IAMA Theatre Company’s 7TH ANNUAL NEW WORKS FESTIVAL to Feature 8 New Plays

IAMA Theatre Company will host its 7th Annual New Works Festival this December. Featuring eight new plays presented as staged readings, IAMA’s New Works Festival gives audiences an early look at future hits and allows playwrights to experience public reaction to their work for the first time. Thanks to a generous award from the National Endowment for the Arts, this season’s Festival has been expanded to eight new plays, up from six in previous years. IAMA Theatre Company’s 7th Annual New Works Festival will take place December 5-8 and 12-15, 2024 at Atwater Village Theatre, 3269 Casitas Ave, Los Angeles. Tickets ($18 for each reading, includes fees). 
 
“An important part of IAMA Theatre Company’s mission is to develop new works from the ground up. Our New Works Festival focuses on bold storytelling and compelling narratives that accurately reflect the diverse spectrum of human experience in contemporary America,” said IAMA Theatre Company Artistic Director Stefanie Black. “IAMA values the creation of art and the cultivation of artists that challenge boundaries and take risks. Deliberate care is taken throughout the Festival to create a safe creatively rigorous space for artists to explore, experiment, test, question, and thrive. We are very grateful to our community for helping us cultivate an environment where our artists can play and grow. And, thanks to the generosity of the National Endowment for the Arts, we are able to include two more readings in this year’s Festival, provide additional compensation to the artists, and also offer reduced ticket prices, enabling the public to encounter more new works firsthand.” 
 
Since 2018, IAMA’s New Works Festival has emerged as IAMA’s leading development and community engagement program and provides the opportunity to take the first step in curating new plays of artistic excellence that will be considered for future productions. The Festival invites the local community into the creative process and welcomes social gatherings and discussions following each play presentation, sparking important dialogue, connection, and creative exchange, both on and off the stage. New works developed during the Festival have gone on to full, world premiere productions not only at IAMA, but at theatres across the country.    
 
The 7th Annual New Works Festival will include Grief World written by Hannah Kenah and directed by Hannah Wolf at 8pm on Thursday, December 5, Wad by Keiko Green and directed by Rebecca Wear at 8pm, Friday, December 6, HIT MACHINE (or, TRUE WES) by Jonathan Caren and directed by Jaime Castañeda 8pm, Saturday, December 7, Baruch HaShem by Josh Levine and directed by Stefanie Black* at 8pm, Sunday, December 8, Beautiful Blessed Child by Daria Miyeko Marinelli and directed by Reena Dutt at 8pm, Thursday, December 12, Foursome by Matthew Scott Montgomery* and directed by Tom Detrinis* at 8pm, Friday, December 13, Care Less by Chloé Hung and directed by Lily Tung Crystal at 8pm, Saturday, December 14, and The Playground by KJ Cuitiño Bjorge and directed by Margaux Susi* at 8pm, Sunday, December 15. *Denotes IAMA Theatre Company Ensemble members. 
 
IAMA Theatre Company’s 7th Annual New Works Festival detailed lineup is as follows:  
 

Grief World 

Written by Hannah Kenah 
Directed by Hannah Wolf 
8pm, Thursday, December 5 
 
In this furious satire for these regressive times, a group of men rages at Mother, two teens attempt to heal via equestrian therapy, and Crone & Spinster battle it out on blood-soaked archetypal grounds. 
 
Hannah Kenah (Writer) is a playwright, performer, director, and devised theatre artist. Kenah has been developing original theatrical performance for two decades. For the Rude Mechs, she wrote Field Guide, which premiered at Yale Repertory Theatre; she wrote Now Now Oh Now, which toured nationally; and she performed in the national and international tours of The Method Gun, as well as tours of other Rude Mechs' work. For Salvage Vanguard, she wrote and performed in Guest by Courtesy, which was selected for Fusebox Festival and toured to Brooklyn and Bulgaria. Hannah has performed at Lincoln Center, Humana Festival, Yale Repertory Theatre, Walker Arts Center, and Center Theatre Group/Kirk Douglas Theatre, among others. She has developed and presented work with Sibyl Kempson & New Dramatists, Yale University, PlayMakers at UNC Chapel-Hill, University of British Columbia, Physical Plant, Underbelly, Paper Chairs, Echo Playwrights Lab, and Tofte Lake Center, among others. Her plays have been finalists and semifinalists for the O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, the Relentless Award, The Playwrights Realm, PlayPenn, SPACE on RyderFarm, Bay Area Playwrights Festival, and honorably mentioned on the Kilroy List and for the Relentless Award.  
 
