The Drinking Gourd Reveals 2025–26 Playwright Cohort

The Drinking Gourd, a national initiative dedicated to developing new works by Black playwrights, has announced its 2025–26 cohort: Stacey Rose, India Nicole Burton, and Nathan Yungerberg.

Charlotte-based playwright Stacey Rose has been named the cohort’s commissioned playwright and will receive $10,000 to complete the production draft of a new play. Burton and Yungerberg will each receive developmental support including a dramaturg and a 29-hour workshop of one of their plays.

“We are very excited to have three of the country’s outstanding Black playwrights in our new cohort,” said Jamil Jude, artistic director of True Colors Theatre, which played a leading role in creating The Drinking Gourd. “All of them have been nationally recognized for their work which, collectively, has been presented on stages across the country and internationally.”

Rose’s plays—including America v. 2.1, As Is, and Legacy Land—examine Black identity, body politics, and the experience of “otherness.” Her work has been developed at The Lark, Barrington Stage Company, Kansas City Rep, and Rattlestick Playwrights Theatre, among others. She is a 2019 Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation Women’s Commissioning Grant recipient and has held fellowships with The Dramatists Guild, The Playwrights’ Center, and Sundance Theatre Lab.

India Nicole Burton, a Chicago-based director, playwright, and producer, is known for creating socially relevant and artistically daring work. Her play Panther Women: An Army for the Liberation received a National New Play Network Rolling World Premiere and earned multiple Jeff Award and Chicago Black Excellence Award nominations. A theatre professor at Chicago State University, she has been part of the NNPN Producer in Residence and Bridge Program Grant, and was selected for The New Harmony Project cohort in 2024.

Nathan Yungerberg, an Afro-surrealist storyteller based in Brooklyn, writes for stage, screen, and audio. His credits include serving as head writer for the Webby-nominated podcast Live from Mount Olympus, freelance work for Sesame Street, and script editing for Cultureverse, narrated by Yara Shahidi and Kelly Marie Tran. His plays have been developed at New York Theatre Workshop, The Apollo Theater, Roundabout Theatre Company, and Alliance Theatre, among others.

The Drinking Gourd is a consortium of Black-led theaters dedicated to supporting the creation and production of new work by Black playwrights. This year’s participating theaters include True Colors Theatre Company (Atlanta), The Hansberry Project (Seattle), National Black Theatre (New York), The Ensemble Theatre (Houston), Hattiloo Theatre (Memphis), and Karamu House (Cleveland).

Through collective resources and collaboration, The Drinking Gourd seeks to return Black stories to the care of Black institutions, ensuring these works reach communities across the nation.