Manhattan Theatre Club Announces Lineup For 2024 Ted Snowdon Reading Series

Manhattan Theatre Club has announced the lineup for the 2024 Ted Snowdon Reading Series.

The readings kick off Monday, March 4 and will be held on Mondays through March 25. The readings will take place at New York City Center – Stage I (131 West 55th Street). All readings are free and open to the public, but space is limited and RSVPs are required. To RSVP, please visit https://forms.gle/S7S2LwsV5JWX6V3h8.

Now in its 26th year, this rehearsed reading series is dedicated to the support and development of innovative new work, offering each playwright a week-long rehearsal period with directors and actors. This year, the series will feature four new plays, including two MTC commissions, by an exceptional group of writers. MTC is grateful to Ted Snowdon for his generous support of the reading series.

Several plays developed in this reading series have gone on to full productions at MTC, including David Auburn's Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning Proof, Joe Hortua's Between Us, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa's Based on a Totally True Story, Molly Smith Metzler's Close Up Space (Susan Smith Blackburn finalist), Abe Koogler's Fulfillment Center, Jaclyn Backhaus' India Pale Ale and Eleanor Burgess' The Niceties.

Plays from this reading series that have been produced elsewhere in New York and around the world include Lloyd Suh's The Heart Sellers, Christine Quintana's As Above, Jonathan Spector's This Much I Know, Lauren Yee's Young Americans, Jessica Dickey's Nan and the Lower Body, Brittany K. Allen's Redwood, Paola Lázaro's There's Always the Hudson, Sharyn Rothstein's Right to Be Forgotten, Kimber Lee's to the yellow house, Jen Silverman's Dangerous House, Nick Gandiello's The Blameless, Jocelyn Bioh's Nollywood Dreams, Nicky Silver's This Day Forward, Michael West's The Chinese Room, Halley Feiffer's I'm Gonna Pray for You So Hard, Joshua Harmon's Significant Other, Ethan Lipton's Tumacho, Rachel Bonds' Five Mile Lake, Ayad Akhtar's The Who and the What, Penelope Skinner's The Village Bike, Rona Munro's Donny's Brain, Jonathan Caren's The Recommendation, The Civilians' The Great Immensity, Heidi Schreck's There Are No More Big Secrets, Eric Simonson's Fake, David Adjmi's Stunning, Naomi Iizuka's Strike-Slip, Stephen Adly Guirgis' The Little Flower of East Orange, Julia Cho's Durango, Adam Rapp's Red Light Winter, and Theresa Rebeck's The Scene.

March 4 at 4pm: Wilma

by Abby Rosebrock, directed by Colette Robert

South Carolina, 1999. A mother tamps down her gargantuan rage at the President to make sure her 12-year-old daughter wins a speech contest. Over the course of a morning, trapped by a flood in their intimate world of two, Wilma and Tally contend with mass media, each other, and the most brutal stages of life, as radioactive secrets are pushed into the light. An MTC/Bobbie Olsen Play Commission and the first play in Rosebrock's Good Girl Trilogy, Wilma is an intergenerational story of two women, three decades apart, as desperate to master the cult of American striving as they are to find some permanent relief from it.

About the Artists

Abby Rosebrock (Playwright) is a playwright, screenwriter and actress from South Carolina. Her plays have been commissioned and produced throughout New York City and across the country. Additional full-length works include Monks Corner, Blue Ridge, (Atlantic Theater), Ruby the Freak in the Woods (EST/Sloan Foundation commission), Dido of Idaho (Ensemble Studio Theatre), Singles in Agriculture, and Different Animals (Cherry Lane), several of which are available for purchase and licensing from Theatrical Rights Worldwide. A proud alum of writers' groups at Clubbed Thumb, EST, The Orchard Project, and more, Abby is currently gearing up for the West Coast premiere of Dido of Idaho and developing several audio and TV projects.

