Welcome to Playwrights Theatre!

NEW PLAY DEVELOPMENT

Life After Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey

Plays that have their roots in the Playwrights Theatre new play development process and have gone on to other venues, successful productions and to win awards.

These are just a few of our success stories...

Radium Girls by Dolores Whiskeyman, premiere production Spring 2000

Hailed by the Star Ledger as the "Best play produced in New Jersey professional theatre" for the 1999-2000 season
Finalist, 1999 Eugene O'Neill National Playwrights Conference
Finalist, 1999 New Harmony Project

Miss Evers’ Boys by David Feldshuh (workshopped in the summer of 1989 as part of the New American Play Award of the Dodge Theatre Program, administered by Playwrights Theatre)

This play went on to be one of the most widely produced plays in the country and then an HBO special that won a 1997 Emmy award for best television movie.

Sister Calling My Name by Buzz McLaughlin, premiere production Spring 1996

Winner National Play Award from the National Repertory Foundation

Performance scheduled this fall in Hollywood with a star cast

New American Play Festival, Charlotte Repertory Theatre (North Carolina), February, 1997

I See My Bones by Kitty Chen, premiere production fall 1995

Reading at Playwrights Preview Productions in NYC
Production by Urban Stages toured New York libraries (both directed by John Pietrowski)
Showcase production at Playwrights Preview Productions, NYC

Rowing to America: The Immigrant Project by nine different playwrights, premiere production spring 1997

Published by Dramatists Play Service, Fall 1998

Eating Chicken Feet by Kitty Chen, staged reading January 1993

Produced in New York fall 1993 co-sponsored by Pan Asian Rep and the Women’s Project. Fall 1997 at the Kuma Kahua Theatre in Honolulu.

DaDa by Haris Orkin, premeire production November 1992

Selected as the lead-off play for the Barbra Streisand Festival of New Jewish Plays at the La Jolla Playhouse in California May 1997
PTNJ production (same director and cast) presented at American Stage in Teaneck, October 1993.

An Asian Jockey in Our Midst by Carter Lewis, concert reading fall 1995

Won the Rosenthal Prize for new plays from the Cincinnati Playhouse where is was produced in January 1996.
Subsequent productions: Roundhouse Theatre, Washington, D.C. and GeVa Theatre in Rochester, NY.

Genesis, adapted by Max McLean and Buzz McLaughlin under the direction of Playwrights Theatre Artistic Director John Pietrowski, performed spring 1995

PTNJ production presented as part of the "Fringe Festival" in Edinborough Scotland and at The Lambs Theatre in New York City spring 1997

Coming of the Hurricane by Keith Glover, concert reading November 1993

Production Denver Theatre Center, January, 1995
Arena Stage in Washington, D.C.
Opened the 1996 season at Crossroads Theatre in New Brunswick.

Thunder Knocking on the Door by Keith Glover, concert reading August 1995

Produced the fall of 1996 at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival
Productions at Baltimore Center Stage, Dallas Theatre Center, Yale Rep, and San Jose Rep.

The Secret Wife by Y York, concert reading October 1995

Production at Arena Stage, Play Quest Series February 1996
A finalist for the New Harmony New Play Festival, Indiana

The Keepers by Barbara Lebow, staged reading May 1993

Production by Jean Cocteau Repertory, NYC, November 1994

The Shannon Doyle Incident by John Morrison, staged reading spring 1993

Won first prize in a contest at Humboldt State University in California for professional writers
Production at Humboldt State University, fall 1993
Premiered at the Samuel Beckett Theatre in New York October 1993.

How His Bride Came to Abraham by Karen Sunde, premiere production spring 2002, staged reading September 1992

Included in the New Plays Festival at Nebraska Repertory Theatre, 1994.

Spine by Bill C. Davis was the first staged reading at Playwrights Theatre, April 1987

Presented at the Cast Theatre in Hollywood, fall 1991
George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick, spring 1993

Come As You Are by N. Richard Nash (author of The Rainmaker), staged reading fall 1989

Produced in New York City
Subsequent productions in Berlin, Munich, and Strasbourg