Hannah Wolf (Director) is an LA-based theatre director, and producer originally from Juneau, Alaska. She’s directed and developed work at The Geffen Playhouse, B Street Theater, La Jolla's WOW Festival, The Playwright’s Center, Perseverance Theatre, IAMA Theatre Company, Echo Theater Company, The Fountain Theatre, The Vineyard Theatre, and many others. Recent shows include Indecent by Paula Vogel, Last Summer at Bluefish Cove by Jane Chambers, Fixing King John by Kirk Lynn, Instructions For a Seance by Katie Bender, Airness by Chelsea Marcantel, and Fun Home by Lisa Kron and Jeanine Tesori. Wolf is the senior artistic producer at the Ojai Playwrights Conference and a member of SDC. She’s a National Directors Fellow (the O'Neill, NNPN, SDC, and The Kennedy Center), a Fulbright Research Fellow (Bucharest, Romania), a member of the Lincoln Center Directors Lab, and the Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab, and a member of SDC. 
 

Wad  

Written by Keiko Green 
Directed by Rebecca Wear 
8pm, Friday, December 6 
 
“True-Crime”-obsessed 17-year-old girl Nyce becomes pen pals with 40-year-old Jim, a man on death row. As Jim’s execution date nears, he and Nyce live out alternate realities, fantasize about death and dying, tell a bunch of lies, and eventually get to something close to the truth. 
 
Keiko Green (Writer) is a playwright, screenwriter, and performer based out of Los Angeles and Seattle. Green’s plays include You Are Cordially Invited to the End of the World! (South Coast Rep), Exotic Deadly: Or the MSG Play (The Old Globe, San Francisco Playhouse), Empty Ride (The Old Globe), The Bed Trick (Seattle Shakespeare Company), Hells Canyon (Theater Mu), Sharon (Cygnet Theatre), and Hometown Boy (Actor's Express; Seattle Public Theater). Her plays have been developed by The Kennedy Center, National New Play Network, The Playwrights Realm, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Atlantic Theatre Company, and twice by the O'Neill National Playwrights Conference. She has received the Gregory Award, San Diego Critics Circle Award, and Sound on Stage Award for Outstanding New Play and the 2023 Kilroys Web. Green holds commissions from Manhattan Theatre Club/Sloan Foundation and Seattle Children's Theatre/The Kennedy Center. For television she has been involved in Hulu's “Interior Chinatown” and upcoming Apple TV+ series “Margo’s Got Money Troubles.” As an actor, Green has performed at the Denver Center of Performing Arts, Seattle Repertory Theatre, ACT, NAATCO, and others.  
 
Rebecca Wear (Director) directed world premieres in New York (HERE Arts Center), Atlanta (Actor’s Express), Cincinnati (Know Theatre of Cincinnati), and site-specific locations, West Coast premieres in Los Angeles (Artists at Play), Sacramento (B Street Theatre), and more. She has developed work with Roundabout Theatre, Ojai Playwrights Conference, The Playwrights' Realm, Geffen Playhouse, East West Players, and others. She was a 2023 Pfaelzer Award Finalist (NYSAF), a 2019 National Directing Fellow, HERO Theatre Resident Director, holds a Ph.D. from UC Santa Barbara, and is currently a professor at UC Santa Cruz. 
 