Colette Robert (Director) is a director and playwright from Los Angeles, currently based in New York. Most recently, she wrote and directed The Harriet Holland Social Club Presents the 84th Annual Star-Burst Cotillion in the Grand Ballroom of the Renaissance Hotel (The Movement Theatre Company/New Georges.) Other New York directing credits include: the first New York revival of Lynn Nottage's Crumbs from the Table of Joy (Keen Company), and the world premieres of Stew (Page 73, Pulitzer Prize Finalist) and Behind the Sheet (Ensemble Studio Theatre). Regional credits include The Wanderers (City Theatre Company), Weathering (Penumbra Theatre), Egress (Salt Lake Acting Company), and Celebrating the Black Radical Imagination: Nine Solo Plays (Williamstown Theatre Festival). She was the Associate Director for the Broadway revival of Caroline, or Change. Colette is a member of Ensemble Studio Theatre, a New Georges affiliated artist, and an adjunct lecturer at NYU. M.A., RADA and King's College, London. B.A., Yale University. Member, SDC. SDCF Denham Fellow. https://www.coletterobert.com/

March 11 at 4pm: Wipeout

by Aurora Real de Asua, directed by Morgan Green

Three retired best friends. One hotrod surf instructor. The currents of the Pacific Ocean. What could possibly go wrong? Set on surfboards, Wipeout is a poignant comedy about friendship, grief, and the unpredictable tides of life.

AURORA REAL DE ASUA (Playwright) is a playwright, filmmaker, and performer. Her play Wipeout will receive a rolling world premiere in 2024 through the National New Play Network, with productions at Rivendell Theatre, B Street Theatre, and Gloucester Stage Company. Wipeout was developed at Williamstown Theatre Festival, the New Harmony Project, The Old Globe, and Rivendell. Her other plays have been developed with The Playwrights Realm, Victory Gardens, Chicago Children's Theatre, and Sideshow Theatre. Her short film Heartsong debuted on Short of the Week and screened at various festivals. It is available to stream on Mitú.tv. She holds a BA in Theatre from Northwestern University and an MFA in film from Columbia University.

Morgan Green (Director) is a director of plays, films, radio, and dinnertime. She is currently a Co-Artistic Director at the Wilma Theater in Philadelphia where she recently premiered the Pulitzer Prize winning Fat Ham by James Ijames, Eternal Life Part 1 by Nathan Alan Davis, and School Pictures by Milo Cramer which went on to Playwrights Horizons in New York where it was lauded as best production of the year in NY Magazine 2023. She was also a co-founder of the award winning theater company, New Saloon, best known for Minor Character: Six Translations of Uncle Vanya at the Same Time (The Invisible Dog, The Public Theater, Sharon Playhouse). Other credits include: The Music Man (The Sharon Playhouse), The Wolves by Sarah DeLappe (Marin Theatre Company), and Cute Activist by Milo Cramer (The Bushwick Starr). Her short film One More Time With Feeling premiered at the Raindance Film Festival in London October 2023. Morgan has developed new work at the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Bric, Baryshnikov Art Center, Mabou Mines, and Mercury Store. She is a New Georges Affiliated Artist and proud member of SDC. MorganClaireGreen.com

March 18 at 4pm: Asilomar

by Dipika Guha, directed by Jess McLeod

In 1975, a group of scientists gathers in Asilomar, California to discuss the safety and regulation of a cutting-edge new technology: genetic engineering. Decades later, gifted scientist Dr. Annie Roy devotes herself to this field of study, facing breakneck competition towards a discovery with nuclear implications for the human species. Commissioned by MTC through the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Asilomar is a thrilling new play about the culture of competition in science, the ethics that accompany scientific discovery, and the implications of gene editing technology in our quest for advancement.

Dipika Guha (Playwright) was born in India and raised in UK and Russia. Her plays include Yoga Play (South Coast Rep, SF Playhouse, Playmakers Rep and others), The Art of Gaman (Theatre 503, London) and Unreliable (Kansas City Rep). She was the inaugural recipient of the Shakespeare's Sister Award, the Hodder Fellowship at Princeton, and the Venturous Fellowship for her play Passing. She is currently under commission from South Coast Rep and Berkeley Rep and is adapting a novel for TV for A24. For TV, she's written on “American Gods,” “Sneaky Pete,” “Black Monday,” “The Marvelous Mrs Maisel,” and currently “Quarter Life” by Riz Ahmed. Dipika is a proud member of New Dramatists, an alumnus of the WP Lab, Ars Nova's Play Group, Soho Rep W/D Lab, Geffen Writers Room, Playwrights Foundation, Ma Yi Writers Lab, and Playwrights Center. Dipika received her BA in English Literature at University College London, was a Frank Knox Fellow at Harvard University, and was awarded her MFA from the Yale School of Drama under Paula Vogel. 

