The Playwrights' Center


The Playwrights' Center is a non-profit theatre organization focused on both supporting playwrights and promoting new plays to production at theaters across the country. Its mission is to champion "playwrights and new plays to build upon a living theater that demands new and innovative work." It is located in the Seward neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota.

History

The Playwrights' Center was founded in 1971 by a group of University of Minnesota undergraduate and graduate students, including Greg Almquist, Erik Brogger, Tom Dunn, Barbara Field, Gar Hildenbrand, and Jon Jackoway. These playwrights conceived of the Playwrights' Center as a place where writers could have the opportunity to hear their work read aloud by professional actors, to hear comments and criticism from peers and audience members, and to develop their scripts with the help of artistic collaborators and working professionals. After becoming a not-for-profit company in 1973, the founders held a series of play readings, discussion series, and one-acts performed at various venues in the Twin Cities. The focus was on a continued playwriting conversation and aiding works-in-progress. These ideals continued to be the mainstay of the center as membership expanded. In 1979, the center moved into the Olivet Lutheran Church in south Minneapolis, which remains its home today.
Since its founding, the Center has grown into a national resource for script development, and currently provides a range of services for writers at all stages of their careers. Jeremy Cohen serves as the producing artistic director, and the center is further supported by a full staff, an eighteen-member board of directors and a national advisory board of theater professionals. Members of the Playwrights' Center include nationally distinguished artists such as August Wilson, Lee Blessing, Ping Chong, Paula Vogel, and Jeffrey Hatcher, Suzan-Lori Parks, Jordan Harrison, Carlyle Brown, Craig Lucas, Melanie Marnich, and Kira Obolensky. The work of Center playwrights has won every major recognition the field offers, including two Pulitzers and the Tony Award, and has been seen nationwide on such stages as Yale Repertory Theatre, Woolly Mammoth, the Guthrie Theater, Goodman Theatre, and many others.
Recent partners have included Tectonic Theater Project, Mixed Blood Theatre, Actors Theatre of Louisville, The Public Theater, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Ten Thousand Things Theater Company, Berkeley Rep, Marin Theatre Company, Seattle Repertory Theatre, and others. The Center also collaborates with local cultural institutions as the Walker Art Center and Minnesota History Center to develop theater that deepens their programming.

Programs

The Ruth Easton Lab

The Ruth Easton New Play Series is a uniquely intimate and accessible way to experience the thrill of raw new work. It gives selected Core Writers 20 hours with collaborators to workshop their script—to write, rewrite, experiment, and shape their work. Each year a handful of plays are selected from the Core Writers for development in The Ruth Easton Series. With funding from the Ruth Easton Lab, the plays receive a director, a designer who works with the playwright on one design element of his or her work, rehearsal time, and, if the playwright chooses, a two public readings of the play which are free for everyone. In the 2014-2015 Ruth Easton Series the names of the plays and playwrights as well as the dates of public readings are:
The Playwrights’ Center invites committed professional playwrights to apply for the Core Writer Program. Created in recognition of the particular needs of emerging and established writers, the program offers significant resources intended to further a playwright's career and is available to writers nationally.
Playwrights who have benefited from the Core Writer program include Christina Anderson, Trista Baldwin, Lee Blessing, Carlyle Brown, Lonnie Carter, Constance Congdon, Marcus Gardley, Jeffrey Hatcher, Sherry Kramer, Carson Kreitzer, Melanie Marnich, Winter Miller, Gregory Moss, Qui Nguyen, Kira Obolensky, and Elaine Romero.
The Core Writer program gives 25-30 of the most exciting playwrights from across the country the time and tools to develop new work for the stage. All Core Writers receive play development workshops at the Center, in collaboration with prominent directors, actors, dramaturgs, and designers. Selected work by Core Writers makes up our formal season of public readings: the PlayLabs Festival and the Ruth Easton New Play Series. Core Writers are also promoted by the Center and provided opportunities through an extensive network of colleges and universities, cultural institutions, and producing theaters.
Each term is three years; Core Writers may re-apply for additional terms.

Core Apprentices

Schools participating in the New Plays on Campus program may nominate students to become Playwrights’ Center Core Apprentices, a unique and high-profile opportunity. In partnership with the , the Core Apprentice program provides student playwrights with such benefits as a year of mentorship with a professional playwright and a full workshop of a new play at the Playwrights’ Center. Five student playwrights are selected each year to be “Core Apprentices”.

PlayLabs

PlayLabs is an annual new play festival that occurs during a two-week span in October and is the largest development event of the Playwrights' Center's season. Each playwright is paired with a director, designer, and cast of actors. The selected plays receive 30 hours of rehearsal and two readings with allocated writing and revision time. All readings are free to the public. The festival extends beyond the readings including a Jerome Fellows showcase, a panel discussion, and a festival celebration. According to The Playwrights' Center 2005 annual report, seventy four percent of Playlabs playwrights go on to receive professional productions or further development opportunities.

Fellowships

Jerome Fellowships

The Many Voices Fellowship was created in 1994 in partnership with the Jerome Foundation in order to create a home for early-career playwrights of color who would provide the American theater scene with diverse voices and aesthetics. Since that time, the Many Voices program has provided 140 fellowships for some 100 emerging playwrights of color, offering class instruction, play development workshops, and mentoring opportunities.
The Playwrights Center offers private membership for an annual fee of $50. Member benefits include:

Workhaus Collective

Workhaus Collective became The Playwrights' Center's company in residence in 2008. Workhaus Collective is a Twins-Cities based organizations of nationally recognized playwrights that produces the work of its members and aims to "communicate directly with audiences with shows that are adventurous and event-driven."

The Unit Collective

The Unit Collective is a community of playwrights in the Twin Cities committed to developing and promoting under-represented new work. The collective holds Minneapolis Madness, a monthly development event, at The Playwrights' Center to test new work. Their mission is to "create Theatre/er that reflects who we are and the world in which we live. Through the quality of the shared experience we make the invisible audience visible."