HIT MACHINE (or, TRUE WES)  

Written by Jonathan Caren 
Directed by Jaime Castañeda 
8pm, Saturday, December 7 
 
A “True West” for the 21st century where the Musks and Zuckerbergs have all the power and must contend with those pesky artists and naysayers. Even worse when the irritant is family. Can two music-obsessed brothers Alex and Wesley get beyond their differences to make something epic? This new work with original music by the artist Ben Harper offers an inside look at what it takes to make a hit song from a family that does not pull its punches.  
 
Jonathan Caren’s (Writer) plays include Metanoia (Center Theatre Group’s Writers’ Group),Canyon (IAMA Theatre Company/Latino Theater Co., dir. Whitney White, Center Theatre Group “Block Party” recipient) The Recommendation (Windy City Playhouse, The Flea, The Old Globe, IAMA Theatre Company, Craig Noel Award for Best Production, Jeff Award/Chicago, LA Ovation Award, NAACP nom, MTC 7@7, Roundabout Underground reading series), Need to Know (Rogue Machine), and Four Woke Baes (2019 Edinburgh Fringe, Guardian’s Best of The Fringe). He is a former Dramatist Guild Foundation, MacDowell, and SPACE fellow. His awards include New York Stage & Film, Lecomte De Nouy & Theater Publicus Prize for Dramatic Fiction.  He’s been commissioned by The Geffen Playhouse & The Keen Company amongst others. Caren hosts a monthly cold reading series at Judson Church in New York City which brings actors, writers, and musicians together to share work and a meal in a salon-style setting. In television he has been involved in “We Were the Lucky Ones” (Hulu), “The Corps” (Netflix), The Sinner – season three and four (UCP), “Rise” (NBC), “a million little things” (ABC), “Gypsy” (Netflix).  
 
Jaime Castañeda (Director) has directed Poor Yella Rednecks and Vietgone by Qui Nguyen (A.C.T.), The Luckiest by Melissa Ross, Seize the King by Will Power, At the Old Place by Rachel Bonds, Guards at the Taj by Rajiv Joseph (La Jolla Playhouse), The Canadians by Adam Bock (South Coast Repertory), Black Beans Project by Melinda Lopez and Joel Perez (Huntington Theatre), Chimichangas and Zoloft by Fernanda Coppel (Atlantic Theater Company), The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity by Kristoffer Diaz (Dallas Theater Center), The Royale by Marco Ramirez (American Theater Company), How We Got On by Idris Goodwin (Cleveland Playhouse), Tiger Style! by Mike Lew (O’Neill & La Jolla Playhouse), Welcome to Arroyo’s by Kristoffer Diaz (Old Globe), Red Light Winter by Adam Rapp (Perseverance Theatre). Castañeda has developed new plays with Center Theatre Group, Geffen Playhouse, Arena Stage, Denver Center, Rattlestick and Portland Center Stage, and is a Drama League fellow and Princess Grace Award recipient.   
 

Baruch HaShem  

Written by Joshua Levine 
Directed by Stefanie Black 
8pm, Sunday December 8   
 
A humorous family drama about a modern-day Jewish family in the suburbs of Orlando, Florida and how differing beliefs and trauma bring them together and tear them apart. 
 
Joshua Levine (Writer) is a queer Jewish writer fascinated by stories and characters that explore unconventional relationships and the special – yet sometimes blurry and messy – line that separates family from friendship. In television, he served as executive story editor on Steve Levitan's Hulu comedy “Reboot,” for which he wrote and produced two episodes. Other writing credits include “Ms. Marvel” for Marvel Studios, Peter Tolan's FX series “Belated,” and the Emmy-nominated season two of Hulu's critically acclaimed comedy “PEN15.” His episode for “PEN15” titled “Sleepover” was named one of 30 Best TV Episodes of 2020 by Entertainment Weekly. For feature films, he has written for Paramount Pictures and Broken Road Productions. Levine’s other feature film credits include the animated four-quadrant action-adventure “The Pirate Princess” for Mattel and Curiosity Ink. Levine’s play Homemade received The Kennedy Center's Mark Twain Prize for Comic Playwriting and his play I Love You, I Love You was chosen by Smith & Krause for inclusion in its The Best Ten-Minute Plays 2014.  
 
