San Francisco Playhouse Commissions 16 New Works

San Francisco Playhouse is currently collaborating with a lineup of 16 established and emerging playwrights to pen new plays. The roster of acclaimed playwrights under commission includes award-winners such as Octavio Solis (Quixote Nuevo, Mother Road), Aaron Loeb (Ideation, First Person Shooter), Ruben Grijalva (Shoot Me When…), Minna Lee (My Home on the Moon – 2024 World Premiere at San Francisco Playhouse), and Candrice Jones (Flex), among others. Recent drafts of Loeb's play The Pitch and Grjialva's play The Justice is Just Asleep will undergo workshops at the Playhouse in early December. 

“We believe that the future of American theatre is strong, and it starts with new works,” said San Francisco Playhouse Artistic Director Bill English. “By committing to these playwrights, we are determined to do our part in ensuring this future.”

Commissioned scripts under development also include Octavio Solis' Father Land, Candrice Jones' The Chicot Bluff Country Club, Geetha Reddy's Me Given You, Brian Copeland's The Sleepover, Lee Cataluna's Sons of Maui, Hend Ayoub's Home?, Tori Keenan-Zelt's The JonBenét Game, Julie Hébert's Entangled, Christian Durso's Glint, Ezra Reaves' The Outsiders, and untitled commissions by Melissa Ross, Theresa Rebeck, Theodore J.H. Hulsker, and Minna Lee.

The Playhouse's celebrated New Works program has birthed new plays from notable playwrights including Lauren Yee, Theresa Rebeck, George Brant, Lauren Gunderson, and Christopher Chen. World premieres produced by the Playhouse have been recognized over the last decade with three prestigious Will Glickman Awards for Best New Bay Area Play (Grijalva's Shoot Me When… in 2022; Yee's In A Word in 2016; Loeb's Ideation in 2014).

“Many of the plays we commissioned before and during the pandemic are now completed and have been pouring into my inbox,” said Associate Artistic Director Marie-Claire Erdynast. “It is thrilling to have so many scripts by such talented writers in development.”

The Playhouse also announced its commitment to resuming the Sandbox Series, its award-winning subscription series of World Premieres for new plays produced on local stages. The company has established a New Works Fund to strengthen its play development arm and plants to relaunch the series in the near future.

“With the establishment of this New Works Fund, we are determined to bring back our beloved Sandbox Series, which has been on hiatus since the pandemic,” said Bill English. “We look forward to relaunching this essential new play incubator in the coming months.”

Established in 2009, the Sandbox Series produced 24 World Premieres over 11 consecutive seasons before it was paused for the COVID-19 pandemic. The last two Sandbox Series productions, Patricia Cotter's The Daughters and Rogelio Martinez's Born in East Berlin, were critical and commercial successes, breaking box office records for the series.

Photo credit: Vita Hewitt

 

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