Playwright Jacqueline Goldfinger Launches New Book For Theater Artists With Free Workshop

Award-winning playwright Jacqueline Goldfinger's new book, Playwriting with Purpose, will be published by Routledge in August 2021.

To celebrate the launch of her new book, she is offering her popular workshop "Networking and Marketing for Playwrights" online for free once a month through the summer. Seating is limited and reservations are required (https://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/5118734).

Playwriting with Purpose provides a holistic approach to playwriting. This book incorporates craft lessons by contemporary playwrights, offers active writing prompts, and provides concrete guidance for playwrights. The author takes readers through the entire creative process, from creating characters and writing dialog and silent moments to analysing elements of well-made plays and creating an atmospheric environment. Each chapter is followed by writing prompts and pro-tips that address unique facets of the conversation about the art and craft of playwriting. The book also includes information on the business of playwriting and a recommended reading list of published classic and contemporary plays, providing all the tools to successfully transform an idea into a script, and a script into a performance.

Playwriting with Purpose gives writers and students of Playwriting hands-on lessons, artistic concepts, and business savvy to succeed in today's theatre industry. Chapter topics include Creating Compelling Characters, Writing Electric Dialogue and Silent Moments, Scene Structure, Thoughts on Aristotle's Poetics, The Revision Process, and The Business of Playwriting.

Goldfinger is currently working on a new book for Routledge titled Writing Adaptations and Translations for the Stage with Broadway dramaturg and translator Allison Horsley. It will be released in 2022-23 by Routledge.

You can see Goldfinger's work on-stage in the 2021-22 season. Her adaptation of Madeline L'Engle's A Wind in the Door will be produced at The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington DC and her original play Babel will be produced at the Contemporary American Theatre Festival. Babel is currently nominated for a 2021 LAMBDA Literary Award for Drama.

Jacqueline Goldfinger (she/they) is an award-winning playwright, dramaturg, and librettist who seeks out unique collaborations, working across disciplines to create singular works of theatre and opera around the world. Her awards include the Yale Prize, Opera America Discovery Grant, Smith Prize, Sloan Grant, Independence Foundation Fellowship in the Arts, Tennessee Williams Fellowship, and Generations Award. She teaches workshops and seminars at college and university theatre programs across the U.S. including at University of California, Davis & San Diego, University of Pennsylvania, and Temple University. Her agent is Susan Gurman at The Gurman Agency. For more information, visit www.jacquelinegoldfinger.com.

Allison Horsley (she/they) is a writer, story consultant, translator, and dramaturg based in New Zealand and the United States. In over twenty years of working in American professional theatre, Allison has dramaturged new plays, musicals, and classics for Denver Center Theatre Company, O'Neill National Music Theater Conference, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Bay Area Playwrights Festival, La Jolla Playhouse, Dallas Theater Center, and Baltimore's Center Stage, among others. In New Zealand, she has worked as Literary Manager of The Court Theatre in Christchurch and served as Script Advisor for Playmarket, the NZ national playwrights' agency and publisher. She was the original dramaturg for the award-winning musical Jersey Boys, providing extensive developmental and research support for the Broadway, West End, and resident Las Vegas productions, as well as training national touring companies. She has contributed to the development of numerous other new musicals and operas for Broadway and commercial productions around the world, including Doctor Zhivago, Dracula, Chaplin, Amazing Grace, I Dream, and State Highway 48. Her tailor-made literal translations of Chekhov's major plays from Russian have been adapted by Libby Appel for professional and university productions across the United States. Her translation of Seagull served as the basis for Stephen Karam and Michael Mayer's acclaimed 2018 film adaptation starring Annette Bening. Allison's translation also served as the basis for Karam's Broadway production of The Cherry Orchard, starring Diane Lane and Joel Grey. She holds an MFA from Yale School of Drama and a BA in Russian and Theatre from University of Denver, where she earned tenure.

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