Revolutionary Plays

We've just recently updated the guidelines for the 2014 New Jersey Young Playwrights Festival with information about a new division for this year: Revolutionary Plays!

For the 2014 season of the New Jersey Young Playwrights Festival (NJYPF), Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey (PTNJ) will commemorate the 350th anniversary of the founding of the state of New Jersey with a special submission category called “Revolutionary Plays”. 

The Revolutionary Plays category will be open to NJ students grades 4-12. Script submission and formatting guidelines are the same as the general categories of the NJYPF, with the exception that the subject matter relates to specific people, places, and events from New Jersey’s role in the American Revolution. For the purpose of this project, we will consider the Revolutionary period to be from 1765 to 1787. 

Submissions to the Revolutionary Plays must be inspired by New Jersey’s Revolutionary War history. While we are interested in unique takes on historical plays, historical drama is certainly encouraged, but not required, for submission. 

Playwrights should research their subject and, if possible, conduct on-site research at an historic Revolutionary area site in New Jersey and/or to speak with an interpreter or historian. The website of The Crossroads of the American Revolution (http://www.RevolutionaryNJ.org) will be a helpful tool in discovering historic sites in the various regions of the state. You also may find information through the National, State, and County Parks websites. 

We recommend visiting sites that host interpretive and encourage you to check with area libraries for artifacts with local significance that they might have in their collections.   

Submission and Selection Process Scripts should be submitted online via the NJYPF website (http://www.njypf.org) by the January deadline. Script readers from PTNJ will adjudicate the Revolutionary Plays for artistic merit in accordance with the general procedure for the contest. Select scripts will get a second look by additional readers from the theatre and historical communities who may determine the winners.   

Performances Winning plays will be given staged-readings during the annual NJ Young Playwrights Festival in spring 2014. Additional plans to stage readings of plays at historical sites are also possible, given the subject matter or setting of the winning plays.   

The winning playwrights in the Revolutionary Plays division will each receive a $100 Savings Bond, and the students’ schools will receive a $50 Gift Card towards the purchase of books for their school library.

Beginning again

Another school year means another season of the NJ Young Playwrights Festival! We hope that you enjoyed your summer break and that the new school year has been kind. There is still some clean up work to do from last year's contest, but we have already opened the submission process for the 2014 program. What are you going to write about? No time like the present to get started!

If you are still waiting for critiques, thank you so much for your patience! Those will be mailed by the end of September.

Thanks!

Summer playwriting

Our summer playwrights are back at it during these final two weeks of August. I'm working with two young playwrights on their new one-act plays, which have quickly taken off from ideas to multiple pages in a few short days. Looking forward to getting full drafts by the start of next week and to involving some actors in the revision process.

Oh, and we're working on some exciting news about the 2014 NJ Young Playwrights Festival. Details coming soon!

Former NJ Young Playwright is Valedictorian

Congratulations to Emma Hathway, a 2012 winner in the high school division of the NJ Young Playwrights Festival. She is a Valedictorian of her class at Bergen County Academies!

http://www.northjersey.com/news/210357361_Valedictorians__Emma_Hathaway.html