Stefanie Black (Director) is one of the original founding members and the current artistic director of IAMA Theatre Company. Over the last 10 years, Black has paved the way for over a hundred new plays, both in development and production. She has overseen over 20 world premieres, as well as five West Coast premieres, most notably, the world premiere of Leslye Headland’s Cult of Love, which begins performances on Broadway in November 2024. She has developed and directed plays with IAMA (Brandon Kyle Goodman's The Latrell Show, and Louise Munson's Penelope,) Ammunition Theatre Co., The 24 Hour Plays, Geffen Playhouse, and 54Below. As an actor she is most known for her recurring roles on such shows as “Scandal” (ABC), “Making History” (FOX), “House of Lies” (Showtime), and “How I Met Your Mother” (CBS), and has appeared on “This Is Us” (NBC), “Casual” (Hulu), “American Horry Story: 1984” (FX). She co-wrote the holiday film “Jingle Bell Love,” starring Joey McIntyre, that premieres on The Roku Channel this holiday season. Black is a proud member of SAG/AFTRA, AEA and Film Fatales. 
 

Beautiful Blessed Child  

Written by Daria Miyeko Marinelli 
Directed by Reena Dutt 
8pm, Thursday, December 12 
 
Zen minimalist cowboy Aimiko has never taken a road trip with their mom. Hamstring-slicing housewife Sharon has never seen nor heard of any sort of mother-daughter-child road trip. And so, these brave pioneers take to the road, driving West at 10 miles per hour above the speed limit, with tales of cannibals, crane wives, and samurai children buzzing over the airwaves, offering avenues of survival, all of which are only moderately helpful when Aimiko’s car radiator suddenly goes dead. This is their story. Kind of. And again. And again. 
 
Daria Miyeko Marinelli (Writer) is a Japanese Italian playwright and screenwriter whose work has been performed at Victory Gardens Theater, Ensemble Theatre Company, La Jolla Playhouse’s WOW Festival, Atlantic Theatre Company, The Flea, and HERE Arts Center, among others. Marinelli has developed work with Cirque du Soleil, Roundabout Theatre Company, The Playwrights Realm, Fault Line Theatre, Seven Devils New Play Foundry, SPACE on Ryder Farm, The New Harmony Project, Jackalope Theatre, pseudonym productions, Ensemble Studio Theatre-LA, and The Kennedy Center’s MFA Playwrights Workshop and TYA/USA’s New Visions New Voices at The Kennedy Center. They currently serve on the Board of Directors for The New Harmony Project (Vice-Chair) and Fault Line Theatre. Most recently, Marinelli was accepted to the EST/LA’s Ignite Cohort to develop a verbatim piece on the climate crisis and our future through it (What Happens Next) and their original pilot (We are Your Villain) was a Finalist for The Black List’s NRDC Climate Storytelling Fellowship. 
 
Reena Dutt (Director) is dedicated to new and reimagined texts that catapult polarizing conversations through unexpected stories with the bodies, voices and life experiences of the underheard. She recently opened Galileo’s Daughter by Jessica Dickey in the Berkshires at WAM transferring to Boston’s Central Square Theater. Her Broadway debut was assistant directing on The Collaboration starring Paul Bettany and Jeremy Pope. Upcoming collaborations include The Magician’s Sister (Kayenta Arts) and The Yoga Play (CSULB). In New York Dutt has worked with Columbia University, The Playwrights Realm, A.R.T. and on the West Coast Chalk Rep, CalArts, Artists At Play, UC Riverside, Artists Repertory Theatre, Coeurage Ensemble, UC Riverside, Greenway Court Theatre, East West Players, Sacred Fools. She has served as an assistant/associate director in works at Manhattan Theatre Club (Broadway), NYTW (Off-Broadway), The Public (Off-Broadway), and Geffen Playhouse. The Drama League NY Directing Fellow, LCT Directors Lab, and Directors Lab West fellow is also a film director and producer having screened films at over 80 festivals worldwide including Sundance, LAFF, Outfest, Frameline, Cucalorous, NBCUniversal, BET, PBS/Latino and HBO.  
 

