Welcome to the Workshop

Welcome! Glad to have you here. This is a fun workshop that intends to give you some ideas, energy, and confidence to write and complete a piece for the stage. We will read from some popular scripts, some local work, talk a whole lot about the craft of playwriting, write, read our own and each others’ pieces aloud, discuss them, and give each other constructive feedback. This is a safe place to be as creative, expressive, politically controversial, and experimental as you wish. Relax, enjoy yourself, and enjoy the process!

Visit Writers&Books virtually here to check out their schedule and other classes.

Our ten-week course will look something like this, though it’s subject to tweaking. Please scroll down or click on the links to the right to experiment with each week's challenges!

1: introductions and the basic tools of playwriting (challenge #1)
2: scene elements: stage, dialogue, and action; workshop your scripts, discussion/feedback. (challenge #2)
3: #2 workshop; elements of conflict (challenge #3)
4: the monologue (challenge #4)
5: creating significant moments: using pauses/beats; readings/disc.
6: rounding out the characters; Time to begin revisions!
7: using stage space (play-ground); revisions aloud and choosing actors
8: symbolism and profundity: making your play mean; rehearsal time
9: Reading, a game or two, rehearsal time for you to work with your actors. For next week, please write a note for your audience about how or why you created the piece.
10: A grand night of staged readings at Writers and Books! Please bring your loved ones and a yummy dish to pass.


Among some of the plays (or parts of plays) we’ll look at:

“Fences,” by August Wilson
“True West,” by Sam Shepard
“Angels in America: Perestroika,” by Tony Kushner
“Mother Hicks,” by Susan Zeder
“Fat Pig,” by Neil LaBute
“When I was a Girl I Used to Scream and Shout,” by Sharman MacDonald
“Art,” by Yasmina Reza
pieces by Ntozake Shange