Studio R&D: New Work at Studio

Building on more than four decades of producing powerful contemporary theatre, Studio supports new writing from inception to first production: commissioning new work from both writers and directors; giving artists time and resources to develop their work; and hosting them in residence during the rehearsal process. Our intimate spaces are uniquely suited to the immediacy of new work—they’re small, and they provide a direct relationship between the actor and audience.

Studio R&D is our incubator for new plays, new relationships, and new modes of collaboration. Encompassing the full range of Studio’s commissioning and new work development activities, Studio R&D supports artists through both the writing and development of their work, offering commissions, residencies, and artistic retreats. Studio R&D provides artists the resources and tools they need to create, and allows Studio to introduce aesthetically diverse new work into the international repertoire.

Beginning with Lungs in the 2011-2012 Season, Studio has published all of its world premiere plays, broadening the reach of these new works, and launching them onto the international stage. The work Studio has premiered has gone on to productions across the US, Canada, and Europe, playing Off Broadway, touring the UK, and entering the permanent repertoire of the Schaubüehne in Berlin.

Commissions

In 2012, Artistic Director David Muse began a commissioning program, inviting new and established writers from the US and beyond to develop work specifically for Studio’s intimate spaces. Studio's commissions include established and emerging writers: Stew and Heidi Rodewald, Vivienne Franzmann, Rachel Bonds, Clare Lizzimore, Mary Elizabeth Hamilton, Ike Holter, Aaron Posner, Sarah DeLappe, Abe Koogler, Steph Del Rosso, Emily Schwend, James Ijames, and James Fritz. Beginning in 2016, Studio began to extend commissions to directors as well, offerings artist whose work we admire the time to reflect, read, and develop projects for Studio. Current and past commissioned directors are Lileana Blain-Cruz, Carl Cofield, Mike Donahue, Jackson Gay, Eric Ruffin, and Lila Neugebauer.

Studio produced its first play from this program in 2014, The Wolfe Twins by Rachel Bonds. 

Studio R&D: Work in Process

Studio supports new writing from inception to first production. We commission new work from both writers and directors, give artists time and resources to develop their work, and host them in residence during the rehearsal process. Through the Studio R&D: Work in Process, we’re opening up the creative process a little early to another critical component of artmaking: the audience.

Okinawa Demo Reel

Okinawa Demo Reel is an episodic video project from playwright/director and Georgetown University professor Natsu Onoda Power that let's viewers into a rehearsal room of ideas that are being tested out for a play about imperialism, colonialism, militarization and connecting across differences. Through the video project, Natsu invites viewers along for the evolution of this emerging theatre piece, tests out ideas she plans to integrate into the final product, and refines her devised Zoom-based development process with dramaturg Soyica Colbert. 

The project is part documentary, part theatre, a voyeuristic look into a playwright's creative process, and "something else entirely," Natsu explains.

Commissioned Artists

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Past Commissions

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Rachel Bonds

Rachel Bonds is a playwright and performer currently living in Brooklyn. Her plays have been developed by New Georges, Ars Nova, Ensemble Studio Theatre, LaMaMa, The Flea, Playwrights Horizons, The Sewanee Writers’ Conference, Williamstown Theater Festival, Gotham Stage Company, Chicago’s American Theater Company, McCarter Theatre, Roundabout Underground, The Arden, and Manhattan Theatre Club. She is an Affiliated Artist with New Georges, a member of EST’s Youngblood, a 2010-12 member of Ars Nova’s Play Group, and a Playwriting Mentor in the PEN American Center’s Prison Writing Program. She was an Associate Artist in Residence at The Atlantic Center for the Arts and the Father William Ralston Fellow at the 2011 Sewanee Writers’ Conference. Rachel is a graduate of Brown University.

Lileana Blain-Cruz

Lileana Blain-Cruz’s theatre work includes Dominique Morisseau’s Pipeline at Lincoln Center, Salome at Governor's Island, Suzan Lori-Parks’ Death of the Last Black in the Whole Entire World at Signature, War at Yale Repertory Theatre and Lincoln Center Theatre, Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again at Soho Rep, Red Speedo at New York Theatre Workshop, a new translation of The Bakkhai at Fisher Center at Bard College, Much Ado About Nothing at Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Christina Anderson’s Hollow Roots at the Under the Radar Festival, Project Realms at La Sala, A Guide to Kinship and Maybe Magic with choreographer Isabel Lewis and Branden Jacobs-Jenkins at Dance New Amsterdam. She was one of the co-artistic directors of the 2011-2012 Yale Cabaret and is a member of the Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab. Education: Princeton University, MFA in directing, Yale School of Drama.