Foursome 

Written by Matthew Scott Montgomery  
Directed by Tom Detrinis 
8pm, Friday, December 13 
 
Best friends and two couples Noah, Felix, Tahj, and Kobe blur the lines between sex, friendship, and romance on a fateful New Year's Eve in this very-modern romantic comedy about queer love, chosen family, growing up and navigating the last year of their twenties. 
 
Matthew Scott Montgomery (Writer) is an award-winning stage and screen actor and writer living in West Hollywood. Montgomery’s theatre credits include Stage Kiss at Geffen Playhouse, Del Shores’ YELLOW (Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award recipient for Best Actor) at The Coast Playhouse, multiple jukebox musicals at The Bourbon Room and Rockwell Table & Stage such as I Know What You Did Last Summer: The Musical, A Walk to Remember: The Musical, The OC Musical, BROLESQUE, and CLUE: The Musical. Most recently he has been on the UCB Stage in ASSSSKETCH and Starpunch. He has also written and starred in the play Dead Boys (West Hollywood One City One Pride Excellence in LGBT Theatre winner) at The Blank Theatre and Celebration Theatre and Montgomery can be seen on big and small screens in Del Shores’ “Southern Baptist Sissies” opposite Leslie Jordan, “Jane the Virgin,” “White Famous,” “Sonny With a Chance,” “So Random!,” “Shake it Up!,” “Austin & Ally,” “SMOSH,” “Unidentified with Demi Lovato" and in the TikTok viral series “The Real Real Friends of WeHo.” This year, his short film "Don't Turn Off the Ghost Light" has won multiple awards in the festival circuit, which marked a reuniting of he and his Disney Channel co-star Allisyn Snyder (“Sonny With a Chance”). The two co-directed with Montgomery writing and starring. His first feature, “Howdy, Neighbor!,” is in post-production, directed by Snyder and stars himself, Debby Ryan, and Alyson Stoner. 
 
Tom Detrinis (Director) has directed Happy Birthday Doug by Drew Droege (Off-Broadway), Psycho Beach Party (LA), The Past, A Present Yet To Come by Matt Schatz (InHouse Theatre LA), Ravenswood Manor by Justin Sayre (Celebration Theatre), Pancakes From the Edge by Sam Pancake (LA/Palm Springs), Samboyant by Sam Pancake (LA), No But I'm Definitely... by Michael Feldman (LA/NY), Total Trash Live by Pete Zias (LA). As a theatre performer has performed in Lottie Plachett Took a Hachett (LGBT Center/Ed Fringe Assembly), The 39 Steps (Drury Lane Theatre), Found (IAMA Theatre Company), I HATE NEW YORK (IAMA Theatre Company/Ed Fringe - Assembly), Die, Mommie, Die! (Center Theatre Group/Celebration), The Santaland Diaries (Virginia Stage Company), 30 Minute Musicals (16+ titles), Bright Colors and Bold Patterns (Off Broadway). Detrinis’ television and film credits include “Grey's Anatomy,” “That 90's Show,” “Rutherford Falls,” “90210,” “Community,” “Squirrel” (NHFF Best Narrative Feature), “Pretty Problems” (SXSW - Audience Award), “12 Hour Shift,” “Wedding Dance,” and “Adjust-a-Dream” Online he can be seen in “Finding the Asshole” series (co-creator/producer/actor - Official Selection of Slamdance 2019), “Edgar Allen Poe's Murder Mystery Party,” “Fig,” and “Ford, Headless.”  
 

