Rehana Lew Mirza News

Applications are open to all musical theatre writers for Rhinebeck Writers Retreat's summer residencies. Nine teams will be hosted for nine consecutive weeks in the Hudson Valley between June 25 and August 27.

As part of their landmark partnership, the five Generation Now theatres (Latino Theater Company, Ma-Yi Theater Company, Native Voices at the Autry, Penumbra, and Children's Theatre Company) have awarded their first round of commissions to four incredible projects.

Other than a handful of playwrights 30 and under, all the playwrights spoken to for this piece believe their sex has impacted their careers in the theater. Women feel that they have trouble getting in the room and being taken seriously once there. But there is something more, a sense that when things get really bad -- beyond mansplaining bad -- there aren't many people to turn to in the theater.

In this three-part series, BroadwayWorld spoke to over 20 female playwrights who have been produced in major NY theaters about what life in the theater is really like for them -- and what can be done to make it better.

BroadwayWorld chats with OBIE-winning playwright Christopher Chen about his incendiary new play 'The Motion' which will be part of the TheatreWorks New Works Festival at Montalvo Arts Center in Saratoga November 6 to 13. The Festival offers a first look at three intriguing and wonderfully different new plays.

First Floor Theater will conclude its Tenth Season with the Chicago premiere of Rehana Lew Mirza’s Kilroys’-lauded hit Hatef**k, directed by Arti Ishak, playing May 4 – June 10, 2023 at The Den Theatre.

This Fall, TheatreWorks Silicon Valley will present the 19th Annual New Works Festival, providing Bay Area theatre lovers an advance look at tomorrow’s hits. The festival runs November 6-13, 2022 at Montalvo Arts Center.

Colt Coeur’s 2022 Benefit took place last week, honoring actor Sendhil Ramamurthy (Hatefu*k, Netflix's 'Never Have I Ever') and producer and Board Chair Erica Rotstein (Hundred Days, Water for Elephants). It was held at Casa La Femme on Thursday September 23. Check out photos here!

Writers Theatre will debut its 2022/23 Season with Tiger Style! by Mike Lew, directed by Brian Balcom. The production runs September 29, 2022 – October 30, 2022 in the in the Alexandra C. and John D. Nichols Theatre.

Colt Coeur will present the World Premiere of Dodi & Diana, by Kareem Fahmy. Commissioned by Colt Coeur and directed by Adrienne Campbell-Holt (Eureka Day), Dodi & Diana begins previews on October 1, 2022, for a strictly limited engagement through October 29, 2022, at HERE.

Ma-Yi Theater Company – which recently celebrated a return to in-person events with the four-time Lortel nominated production of Lloyd Suh’s The Chinese Lady at The Public Theater – has announced additional programming running May 1–September 18, 2022.

The Huntington has announced its 2022-2023 season, featuring 8 shows including 2 jubilant new musicals, 3 world premiere plays, one recent Broadway hit, and an outstanding revival of an August Wilson classic.   

The Huntington announces its 2022-2023 season, featuring 8 shows including 2 jubilant new musicals, 3 world premiere plays, one recent Broadway hit, and an outstanding revival of an August Wilson classic.   

La Jolla Playhouse is presenting its world-premiere production of Bhangin' It: A Bangin' New Musical, featuring book by Mike Lew and Rehana Lew Mirza, music and lyrics by Sam Willmott, with additional music by Grammy Award nominee Deep Singh, running in the Mandell Weiss Theatre through April 17, 2022.

Williamstown Theatre Festival has announced Mike Lew as the recipient of the 2022 L. Arnold Weissberger New Play Award for his play tiny father. Lew will receive the $10,000 award and the accompanying $10,000 Jay Harris Commission to write a new play.

La Jolla Playhouse is presenting its world-premiere production of Bhangin' It: A Bangin' New Musical, featuring book by Mike Lew and Rehana Lew Mirza, music and lyrics by Sam Willmott, with additional music by Grammy Award nominee Deep Singh, running in the Mandell Weiss Theatre through April 17, 2022.

Playwright Mike Lew’s TEENAGE DICK will stream exclusively beginning February 3, 2022, at pasadenaplayhouse.org. Mike’s modernized take on Shakespeare’s RICHARD III, produced in association with Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company and Huntington Theatre Company, was shot multi-camera during TEENAGE DICK‘s in-person run at Wooly Mammoth last fall. I got the chance to query Mike on his TEENAGE DICK, close collaborations and his sound advice for newbie writers.

Today's top stories include a first look at The Avett Brothers musical Swept Away, which opens tonight at Berkeley Rep. Plus, the full screenplay has been released for the West Side Story film, and you can read it now!

La Jolla Playhouse has announced the cast for its world-premiere production of Bhangin’ It: A Bangin’ New Musical, book by Mike Lew (Playhouse’s Tiger Style!) and Rehana Lew Mirza, music and lyrics by Sam Willmott, with additional music by Grammy Award nominee Deep Singh. 

Kathy Evans, Founding Executive Director of Rhinebeck Writers Retreat, announced that applications are open to all musical theatre writers to participate in weeklong residencies in the Hudson Valley between June 26 and August 28.