Experiments in Playwriting Fellowship
La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club is thrilled to announce a new playwriting fellowship. This “Experiments in Playwriting” Fellowship will offer two early career playwrights in the NYC area an artistic home at the legendary La MaMa for the course of one year. The fellowship seeks to encourage playwrights from underproduced communities with an emphasis on members of the LGBTQ+ community, people of color, and people with disabilities. Throughout the course of the fellowship, playwrights will work with playwright and fellowship mentor, Justin Elizabeth Sayre. Fellows will meet with Sayre on a monthly basis to discuss their work and the works of previous La MaMa playwrights such as Maria Irene Fornes, Jackie Curtis, Sam Shepard, Robert Patrick, Adrienne Kennedy, and many more.
La MaMa houses one of the greatest archives of Off- and Off-Off-Broadway theatre in the world, and the fellows will have access to this amazing archive as both inspiration and insight to foster experimentation in their own work. Besides connecting with La MaMa’s past, playwrights will be able to receive complimentary tickets to La MaMa’s current season, allowing them to learn from current La MaMa artists and the work created there. At the end of the fellowship, fellows will present an open reading through the La MaMa Experiments Play Reading Series. Playwrights will be awarded a $1,250 stipend for their time. This fellowship is made possible by the Jerome Foundation.
Eligibility Requirements:
- Must be of the five boroughs of New York City
- Must NOT be enrolled as a student in a degree-granting program
- Must be a generative artist creating and maintaining control over new original work
- Must be an artist early in their career who has been generating and creating this new work as a professional/vocational artist for at least 2 years but less than 10 years
To apply, please send the following to playwrightfellowship@lamama.org by August 15, 2024.
- Letter of Intent (1,500-word maximum)
- What draws you to La MaMa? What would access to the archive provide your work? What are touchstones in your work that connect with La MaMa?
- Ten pages of a script
- Add a brief description of the work, and if not pulling from the first scene, give a proper description of the scene or scenes prior so that the submission can be understood in the context of the larger work. (200-word max)
- Artist resume essay
- A short essay on what you have done, where you come from and what you hope to do. (500-word max)
Applications for this fellowship are now closed as of August 15, 11:59 PM.
Photo by Duane Michals of Ellen Stewart with La MaMa playwrights Sam Shepard, Leonard Melfi, Ruth Yorcke, David Starkweather, Jean Claude van Itallie, Paul Foster, Robert Sealy, Walter Brown, Lanford Wilson, Ross Alexander, and David Slakin. 1964. Courtesy of the La MaMa Archive.