David Cale

David Cale is the writer and performer of 11 solo works including The History of Kisses, which premiered at Studio Theatre, Palomino (Bay Area Critics Award), A Likely Story,Lillian (Obie Award), Deep in a Dream of You (Bessie Award),Smooch Music, and The Redthroats (Bessie Award), the latter two were both also presented at Studio Theatre. Cale wrote the book, lyrics, co-composed the music for, and starred in the musical Floyd and Clea Under the Western Sky (Outer Critics Circle Nomination) and collaborated with Dael Orlandersmith on The Blue Album. His most recent works include the solo play Harry Clarke, starring Billy Crudup, which premiered at the Vineyard Theatre and transferred to the Minetta Lane Theatre as the inaugural theatre production of Audible. For Harry Clarke, Cale received the 2018 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Solo Show. His solo musical memoir We’re Only Alive for A Short Amount of Time, for which he wrote the book, lyrics, and co-composed the music with Matthew Dean Marsh, premiered at the Goodman Theatre and received the 2019 Jeff Award for Best New Musical and a Jeff nomination for Best Solo Performance. We’re Only Alive for A Short Amount of Time opened at The Public Theater and received a 2020 Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Solo Performance, a 2020 Lucille Lortel Nomination for Outstanding Solo Show, and a 2020 Drama Desk Nomination for Outstanding Solo Performance.

Staceyann Chin

Poet, actor, and performing artist Staceyann Chin is the author of the new poetry collection Crossfire: A Litany For Survival, the memoir The Other Side of Paradise, cowriter and original performer in the Tony Award–winning Russell Simmons’ Def Poetry Jam on Broadway, and author of the one-woman shows Hands Afire, Unspeakable Things, Border/Clash, and MotherStruck. She has appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show and 60 Minutes, and her poetry been featured in the New York Times and the Washington Post. She proudly identifies as Caribbean, Black, Asian, lesbian, a woman, and a resident of New York City, as well as a Jamaican national.

Carl Cofield

Carl Cofield is a New York-based director and actor, and serves as the Associate Artistic Director of the Classical Theatre of Harlem. He directed the award-winning world premiere of One Night In Miami (Huffington Postbest of L.A. 2013, NAACP, L.A. Drama Critics Circle, and others) for Rogue Machine Theater and the Denver Center Theatre, for which he received the Los Angeles NAACP award for Best Director. Other directing work includes: Disgraced for The Denver Center, Henry IV part 2 for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, A Raisin In the Sun for Two River Theater Company, and The Mountaintop for Cleveland Play House. Carl’s New York directing credits include: AntigoneThe Tempest, and Macbeth for the Classical Theatre of Harlem, the 50th anniversary of Dutchman for the Classical Theatre of Harlem/National Black Theatre, The Balcony for The New School, Better Than Yellow for 48 Hours In Harlem, The Seven by Will Power at the Connelly Theatre, A Midsummer Night’s Dream for NYU, 1001 for Columbia University, and The Tuskegee Airman Project for CUNY York College. He assisted Molly Smith in the world premiere of Camp David by Laurence Wright at Arena Stage. He directed the reading of Camp David for President and First Lady Carter at the Carter Center retreat in Vail, Colorado. Upcoming: Twelfth Night for Yale Repertory Theatre, One Night In Miami for Miami New Drama. As an actor, he has performed at Studio Theatre, The Manhattan Theater Club (Ruined), Berkeley Rep, Alliance, Arena Stage, The Shakespeare Theater, Intiman, Actors Theater of Louisville, Shakespeare Santa Cruz, Milwaukee Rep, Alabama Shakespeare, The McCarter, The Acting Company, and many others. 

