Announcing the 2017 NJ Young Playwrights Festival plays

We are pleased to announce the plays and playwrights whose work will be presented at the 2017 New Jersey Young Playwrights Festival on June 26 & 27:

High School (grades 10-12)

Hot Dogs and Feminism by Jasmine Sharma, Bergen County Academies

Learn Your ABCs by Elijah Gaines, Lindenwold HS & Jaleel Lindsey

Packing by Michael Villanueva, Middlesex County Acedemy for Performing Arts

Smile by Kianni Keys, Newark Academy

Trust No One by Gabrielle Poisson, Newark Academy

Junior HS (grades 7-9)

Chow Chow by Marra Finkelstein, Eisenhower Middle School (Wyckoff)

Dog Sitters by Lena Shmitt, Frelinghuysen Middle School (Morristown)

"My Extraordinary World" by Charlie McLace by Maya Levenstein, Green Meadow Middle School (Hackettstown)

Elementary (grades 4-6)

Girl World, Boy World by Isabella Cerciello, St. Vincent Martyr School (Madison)

Robot House by Luke Sherman, Torey J. Sabatini School (Madison)

Techno Takeover by Darren Van Pelt, Manasquan Elementary School

Read more about these plays/playwrights on the Writers Theatre blog at https://www.wtnj.org/thirty-fourth-annual-new-jersey-young…/

Nearly there!

Hang in there, young playwrights! We're almost done confirming the last details of the Festival. Once I get final approval, I will be in touch with the playwrights whose scripts have been selected for the Junior HS and Elementary division presentations. We can also confirm the last scheduling details, too. Just a few days more. Thanks for your patience!

Photos from Day 1 - Rehearsals

Yesterday we spent the day reading through all ten plays for the Festival with many of the playwrights present. It was an active day that didn't leave time for many pictures, but here are a few to give a small glimpse into the work that is being done this week:

Back in the Saddle

My desk yesterday as I made final preparations for NJYPF

Preparations are just about done and this Sunday we begin rehearsals for the 32nd annual New Jersey Young Playwrights Festival. This is a program I have run for Playwrights Theatre since I started working there in 2002. For the past two months, I've communicated with the high school playwrights via email and phone, and finally had a chance to meet them in person at the NJ Governor's Awards for Arts Education on Wednesday. These four students have done a remarkable job not just crafting engaging stories, but also a pair of significant revisions using feedback from our contest readers and the festival dramaturgs. The first rewrite was a great way to assess the commitment to the process and willingness of the finalists to make changes to their work. The goal of the second rewrite under the guidance of a dramaturg, is to help jump start the playwrights into the rehearsal process.

The high school playwrights have always been directly involved in rehearsals, but this is only the second year implementing a pre-Festival routine (last year introduced the dramaturgs; this year, the finalist rewrites). A year prior, I noticed that only a handful of playwrights were actively participating in the program. There are a variety of reasons for this, of course, but it seemed that much of it had to do with the playwrights being thrown into rehearsals without any significant orientation. Seeing professionals work on your script can be exciting, but it can also be very intimidating. Hopefully we've alleviated some of that this year. I can't wait to begin working on the scripts tomorrow. What I can wait for is my new role in this year's program.

I've been directing portions of the Festival for many years, but this is the first time that I will perform in them. Festival scripts are often populated by youth, or young adult, characters; however, this year we were surprised that of the 13 total characters in the four high school plays, only five characters were young people. The majority of the actors that I typically hire for young playwrights presentations are in their early to mid-20s, so the challenge became finding the actors needed for the adult characters. We did well, but fell short to the point where a colleague and I will need to step into two roles. That's all well for my colleague who is a professional actor. For me, on the other hand, it is not a typical role. I've performed onstage before, but I haven't since the New Plays for Young Audiences Series in 2007. So, this should be interesting, to say the least!


This post was originally published on our Director of Education's personal website.

Tickets available

If you are interested in attending the 2015 New Jersey Young Playwrights Festival, it is important that you make a reservation for the reading that you wish to attend. While the Festival is free; seating is extremely limited. We are currently working to ensure that all playwrights' families and schools have seats, but also welcome the public to attend each performance.

To make a reservation, you can use the following links for the Elementary & Junior HS readings on June 1 or the High School readings on June 2. You can also call the PTNJ Education office directly at 973-514-1787, ext. 21.

We will provide updates on the Festival and its participants in the days leading up to our first rehearsal on May 31 and throughout the rehearsal and performance process. You can also follow along on Facebook and Twitter using the hashtags #NJYPF2015 and #youngplaywrights.

Announcing the selected playwrights for the 2015 NJYPF

We finally have everything lined up where we can share the complete list of playwrights whose work has been selected for performance in the 2015 New Jersey Young Playwrights Festival (listed in alphabetical order by title):

High School Division
Listen by Jack Kimber, Chatham High School
Pretty Girl by Laura Diorio, Middletown High School South
Thanksgiving Surprise by Betsy Zaubler, Newark Academy
Worn Thin by Gabrielle Poisson,Newark Academy

Junior High School Division
Doppelganger by Paige Warnock, 9th grade, Union County Academy for Performing Arts
Love Bites by Cathryn Mesce, 9th grade, Union County Academy for Performing Arts
The Angel Side by Evelyn Doskoch, Columbia Middle School

Elementary School Division
Sibling Rivalry by Artha Abeysinghe, Torey J. Sabatini ES
Stitches - Dun, Dun, Dun by Josephine Walker, Torey J. Sabatini ES
Storm in a Cup by Francesca Wan, St. Vincent Martyr School

Congratulations to those selected and to those who reached the final round of judging!

The Junior HS and Elementary plays will be read on Monday, June 1 @ 7:00 pm; the High School plays receive a staged-reading on Tuesday, June 2 @ 7:00 pm. Both presentations will be held on the Florham Campus of Fairleigh Dickinson University. For details and reservations, visit the PTNJ website and select the link for the Festival date you wish to attend.

To learn more about the playwrights, please visit the NJYPF website and select the link for playwrights bios. We will also be asking the high school playwrights a series of 5 Questions, which will be posted to the blog in the days leading up to the Festival on June 1 and June 2.