Page 73 Announces Finalists for 2021 Playwriting Fellowship, Awards Each a $1,000 Honorarium

Page 73 has announced Bleu Beckford-Burrell, Marvin González De León, Jessica Huang, April Ranger, and Haygen-Brice Walker as finalists for the Page 73 Playwriting Fellowship. Recognizing the hardships felt across artistic communities amidst a dearth of government support, Page 73 is, for the first time in the award's history, providing an honorarium of $1,000 for all finalists.

Ultimately, the one selected Page 73 Playwriting Fellow will receive artistic and financial resources to develop one or more new plays of their choosing. They will be honored with an unrestricted award of $10,000 and a development budget, managed by Page 73 and the Fellow over the course of the Fellowship year, up to $10,000. This additional budget can be personalized to support the Fellow's proposed project and can include such expenses as research, workshop and reading presentations, and fees for collaborating artists. The Fellow will work with Page 73 on at least one public presentation of their new play, bringing in artistic collaborators such as directors, designers, and actors.

2021 marks the 18th year of Page 73's most prestigious award, annually supporting a playwright who has yet to have a professional premiere in New York City. The 2020 Fellow is Emma Goidel. Previous Fellows include Sanaz Toossi (2019), C.A. Johnson (2018), John J. Caswell, Jr. (2017), Hansol Jung (2016), Nick Gandiello (2015), Clare Barron (2014), Caroline V. McGraw (2013), Max Posner (2012), Janine Nabers (2011), Eliza Clark (2010), Heidi Schreck (2009), Tommy Smith (2008), Krista Knight (2007), Jason Grote (2006), Quiara Alegría Hudes (2005), and Kirsten Greenidge (2004).

Not long after two recent Page 73 productions-Michael R. Jackson's Pulitzer Prize-winning A Strange Loop (co-produced with and presented at Playwrights Horizons) and Zora Howard's STEW-garnered immense critical and audience acclaim, the pandemic struck; continuing on the same course became, for the entire theater world, an impossibility. Staying true to their mission despite disruption, Page 73 has decided to focus on their fundamental aim of supporting groundbreaking playwrights whose voices the New York theater community at large has yet to hear. Through programs including the Fellowship, the Interstate 73 writers group, and its recently announced series of 11-day playwrights residencies, Page 73 aims to help playwrights ready work for a time when audiences return to theaters-and can fully appreciate conversation-stirring theater that reaffirms the vitality of the form that, in this pause, has been so missed. The organization recently launched their Time Capsule, a collective journaling project drawing on the keen observation of playwrights to create a virtual record of experiences from this moment that will be unlocked in five, and again in ten, years.

About the Finalists

Bleu Beckford-Burrell is a first-generation Jamaican-American actor/playwright. Born and raised in New York City, she works for non-profit organizations where she teaches acting to teens, as well as write and direct plays. Her plays include: P.S.365 (2019 O'Neill Finalist) showcased at EST (Youngblood Workshop Series) and The National Black Theatre (Keep the Soul Alive reading series). Lyons Pride (2018 BAPF, Princess Grace Award Finalist, 2019 The Kilroy's Honorable Mention, and Yale Drama Series Runner Up) showcased at Playwrights Realm (Ink'd Festival of New Plays) and EST (Bloodwork Reading Series). La Race (2020 Normal Ave Finalist and O'Neill, BAPF Semi-finalist) up-coming showcases at Faultline Theatre (Irons in the Fire) and Page73 (Virtual Residency). She is The Playwright Realm Fellow (2018), PWC New Voices Fellowship (2018, Finalist), P73 Fellowship (2020, Finalist), NYTW/2050 Fellowship (2019, Finalist) as well as an I73 playwright (2020), Colt Coeur resident (2021), PWC Core Writer (2020, Finalist), WP Lab (2020, Finalist), Working Farm (2019, Semi-finalist), et cet. She received the Playwrights Horizons, Jody Falco & Jeffrey Steinman Commission for Emerging Playwrights (2020) and has been nominated for South Coast Repertory, Elizabeth George Emerging Writer Commission (2021). M.F.A. Rutgers University. BleuBeckford.com