Jess McLeod (Director) is a first-generation Korean/Filipina/Scottish director and social justice advocate specializing in risky new work about America. NYCLU/Creatives Rebuild Artist-In-Residence; Roundabout Refocus Project Curator; Woolly Mammoth BOLD Resident Director; Resident Director, Hamilton Chicago. Recent NY credits include Atlantic, Roundabout, EST, and Little Island. Regional credits include Woolly Mammoth, Steppenwolf, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Goodman, IAMA, Victory Gardens, San Diego Rep, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Long Wharf, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, Chicago Shakes, The Gift, A Red Orchid Theatre, and developmental work at the O'Neill, NAMT, WTF, and The Ground Floor at Berkeley Rep. Jess also works frequently at the intersection of art and activism, and has created operas with community groups (Lyric), the #STOPASIANHATE video campaign for NY Rep, Grace Meng's 3/26 Day of Action & Healing (co-creator), and curated Broadway Advocacy Coalition's first Arts In Action Festival. Currently under commission at La Jolla Playhouse and Co-Chair, with Michael Korie, of the Dramatists Guild Foundation's Musical Theatre Fellows. MFA, Northwestern. www.jess-mcleod.com | @mcjessmc

March 25 at 4pm: Furlough's Paradise

by a.k. payne, directed by Ibi Owolabi

On a three-day furlough from prison, Sade stays with her only cousin, Mina. On a brief reprieve from her life in the West Coast, Mina returns to her hometown for her aunt's funeral. The cousins try to make sense of grief, home, love, and kinship as time ticks towards the correctional officer's arrival.

a.k. payne (Playwright) (she/they) is a playwright and theatermaker with roots in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Her plays love on and engage Black lives and languages beyond the confines of linear time to find/remember stories that might create conditions for our collective liberation(s). They hold a B.A. in English and African-American Studies from Yale College and an MFA in Playwriting under Tarell Alvin McCraney from fka Yale School of Drama. Their work has been finalist for the L. Arnold Weissberger New Play Award and the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. They are a grandchild of the Great Migration; a queer & non-binary abolitionist affected in community by the ‘New Jim Crow'; and of a great lineage of Black women storytellers and living-room archivists; all of which deeply informs, uplifts, and amplifies their work as a playwright, community organizer, and spacemaker.

IBI OWOLABI (Director) is the current Drama League Stage Directing Fellow, with a residency at Manhattan Theatre Club that led to her recent Broadway debut as the AD on Cost of Living. Her work has been seen at 7 Stages, Kenny Leon's True Colors Theatre, Alliance Theatre, Theatre Emory, The Weird Sisters Theatre Project, and the DC Black Theatre Festival. Ibi is a graduate of Georgia Southern University, the Actor's Express directing internship, and the Kenny Leon fellowship. Ibi's recent in person productions include The Bluest Eye at Synchronicity Theatre, Intimate Apparel at Actor's Express, the world premiere of Good Bad People at True Colors' Theatre, and The Light at University of South Carolina.

About Ted Snowdon

Ted Snowdon has supported new plays and playwrights his entire career, working in both the commercial and non-profit sides of theater. His Broadway producing credits reach back to 1979's Tony Award-winning The Elephant Man and include many plays and musicals like Chita Rivera in The Visit, A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder, The Mountaintop, Reasons To Be Pretty, The Little Dog Laughed, Spring Awakening, and Souvenir. With MTC he co-produced Master Class, Time Stands Still, and LoveMusik. More recent Broadway offerings include two White House plays, The Great Society starring Brian Cox as LBJ and Selina Fillinger's farce POTUS at the Shubert. Off-Broadway presentations were Michael Urie in Jon Tolins's Buyer & Cellar, Charles Busch's The Tribute Artist and The Confessions of Lily Dare, plus Daniel's Husband, My Parsifal Conductor, On That Day in Amsterdam, Robert Montano's solo hit Small, and this season's acclaimed Sondheim-Ives-Mantello musical collaboration at The Shed, Here We Are. Coming up is another Charles Busch comedy, Ibsen's Ghost, at 59e59 Theatre. He has long championed the arts and LGBTQ causes, and he serves on the boards of Primary Stages and the Glimmerglass Festival.

ABOUT MANHATTAN THEATRE CLUB

The 2022-23 season marked Lynne Meadow's 50th anniversary as Artistic Director of Manhattan Theatre Club. She was joined in summer 2023 by Chris Jennings, MTC's new Executive Director. Over the past five decades, Manhattan Theatre Club has been a preeminent producer of the highest quality, award-winning theatrical productions of new works by American and international playwrights. The company's over 600 premieres have been produced throughout the country and across the globe and have contributed a proud legacy to the American theatrical canon.

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