Palm Beach Dramaworks Appoints Jenny Connell Davis as Resident Playwright

Palm Beach Dramaworks is pleased to announce that Jenny Connell Davis, whose commissioned play The Messenger will have its world premiere during the upcoming 2023 – 24 season, has been named the company’s first resident playwright, effective immediately. 

“I am delighted that Jenny accepted our invitation to join us as our resident playwright,” said Producing Artistic Director William Hayes. “PBD has made a resolute commitment to both developing new plays and producing new works. In the past five seasons we’ve produced seven world premieres, and since 2019 our new plays festival has showcased 25 readings of stimulating works still in development. New plays are now so integral to who we are that the logical next step was to offer a playwright an artistic home. And Jenny is not only immensely talented, but she meshed with PBD from the moment she first worked with us.
    
“We met in 2020 when her play, As I See It, was chosen for the festival,” Hayes continued. “I was so impressed by her writing that we planned to produce the play’s world premiere. Unfortunately, due to external circumstances, we couldn’t make it happen. But I knew she was someone I wanted to collaborate with. I admire the way she approaches her work, and we discovered we had a similar sensibility and an easy rapport: we can bounce ideas off each other, and we listen. We may not always agree, but we respect each other’s viewpoint and keep our minds open. It’s a wonderful working relationship.”

“From the moment I arrived here and began meeting everyone, it was like I’d found friends and collaborators,” said Davis. “And I’m not speaking just about the artistic staff, but about board members and patrons. I felt like I had come into a welcoming community, and I wanted to continue to be a part of it. I’m very excited that PBD is committed to new work. Right now, the appetite for new work nationwide is not high, and the opportunities are contracting. So, naming a resident playwright is a brave step when the theatre community nationally is trying to figure out how to be brave. It’s an honor that they talked to me about the position, and it was an easy ‘yes’ for me.” 

Hayes and Davis envision a continuous series of commissions, over a period of years, about subjects that stimulate both of them. The Messenger is such a play. It’s inspired by the life of Holocaust survivor Georgia Gabor and connects the dots between Holocaust denialism, free speech in schools, and racial discrimination in present-day America.

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