The Playwrights Realm Selects 2015-16 Writing Fellows

The Playwrights Realm has selected four early-career playwrights for its 2015-16 Writing Fellows program: Sam Chanse, Lauren Feldman, Jonathan Payne, and David Zax.

The Writing Fellows program lies at the heart of what The Playwrights Realm does - helping writers write. Each year, four early-career playwrights are selected to join The Playwrights Realm to work on a new play over the course of nine months. Through creative development with The Realm's Artistic Director Katherine Kovner and Associate Producer Kate Pines, each writer brings their play from draft form to production-ready state. With an eye on the creative development of each script and professional development of the writers, The Playwrights Realm customizes the Fellowship based on each individual Fellow and the collective needs of the group. The entire experience is designed to widen each artist's network of resources and gain a stronger foothold in the industry. Additionally, the selected playwrights receive a $3,000 stipend, an internal reading, and the generous use of The Realm's office space for printing, writing, meetings and more.

The Fellowship culminates in a final reading of each playwright's finished work in the INK'D Reading Festival. The writers will work with a designer to help develop the physical world of their script, and see select elements of these designs translated to the stage. All readings in INK'D are open to the public, free-of-charge, and will occur in May of 2016.

"David, Jonathan, Lauren, and Sam are four fiercely talented playwrights," said Artistic Director Katherine Kovner, "They have such different theatrical styles, yet they share an ambition of scope and a rigor of craft that is awe-inspiring. I know they will gain a tremendous amount from one another, as well as from The Realm, and I'm honored to get to spend the next nine months as their colleague."

The 2015-16 Writing Fellows program drew a record-breaking 280 applicants. Applicants' plays are read by a panel of industry professionals from across the country, and further screened by The Realm's artistic staff members, who interview twelve finalists. This year's finalists included: Kevin Artigue, Hilary Bettis, Mary Hamilton, MJ Kaufman, Kait Kerrigan, Jason Pizzarello, Sarah Sander, and Aurin Squire. Finalists are chosen based on their demonstration of intellectual curiosity, commitment to a career as a playwright, and, of course, the promise of their voice and vision.

Since the program's inception in 2009, 11 plays that were developed through The Realm's Writing Fellowship have gone on to (or are scheduled to go on to) full productions at major NYC and regional theaters for a total of 31 productions. Past Writing Fellows include Mia Chung (You For Me For You), J.C. Lee (The Inexplicable Disappearance of Hector Villaraigosa), Bekah Brunstetter (Hey Brother), Christopher Oscar Peña (Icarus Burns), Stefanie Zadravec (The Electric Baby), Amy Herzog (After the Revolution), Joe Tracz (In The Woods Where Wolves Are), Elizabeth Irwin (My Mañana Comes), Sarah Gancher (The Place We Built), and Mfoniso Udofia, whose fellowship play Sojourners will be produced by The Playwrights Realm at The Peter J. Sharp Theater beginning January 21, 2016. A complete list of past Writing Fellows can be found at playwrightsrealm.org.

The Playwrights Realm, helmed by Artistic Director Katherine Kovner and Producing Director Roberta Pereira, is devoted to supporting emerging playwrights along the journey of playwriting, helping them hone their craft, fully realize their vision and build meaningful artistic careers. To serve this mission, The Playwrights Realm has produced one Off-Broadway play each year since its founding in 2007, giving ample time and support to each playwright. Last year, The Realm expanded their season to also include the Alumni Production, dedicated to mounting new works by the growing contingency of Alumni Playwrights who have already been produced by the company. A Delicate Ship, by Anna Ziegler, which ran to great acclaim and sold-out houses, closed earlier this month and was the company's second Alumni Production. Previous productions by The Playwrights Realm include last season's My Mañana Comes, by Elizabeth Irwin, and City Of by Anton Dudley, The Hatmaker's Wife by Lauren Yee (2013), Red-Handed Otter by Ethan Lipton (2012), Crane Story by Jen Silverman (2011), Gonzalo Rodriguez Risco's Dramatis Personae (2010), Christopher Wall's Dreams of the Washer King (2010), Anna Ziegler's Dov and Ali (2009) and Anton Dudley's Substitution (2008). The Playwrights Realm is dedicated to providing comprehensive support to playwrights throughout their creative processes and careers, and supplements its Off-Broadway productions with the Page One Residency, Alumni Playwrights Program, and Writing Fellowship.

BIOGRAPHIES

SAM CHANSE (Play: Delivery) is a writer based in New York. A 2015 Sundance Ucross Playwright Fellow, MacDowell Fellow, and member of the Ma-Yi Writers Lab and Civilians R&D group, her work has also been developed and supported with the Lark, the Yale Institute for Music Theatre, Leviathan Lab, the Claque, Second Generation, and Ensemble Studio Theatre. Her work includes Fruiting Bodies, gilgamesh & the mosquito (with composer Bob Kelly), lobsters live forever (also with Bob Kelly), About That Whole Dying Thing, and Back to the Graveyard. Her first solo play, Lydia's Funeral Video, was published this year by Kaya Press.

LAUREN FELDMAN (Play: Another Kind of Silence) is a playwright (Amanuensis ~ The Egg-Layers ~ A People ~ Fill Our Mouths ~ Grace, or the Art of Climbing), a devised-work collaborator (And If You Lose Your Way, Or A Food Odyssey ~ Lady M ~ The Apocryphal Project), a dramaturg, an adjunct professor of playwriting (Bryn Mawr College), and a creator-performer of theatrical contemporary circus (Tinder & Ash). She has been nominated for the New York Innovative Theatre Award, Barrie and Bernice Stavis Playwright Award, Wendy Wasserstein Prize, Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, ATCA/Steinberg New Play Award, Barrymore Award, Carbonell Award, and the Doric Wilson Independent Playwright Award. A graduate of both the Yale School of Drama and the New England Center for Circus Arts, Lauren is also a New Georges Affiliated Artist and a member-mentor of The Foundry. Hailing from Miami, Florida, she has lived in seven cities and is now in Philadelphia. www.laurenfeldman.com

JONATHAN PAYNE (Play: The Revolving Cycles Truly and Steadily Roll'd) recently received a 2015 Princess Grace Playwriting Fellowship. His previous play, The Briar Patch, received the 2014 Holland New Voices Award from the Great Plains Theatre Conference. His work has been produced and developed at the Tristan Bates Theatre (UK), Ars Nova, New York International Fringe Festival, Horse Trade Theater Group, Fire This Time Festival, The Bushwick Starr, and Theatrikos Theatre Company. He is a proud member of the Ars Nova Play Group, a Dramatist Guild Fellow, and a core cohort of the devised theatre group Impossible Bottle. He is a recipient of the Rosa Parks Award for Borne to the Ocean (2011) and the John Cauble Short Play Award for Slavery (2002) from the Kennedy Center's American College Theatre Festival. He received a BA from the GSA Conservatoire (UK) and an MFA in Playwriting from Tisch School of the Arts.

DAVID ZAX (Play: The Room Where I was Held) spent the first decade of his writing career as a journalist, writing for The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, Slate, and other publications. His writing for the stage and screen has yet to be produced, which makes him inordinately pleased and humbled to join such august company as a Playwrights Realm Writing Fellow. He wrote the first draft of The Room Where I Was Held in NYU's MFA program, where he studied with Janet Neipris and Annie Baker. He also holds an MA from the Columbia Journalism School and a BA from Yale. He was a member of the improv comedy team "The Utilitarians," which performed once. More at: www.davidzax.com, @davidzax.

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