Boston Playwrights' Theatre Announces 2018-19 Season

Boston Playwrights' Theatre (BPT) today announces the new plays that will comprise its 37th season. The line-up includes The Tragic Ecstasy of Girlhood by Kira Rockwell, Winter People by Laura Neill, Wynwood by Alexis Scheer and Dead House by Beirut Balutis.

"Once again we are collaborating with the award-winning Boston University College of Fine Arts School of Theatre," BPT Artistic Director Kate Snodgrass says. "Our last collaboration resulted in one world premiere at the Perseverance Theatre in Juno, Alaska (Franklin by Samantha Noble), and one National Student Playwriting Award at the Kennedy Center (The Honey Trap by Leo McGann). Needless to say, I have great hopes for this new crop of plays that are hot off the presses and impatient to be noticed!"

All of this season's plays were written by the Boston University M. F. A. Playwriting Program class of 2019. They will be co-produced with the Boston University College of Fine Arts School of Theatre-part of their New Play Initiative-and will feature collaborations between graduate-level playwrights, directors, and designers.

The season opens in October with The Tragic Ecstasy of Girlhood by Kira Rockwell, about five teenage girls in a Texas residential care facility combating their grief in five different ways after the suicide of their housemate. The play will be directed by Leila Ghaemi. Playwright Rockwell's Nomad Americana was produced by Fresh Ink Theatre Company earlier this year, and her With My Eyes Shut was an award-winner at last summer's Hollywood Fringe Festival.

Next, in December, is Laura Neill's Winter People (directed by Avital Shira), about Hamptons locals living in the shadows of the summer people's empty mansions. Tensions rise when one of those mansions erupts in flames, and five families struggle to protect their own. Neill's play DIVAS was produced by OperaHub last summer. She is the 2017 winner of University of Tulsa's WomenWorks, a national script competition focused exclusively on plays by female graduate students.

Wynwood by Alexis Scheer, directed by Sara Katzoff, opens in late February. The comedy centers on Marianna and the gallery she runs in Miami's Wynwood Arts District. The high stakes environment of annual international arts fair Art Basel reaches new levels when Marianna's movie-star mother gets involved. Scheer's play Our Dear Dead Drug Lord (produced by Off the Grid Theatre last summer) was selected as a finalist in the 2018 Latinx Theatre Commons Carnaval of New Latinx Work. Scheer was named Rising Theater Star in The Improper Bostonian's 2018 Boston's Best issue.

The season closes with Beirut Balutis's drama Dead House, directed by Adam Kassim. Set in Bone Flat, Pennsylvania, the high school community is plunged into shock and grief following the death of a beloved varsity football player. New student Merle provides closure for those in mourning, but when Merle's interest demands more than just a shoulder to cry on, things get dangerous. Balutis's works have been developed or produced at the Boston Theater Marathon, Cape May Playwright Symposium, Mt. Gretna Theatre Festival, and the Hershey Area Playhouse.

Founded in 1981 at Boston University by Nobel Laureate Derek Walcott, Boston Playwrights' Theatre (BPT) is an award-winning professional theatre dedicated to new works. At the heart of BPT's mission is the production of new plays by alumni of its M.F.A. Playwriting Program, the latter in collaboration with Boston University's renowned School of Theatre. The program's award-winning alumni have been produced in regional and New York houses, as well as in London's West End. BPT's productions have been honored with numerous regional and Boston awards, including numerous IRNE Awards for Best New Script and Boston Critics' Association Elliot Norton Awards.

The BU New Play Initiative (NPI) expresses the Boston University College of Fine Arts' commitment to the School of Theatre's participation in the development of new work. This special initiative provides playwrights, directors, designers, and actors with a variety of developmental options to support the collaborative creation of new work for the theatre. Students, faculty, alumni, and guest artists are given the opportunity to utilize the creativity of the rehearsal room to develop their plays, which are then presented through workshop productions. The life of these new plays doesn't end on the BU stages. Many New Play Initiative productions are often later fully produced by member companies of our Professional Theatre Initiative, including the School of Theatre's professional extension-Boston Center for American Performance. www.bu.edu/cfa/npi

Founded in 1839, Boston University is an internationally recognized private research university with more than 30,000 students participating in undergraduate, graduate, and professional programs. BU consists of 17 colleges and schools along with a number of multi-disciplinary centers and institutes which are central to the school's research and teaching mission. Established in 1954, Boston University College of Fine Arts is a top-tier fine arts institution. Comprised of the School of Music, School of Theatre, and School of Visual Arts, CFA offers professional training in the arts in conservatory-style environments for undergraduate and graduate students, complemented by a liberal arts curriculum for undergraduate students.

BEIRUT BALUTIS is an Appalachian playwright. His works have been developed or produced at the Boston Theater Marathon, Cape May Playwright Symposium, Mt. Gretna Theatre Festival, and the Hershey Area Playhouse. Beirut previously earned his first M.F.A. in Stage and Screen at Lesley University. He is currently producing and performing within a Boston art collective.

LAURA NEILL's previous productions include DIVAS (OperaHub), Skin and Bones (Wilbury Theatre Group), and Don't Give Up the Ship (Fresh Ink Theatre). A 2016 Company One PlayLab affiliate and the 2017 winner of University of Tulsa's WomenWorks, Laura will teach at Boston College in spring 2019.

KIRA ROCKWELL hails from the heart of Texas. Her character-driven plays aim to foster empathy, cultivate hope, and challenge the complacent. Kira's most recent credits include a world premiere of Nomad Americana with Fresh Ink Theatre and an award-winning production of With My Eyes Shut at the Hollywood Fringe Festival.

ALEXIS SCHEER was named Rising Theater Star in The Improper Bostonian's 2018 Boston's Best issue. She is earning her MFA in Playwriting at Boston University and holds a BFA in Musical Theatre from Boston Conservatory. Alexis moonlights as the Producing Artistic Director of the award-winning fringe company, Off the Grid Theatre.

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