Marvin González De León is a Xicano playwright and educator whose work has been produced and developed at Teatro Bravo, Arizona State University, Teatro del Pueblo, Page 73 Productions, The Playwrights Realm, and the Playwrights' Center. His fellowships at the Playwrights' Center in Minneapolis include: the McKnight Fellowship in Playwriting (2020-2021), the Core Writer Fellowship (2019-2023), and the Jerome Many Voices Fellowship (2018-2019). He is a member of the 2020 Interstate 73 Writers Group at Page 73 Productions and is a 2020-2021 Virtual Realm Mentee with The Playwrights Realm. A section of his playa??Habooba??appears ina??Scenes for Latinx Actors: Voices for the New American Theater,a??and his short plays,a??Prostheses Bounda??anda??Sink.Row.Nice!, are published through Samuel French. González De León teaches part-time at Arizona State University, where he received his MFA in Dramatic Writing in 2017.

Jessica Huang is a playwright based in New York, from Minnesota. She is the inaugural recipient of the 4 Seasons Residency; the 2019 resident playwright at Chance Theater; a 2018 MacDowell Fellow; and a three-time Playwrights' Center Fellow. Her work includesa??The Paper Dreams of Harry China??(2018 Barry and Bernice Stavis Award, 2017 Kilroy's List),a??Mother of Exilesa??(2020 Rosa Parks Playwriting Award, 2020 Paul Stephen Lim Playwriting Award, 2020 Kendeda Prize Finalist),a??Transmissions in Advance of the Second Great Dying, anda??Purple Cloud. She has commissions with Manhattan Theatre Club, TimeLine Theatre Company, Audible, Theater Masters, History Theatre, and Theater Mu. Her work has been seen or read at New York Stage and Film, The New Group, Atlantic Theater Company, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, The Old Globe, Indiana Repertory Theatre, Mixed Blood Theatre, The Consortium of Asian American Theaters and Artists, The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, The Minnesota Museum of American Art, Yellow Earth Theatre and more. She has received awards from the Sloan Foundation, the Jerome Foundation and the Minnesota State Arts Board. Jessica co-founded and co-directs Other Tiger Productions, a theatrical production company with a mission to pursue multidisciplinary collaborations, intentional inclusivity and a re-examination of traditional theater practices. She has been a member of The Civilians R&D Group, Page 73's Interstate 73 and Ars Nova Play Group. She is a graduate of the Playwrights Program at Juilliard.

April Ranger is a poet and playwright from Maine. Her play Bathsheba's Psalms, Or A Woman of Unusual Beauty Taking A Bath (Dir. Christina Roussos) premiered at The Tank in 2019, after workshops with Fault Line Theatre and Pegasus PlayLab. Her plays have been performed at The Public Theatre, Rattlestick Playwright's Theater, The Wild Project and The New Ohio Theatre. She received her MFA in playwriting from Brooklyn College in 2018, where she currently teaches.

Haygen-Brice Walker is a half-Puerto Rican, half-white trash playwright-creative producer raised by professional bodybuilders in a southern swamp and currently dividing his time between Philadelphia, Nashville, and NYC [because throuples are sexy and fun]. In Philadelphia, Haygen-Brice is the Co-Founder of ON THE ROCKS, a production company devoted to the deep-fried, late-night, BYOB theatrical dumpster-fires that Haygen-Brice makes with Director-Producer, Elaina Di Monaco.a?? Haygen-Brice is currently writing a play full of monsters, rim jobs, and interior design as a 2020-2022 Ingram New Works Playwright at Nashville Repertory Theatre and is developing a gay-coming-of-age-nightmare-play about serial killers, corpses, and pornography with Page 73 as a member of the 2020 I73 Writers' Group.a?? Recently, Haygen-Brice was selected a 20/21 Season Playwright at Playwrights Realm where he's a Virtual Mentee.a?? He's also an Affiliated Writer with The Playwrights' Center (2018-2019 Jerome Many Voices Fellow). Haygen-Brice's work is like ifa??Streetcar Named Desire,a??Mean Girls,a??Texas Chainsaw Massacre, anda??Beloveda??got shit-tanked at a Buffalo Wild Wings happy hour (extra bleu cheese please) and then sashayed into the neighborhood bathhouse while belting the soundtrack ofa??In The Heights.a??Each day, Haygen-Brice is one step closer to becoming Jennifer Lopez, which is trite for a gay boricua, but he's embracing the cliché and living in his truth.

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