Mike Donahue

Mike Donahue's recent productions include the world premieres of Rachel Bonds’s The Wolfe Twins (Studio Theatre) and Swimmers (Marin Theatre Company), Matthew Lopez’s The Legend of Georgia McBride (Mcc and Denver Center Theatre Company) Lauren Feldman’s Grace, or The Art of Climbing (Denver Center Theatre Company); Jen Silverman’s Collective Rage (Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company and MCC), The Roommate (Actors Theatre of Louisville and Williamstown Theatre Festival), Phoebe in Winter (Clubbed Thumb), The Hunters (Cherry Lane Mentor Project); Annie Baker’s adaptation of Uncle Vanya with Campbell Scott (Weston Playhouse); Ethan Lipton’s Red-Handed Otter(Playwrights Realm); Shostakovich’s Moscow, Cheryomushki with new libretto by Meg Miroshnik (Chicago Opera Theatre); and Assassins, Henry IV & V (co-director), and A Number (Playmakers Rep, 2011/12 Distinguished Guest Artist). Donahue is a recipient of a Fulbright to Berlin, the Drama League Fall Fellowship, The Boris Sagal Fellowship at Williamstown, and the Inaugural Opera America Director-Designer Showcase Award. He is an alumnus of the Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab and was the Artistic Director of the Yale Summer Cabaret for two seasons. Donahue is a graduate of Harvard University (Louis Sudler Prize for Artistic Excellence) and the Yale School of Drama (MFA).

(As of August 2018)

James Fritz

James Fritz’s first full-length play, Four Minutes Twelve Seconds premiered at Hampstead Theatre Downstairs in 2014 and was nominated for an Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre before transferring to Trafalgar Studios in 2015; James won the "Most Promising Playwright" prize at the Critics Circle Theatre Awards 2015, on the heels of its production. His other plays include Ross & Rachel ("a virtuosic piece of writing"—Time Out) which opened to critical acclaim at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2015, Parliament Square which won a Bruntwood Prize in 2015 and premiered at the Royal Exchange Theatre in 2017 before transferring to the Bush Theatre, and The Fall which he wrote for the National Youth Theatre’s 60th anniversary season in 2016. In 2017 his radio play Comment Is Freereceived both the Imison and the Tinniswood Awards at the BBC Audio Drama Awards, which is the first time that a single writer has won both awards the same year. 

Jackson Gay

Jackson Gay most recently directed Three Sisters at Studio Theatre. She is a founding member of New Neighborhood and the Director of Artistic Programming for Fuller Road Artist Residency. Recent projects include Lucy Thurber's Transfers at New York Stage & Film; Much Ado About Nothing adapted with Kenneth Lin at Cal Shakes; Jen Silverman's The Moors at Yale Rep; These Paper Bullets! —Rolin Jones's adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing with music by Billie Joe Armstrong—at the Atlantic Theater, Geffen Playhouse, and Yale Rep; Rolin Jones' s The Jammer (Atlantic Theater Company); and The Intelligent Design of Jenny Chow (Atlantic and Yale Rep). 

Mary Elizabeth Hamilton

Mary Elizabeth Hamilton has developed work with Page 73, New Georges, and Ensemble Studio Theater. The recipient of the Iowa Arts Fellowship and the Provost's Writing Fellowship, she has participated in Play Penn, Youngblood, I-73, and New Georges’ The Jam. Her plays have been finalists for The O'Neill, The Lark Pony Fellowship, The Yale Drama Series, The Princess Grace Award, and New Dramatists. Mary holds her MFA in Playwriting from The University of Iowa and is currently attending the Lila Acheson Wallace American Playwrights Program at Juilliard.

(As of June 2016)

Ike Holter

David Cale is the writer and performer of 11 solo works including The History of Kisses, which premiered at Studio Theatre, Palomino (Bay Area Critics Award), A Likely Story,Lillian (Obie Award), Deep in a Dream of You (Bessie Award), Smooch Music, and The Redthroats (Bessie Award), the latter two were both also presented at Studio Theatre. Cale wrote the book, lyrics, co-composed the music for, and starred in the musical Floyd and Clea Under the Western Sky (Outer Critics Circle Nomination) and collaborated with Dael Orlandersmith on The Blue Album. His most recent works include the solo play Harry Clarke, starring Billy Crudup, which premiered at the Vineyard Theatre and transferred to the Minetta Lane Theatre as the inaugural theatre production of Audible. For Harry Clarke, Cale received the 2018 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Solo Show. His solo musical memoir We’re Only Alive for A Short Amount of Time, for which he wrote the book, lyrics, and co-composed the music with Matthew Dean Marsh, premiered at the Goodman Theatre and received the 2019 Jeff Award for Best New Musical and a Jeff nomination for Best Solo Performance. We’re Only Alive for A Short Amount of Time opened at The Public Theater and received a 2020 Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Solo Performance, a 2020 Lucille Lortel Nomination for Outstanding Solo Show, and a 2020 Drama Desk Nomination for Outstanding Solo Performance.

