoom by Strange Sun Theatre. Prior to that, Jonathan's play WE SEE WHAT HAPPEN, the story of Jonathan's grandmother's immigration to the U.S. from Greece as told by bootleg action figures, won the Greenhouse Award from Strange Sun Theatre, after being developed in the Ingram New Works Lab at Nashville Repertory Theatre, where Jonathan was a resident, and at Mission to (dit)Mars, where Jonathan was a Playwright-in-Residence. This led to Jonathan winning a Queens Council on the Arts New Works Grant to complete their play WORDS CANNOT DESCRIBE THIS, about their mother's family's journey from Albania and Greece to the United States. Beyond the stage, Jonathan has spoken about toy collecting and gender in many places, including PBS, podcasts like Queersplaining, Is It Transphobic?, and The Deconstruction Workers, and on sites such as Tor.com and Toy Wizards. Jonathan's edited collection of academic toy essays, ARTICULATING THE ACTION FIGURE: Essays on the Toys and Their Messages, was published by McFarland in 2016. They co-run Page 23, the academic literary arm of Denver Pop Culture Con.

With roots in the Philippines and Romania, Amanda L. Andrei (she/her) hails from Virginia/Washington D.C. and currently resides in Los Angeles. Her plays are epic, irreverent, and medicinal. Full-length plays include Lena Passes By (Quarterfinalist 2020 Screencraft Stage Play Competition), Black Sky (Madison New Works Lab; Semifinalist 2019 Screencraft Stage Play Competition; Finalist 2020 New American Voices Festival), Crocodile (The Last Escape), and Every Night I Die (Winner 2010 International Bottle Tree Award). Her work has been developed by Pasadena Playhouse, Playwrights Arena, La MaMa, Artists at Play, Son of Semele, In Full Color, Relative Theatrics, Bucharest Inside the Beltway, La-Ti-Do, and others. She is a member of the Echo Young Playwrights group, The Vagrancy Writers Group, Playground LA's Writers Pool, and Dramatists Guild of America. She is a proud alum of VONA, Atlantic Center for the Arts, and was recently named a Sylvia Clare Brown fellow at Ragdale. She is a teaching artist with Fringe Benefits and producer at Aguas Arts Ink. College of William & Mary (BA), Georgetown University (MA), University of Southern California (MFA). She is thrilled to be working on Black Sky with Parity Productions!