The 24 Hour Plays Nationals Open 2025 Applications and Reveal LA Expansion

The 24 Hour Plays: Nationals return this summer for their 14th year. An annual professional development initiative for early-career theater artists, the 2025 program will take place July 9-13 at Pace University's Lower Manhattan campus, with a cohort production at Classic Stage's Lynn F Angelson Theater. Applications are open through March 14 at https://24hourplays.org/nationals.

Since 2007, The 24 Hour Plays have gathered promising early-career theater artists for a rigorous series of workshops, master classes, panel discussions, career development, community building, and more - culminating in their own production of The 24 Hour Plays. Alumni of the program have been nominated for Oscars (Celine Song, Past Lives), Golden Globes (Justin Kuritzkes, Challengers), Tony Awards (Bekah Brunstetter, The Notebook), and have created work on every major stage in the country including Playwrights Horizons, Roundabout Theater, New York Theatre Workshop, Center Theater Group, The Goodman, The Geffen Theater and many more. The Nationals program in NYC has been produced in generous partnership with Pace University's Sands College of the Performing Arts since 2023.

This year, in a historic first, The 24 Hour Plays Nationals will take place both in New York (July 2025) and Los Angeles (January 2026). A separate application for the Los Angeles-based portion of the program will open this summer and additional information about the program will be announced later.

On both coasts, The 24 Hour Plays Nationals are spearheaded by program directors Jake Beckhard and Serena Berman. "The Nationals program has always been, well, national!" said Beckhard and Berman. "We've served early-career artists from all over the country for nearly two decades by gathering them annually in New York City. With this year's expansion of the program, we're truly living up to our name - it's a joy to have our celebrated professional development initiative closer to home for artists building careers on the West Coast."

In previous years, Nationals have featured workshops, panel discussions, and breakout conversations with Pulitzer Prize-winning playwrights (Annie Baker, Martyna Majok, David Lindsay-Abaire), Broadway directors (Leigh Silverman, Liesl Tommy, Thomas Kail), celebrated stage and screen actors (Jesse Eisenberg, Claire Danes, Aasif Mandvi) and game-changers from across the arts and entertainment industry.

The 24 Hour Plays celebrates the diversity of the theatrical field and seeks to make the application process equitable for every early career artist. Artists of all races, ethnicities, creeds, classes, abilities, genders, identities, affiliations, and orientations are encouraged to apply. Applicants with accessibility concerns about the application or program can reach out to staff at nationals@24hourplays.com so they can make reasonable accommodations.
More information about the program and eligibility requirements can be found at 24hourplays.org/nationals.