Abe Koogler

Abe Koogler's plays include Advance Man; Blue Skies Process; Kill Floor, which premiered at Lincoln Center Theater with a regional premiere at American Theater Company; and Fulfillment Center, which premiered at Manhattan Theatre Club. Koogler is a recipitent of the Kennedy Center's Paula Vogel Award and Williamstown Theatre Festival's Weissberger Award. He is under commission from Manhattan Theatre Club and Studio Theatre. He was a Michener Fellow at UT-Austin and is an alum of Juilliard's Playwrights Program. 

Clare Lizzimore

Clare Lizzimore is a playwright and an Olivier-Award winning director. Her first play, Mint (2013), was produced at the Royal Court's Open Court Season and long-listed for the prestigious Bruntwood Prize. Her first radio play was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2014, her new radio play The Rage was broadcast in 2016. She is currently under commission with the Royal Court Theatre and the Almeida Theatre. As a director, she has worked extensively in new writing, and her latest production—Bull by Mike Bartlett—won the 2015 Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in An Affiliate Theatre for its production at The Young Vic; it premiered at Sheffield Theatres and also toured to 59E59 in New York. Other recent directing credits include One Day When We Were Young (Paines Plough); Lay Down Your Cross and On the Rocks (Hampstead Theatre); Pieces of Vincent (Arcola Theatre); Faces in the Crowd, War and Peace, and Fear and Misery (Royal Court Theatre); Jonah and Otto (Royal Exchange); and Tom Fool (Glasgow Citizens Theatre and the Bush Theatre, nominated for four CATS Awards). Lizzimore’s directing awards include the Channel 4 Theatre Directors Award and the Arts Foundation Theatre Directing Fellowship.

(As of October 2015).

Lila Neugebauer

Lila Neugebauer’s 2018 production of The Waverly Gallery marked her Broadway debut. Her recent Off Broadway credits include Edward Albee’s At Home at the Zoo, Annie Baker’s The Antipodes, Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ Everybody, Edward Albee’s The Sandbox, María Irene Fornes’s Drowning, Adrienne Kennedy’s Funnyhouse of a Negro, and A.R. Gurney’s The Wayside Motor Inn at Signature Theatre; Sarah DeLappe’s The Wolves at Lincoln Center and Playwrights Realm; Zoe Kazan’s After the Blast andAbe Koogler’s Kill Floor at LCT3; Tracy Letts’s Mary Page Marlowe at Second Stage Theater; Peace for Mary Frances with The New Group; and Carson McCullers’s The Member of the Wedding at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. She is a co-Artistic Director of the ensemble The Mad Ones, with whom she has written and directed: Samuel & Alasdair: A Personal History of the Robot WarThe Essential Straight and Narrow, and Miles for Mary (which also played at Playwrights Horizons). She is the recipient of the Obie Award, Drama Desk Award, and Princess Grace Award winner.

Aaron Posner

Aaron Posner was the founding Artistic Director of Philadelphia’s Arden Theatre and is an Associate Artist at the Folger Theatre and Milwaukee Rep. He has received numerous awards as a director and playwright including a Theatre Bay Area Award, three Barrymore Awards, an Outer Critics Circle Award, The John Gassner Award, and six Helen Hayes Awards as a director or playwright. His plays include My Name is Asher Lev; The Chosen; Stupid Fucking Bird; Life Sucks (or the Present Ridiculous); Who Am I This Time? (And Other Conundrums of Love); Sometimes a Great Notion; A Murder, A Mystery & A Marriage (with James Sugg); and many others. Posner has directed more than 150 productions at major regional theatres across the country. Posner, from Eugene, Oregon, is an Eisenhower Fellow, a graduate of Northwestern University, and lives in the DC area with his wife, actress Erin Weaver, and his daughter Maisie.

(As of February 2017) 

Heidi Rodewald

Heidi Rodewald was co-composer of the musical Passing Strange, which transferred from The Public Theater to Broadway in 2008 where it was nominated for seven Tony Awards, including Best Musical, Best Original Score, and Best Orchestrations. Passing Strange won a Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best Musical, the 2008 Obie Award for Best New American Theater Piece and Best Ensemble, and was made into a film by Spike Lee. Rodewald joined The Negro Problem in 1997 and since then has worked alongside Stew, performing, producing, arranging, and composing. She is currently working on a new musical, Against You, a free adaptation of Antigone set in the 1960’s with librettist, Donna Di Novelli.