Care Less  

Written by Chloé Hung 
Directed by Lily Tung Crystal 
8pm, Saturday, December 14 
 
Has one ever felt like no matter what they did, they’d never meet their parents’ expectations? Meet Dad. He's enlisted the help of The Scientist to create the perfect AI daughter, Claudia. But with each iteration of Claudia, he finds fault. Little does he know that he is the subject in the experiment. Viewer discretion is advised as seeing this play may make one want to call their parents... or block their number. 
 
Chloé Hung (Writer) is a writer and director. Her plays include Three Women of Swatow (Tarragon Theatre, Dora Award nominee for Outstanding New Play; Centaur Theatre), Issei He Say (New Jersey Rep), All Our Yesterdays (Toronto Fringe Fest’s Patron’s Pick, Next Stage Theatre Fest). She has workshopped plays with Geffen Theatre, Great Plains Theatre Commons, Stratford Festival’s Playwrights Retreat, Banff Playwrights Lab, Factory Theatre, Tarragon Theatre, and The Kennedy Center. Hung is a Playwrights’ Center Core Writer and holds the Rhimes Unsung Voices commission from IAMA Theatre Company. In TV and film, she has written for “Queen Sugar,” “Cherish the Day,” “The Watchful Eye,” and developed for Netflix. She is a Film Independent Screenwriting Lab fellow. Her short films include “Signal” (Women in Film’s Production program), and “Gem & Shaz” (Bell Media/Crave).  
 
Lily Tung Crystal (Director) (she/her) is a director, actor/singer, and the artistic director of East West Players in Los Angeles. She is also the former artistic director of Theater Mu in Minneapolis-St. Paul and co-founder of Ferocious Lotus Theatre Company in the San Francisco Bay Area. As a director, her recent productions include the world premiere of Jessica Huang and Jacinth Greywoode’s new musical Blended 和 (Harmony): The Kim Loo Sisters (Mu/History Theatre); the world premiere of Saymoukda Duangphouxay Vongsay’s The Kung Fu Zombies Saga (Mu); Lauren Yee’s Cambodian Rock Band (Mu/Jungle Theater); Susan Soon He Stanton’s Today Is My Birthday (Mu); and Steven Karam’s The Humans (Park Square Theatre), which won the Twin Cities Theater Bloggers’ Favorite Play 2022. She also helmed David Henry Hwang’s Chinglish and Flower Drum Song (Palo Alto Players), and the world premiere of Leah Nanako Winkler’s Two Mile Hollow (Ferocious Lotus), all for which she was named a Theatre Bay Area Award Finalist for Outstanding Direction. As an actor/singer, Crystal has performed at theaters across the country, including Cal Shakes, Jungle Theater, Magic Theatre, Mixed Blood, New World Stages, Playwrights’ Center, Portland Center Stage, San Francisco Playhouse, Syracuse Stage, and Theater Mu.  
 

The Playground  

Written by KJ Cuitiño Bjorge 
Directed by Margaux Susi 
8pm, Sunday, December 15 
 
In this dark comedy, eight wealthy moms gather at a Los Angeles home to serve as proxies for their six-and-seven-year-olds’ private school student council meeting, which turns undeniably bleak encompassing chaos, despair, and a couple of minutes of hell. 
 
KJ Cuitiño Bjorge (Writer) reads, writes, and swims a lot. She lives in Los Angeles, by way of Chicago, which she considers home. 
 
Margaux Susi (Director) is a Cuban-Jewish director and actor from Miami, Florida. Her films have played Sundance, Tribeca, Palm Springs Shortsfest, Austin Film Festival, and more. As an English Dubbing director she’s directed series for Netflix & Disney+ and was a finalist for the 2024 Shondaland/Seriesfest Women’s Directing Mentorship. As an actor, Susi was just seen in IAMA’s 24/25 season opener The Very Best People by John Lavelle. Other acting credits include “Clock” (Hulu), “Better Things” (FX), “Dear White People” (Netflix), “Central Park” (Apple TV+), and “Olaf's Frozen Adventure” (Disney+). Susi is the associate artistic director of IAMA Theatre Company in Los Angeles where she currently resides.  

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