November Monday Night PlayGround-NY Topic Announcement

“Truth will come to light; murder cannot be hid long.” -Shakespeare

Following the successful opening of its inaugural season, New York playwright incubator PlayGround recently announced the prompt for the November Monday Night PlayGround short play staged reading event. Thirty-six New York City writers had just four-and-a-half days to generate their original scripts inspired by the prompt “WHODUNNIT” as they vie for one of six slots in the second round of this year’s Monday Night PlayGround staged reading series, presented live online via Vimeo Live Stream on November 22nd at 7pm PT. PlayGround’s sister companies, PlayGround (SF) and  PlayGround LA will present their own interpretations of the theme on November 15th and November 8th, respectively. New this year, all PlayGround programs in all three regions are being performed under SAG-AFTRA New Media agreements, providing union wages and protections for all performers. Monday Night PlayGround is admission-free (donations gratefully accepted) and advance reservations are required. For the complete schedule or to reserve tickets, visit https://playground-ny.org/monday/.

In this inaugural season, PlayGround-NY’s Monday Night PlayGround staged reading series will take place on fourth Mondays*, Oct-Mar, and will be held via live simulcast (October 25, 2021-March 28, 2022). Each month, PlayGround announces a topic and writers have just four-and-a-half days to generate their original ten-page script. Recent topics have included: “Rebirth”, “Fearless”, and “Reunification.” The top six scripts are matched with directors and a cast of leading local professionals and rehearsed for just ninety minutes on the day of the performance. Following a brief technical rehearsal to add sound and other design elements, the six short plays are performed as script-in-hand staged readings for a live-stream viewing audience on fourth Mondays, October through March. Audience members can also experience the thrill of being a producer through the monthly People’s Choice Awards, helping to determine which plays and playwrights go on for consideration in PlayGround’s annual short play showcase, Best of PlayGround. Advance reservations are required. Admission is free but donations are gratefully accepted.

** January round is on third Monday instead of fourth.

PlayGround-NY’s inaugural Writers Pool, the thirty-six New York-based writers competitively selected to participate in the 2021-22 season and Monday Night PlayGround monthly series are: Sam Affoumado, Anthony Anello, Maria Arreola, Karina Billini, Lilly Camp, Nelson Diaz-Marcano, Barry Eitel, Jessica Fleitman, Bailey Garcia, Kaela Mei-Shing Garvin, Ruth Geye, Stanley William Hathaway, Libby Heily, David Hilder, Nina Ki, Christian Missonak, Alex Moon, Louis DeVaughn Nelson, Matthew Park, Lila Perlman, Phanesia Pharel, Jacob Marx Rice, Rachael Richman, Natalie Sacks, Fernando Segall, Matthew Stephen Smith, Niara Smith, Cece Suazo, Kate Thomas, Charles Velasquez-Witosky, Leela Velautham, Annie Jin Wang, Catherine Weingarten, Cate Wiley, Maggie Wilson, and Lauren Wimmer.

PlayGround-NY is the second regional expansion of the celebrated Bay Area playwright incubator and theatre community hub, PlayGround(SF). PlayGround, California’s leading playwright incubator, provides unique development opportunities for the Bay Area’s, Los Angeles’ and now New York’s best new playwrights, including the monthly Monday Night PlayGround staged reading series, annual PlayGround Festival of New Works, full-length play commissions and support for the production of new plays by local playwrights through the New Play Production Fund. To date, PlayGround has supported over 250 early career playwrights, developing and staging more than 1,000 of their original short plays through the Monday Night PlayGround staged reading series and the PlayGround Festival. PlayGround has also commissioned 90 new full-length plays by 60 of these writers through its Commissioning Initiative and, through the innovative New Play Production Fund, has directly facilitated the premiere of 34 plays at theatres of every size, including three that have gone on to NYC and other major theater communities. Most recently, PlayGround renovated and relaunched the former Thick House Theater in San Francisco’s Potrero Hill as Potrero Stage, a state-of-the-art center for new plays, home to PlayGround’s expanding artistic programs and some of the Bay Area’s most distinguished new play developers and producers. Over the past twenty-seven years, PlayGround has served to identify some of the most important new local voices for the theatre. PlayGround’s alumni have gone on to win local, national, and international honors for their short and full-length work, including recognition at the Humana Festival, O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, Bay Area Playwrights Festival, The Lark’s Playwrights’ Week, New York International Fringe Festival, and others. PlayGround received the 2009 Paine Knickerbocker Award for outstanding contributions to Bay Area theatre, 3 BATCC Awards for Best Original Script for PlayGround commissions, a 2014 National Theatre Company Grant from the American Theatre Wing (founder of the Tony Awards®), and a 2016 Edgerton Foundation New Play Award.

WHAT: PlayGround presents its November Monday Night PlayGround,
featuring six original short plays inspired by the prompt
“Whodunnit”.

WHERE: Vimeo Live Stream

WHEN:     Monday, November 22, 2021 at 7pm ET

Additional Season Dates:

December 27th, 2021 7pm ET via Vimeo live stream

January 17th, 2022 7pm ET via Vimeo live stream

February 28th, 2022 7pm ET via Vimeo live stream

March 28th, 2022 7pm ET via Vimeo live stream

TICKETS: Admission is free (donations gratefully accepted) but advance reservations are required. For tickets and more information, visit https://playground-ny.org/monday/.