Steph Del Rosso

Steph Del Rosso is a playwright, film and television writer, and educator. Her plays include: 53% Of (Kendeda National Graduate Playwriting Award Winner, Alliance 2020), The Gradient (Victory Gardens Ignition Festival), Fill Fill Fill Fill Fill Fill Fill (The Flea), Machinalia (Jack), Are You There? (UCSD), and You're Crazy (a play with karaoke). She is the 19/20 Shank Playwright in Residence at The Public and a member of The Lark's Playground. Her work is published by Dramatists Play Service and has been developed by The Kennedy Center, New York Stage and Film, Ojai Playwrights Conference, Colt Coeur, SPACE on Ryder Farm, and others. She is an alum of the Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab and Clubbed Thumb's Emerging Writers' Group and is currently commissioned by Studio Theatre and La Jolla Playhouse. Steph holds an MFA from UC-San Diego.

Eric Ruffin

Eric Ruffin is a director and educator. His Off Broadway work includes Gutta Beautiful at the New Federal Theatre, and The Bear at HERE Arts Center. Regionally, his work includes A Raisin in the Sun at Crossroads Theatre; Topdog/Underdog and My Children! My Africa at Luna Stage; Public Ghosts/Private Stories at George Street Playhouse; 2-2 Tango at Studio 2ndStage; Black Nativity at Theatre Alliance; The Piano Lesson at The African Globe; Waiting to be Invited at The Black Theatre Troupe; In the Red and Brown WaterOff the Leash, Radio Golf, Sarafina!Venus, and Passing Strange at Howard University; Old Settler at African Continuum Theatre Company; and New Kid at Imagination Stage. He has received the New York Drama League Directing Fellowship, a Folger Theatre Acting Fellowship, and the Princess Grace Grant for Dance. He currently serves on the faculty of Howard University and Duke Ellington School of the Arts. He holds a BFA from Howard University and an MFA from Rutgers University. 

Emily Schwend

Emily Schwend's plays include Utility (The Amoralists in New York City, Orange Tree Theatre in London, Interrobang Theatre Project, 2016 Yale Drama Series Award, 2017 IT Award for Outstanding Premiere Production of a Play), The Other Thing (Second Stage Theatre Uptown), Take Me Back (Walkerspace), South Of Settling (Steppenwolf's Next Up Rep), and Splinters (CUDC Source Festival). She was a 2016-2017 Radcliffe Institute Fellow at Harvard University and the inaugural 2014 Tow Foundation playwright-in-residence at Second Stage Theatre. She is a frequent contributor to Christine Jones’s Theatre for One booth. She is the recipient of a Bogliasco Fellowship, a MacDowell Fellowship, the ACT New Play Award, the David Calicchio Emerging American Playwrights Prize, the Lecomte du Nouy Prize, and the Heideman Prize. Her work has been commissioned by Studio Theatre in DC, the Ensemble Studio Theatre through the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, and the Old Vic in London. She is a proud alumna of the playwriting programs at Juilliard and Tisch.

Stew

Stew wrote the book and co-wrote the music and lyrics to Passing Strange, for which he received the 2008 Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical, and four other Tony nominations including Best Musical. He is also a two-time Obie Award winner for Passing Strange (Best New Theater Piece and Best Ensemble). Stew leads a band called The Negro Problem (TNP), which created the song cycles “Making It” (St. Ann’s Warehouse) and “Brooklyn Omnibus” (Brooklyn Academy of Music). Stew is a member of The Sundance Institute Alumni Advisory Board and was Artist-in-Residence at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.

(As of March 2015) 




Anne Washburn

Anne Washburn is a New York based playwright. Anne’s plays include Mr. Burns, A Post Electric Play (New York Times Critic’s Pick; recently listed as #4 on the New York Times “The 25 Best American Plays Since ‘Angels in America’”), Shipwreck10 out of 12Antlia PneumaticaA Devil at NoonApparitionThe Communist Dracula PageantI Have Loved StrangersThe LadiesThe InternationalistThe Small, an adaptation of The Twilight Zone, and transadaptations of Euripides’ Orestes and Iphigenia in Aulis. Her work has been produced nationally and internationally and has premiered with 13P, Actors Theatre of Louisville, the Almeida Theatre, American Repertory Theater, Cherry Lane Theatre, Classic Stage Company, Clubbed Thumb, The Civilians, Dixon Place, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Folger Theatre, Playwrights Horizons, Soho Rep., Two River Theater, Vineyard Theatre, and Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company. Honors include a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Whiting Award, an Alpert Award in the Arts, a PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for artist in mid-career, a New York Film Academy Fellowship, a Time Warner Fellowship, and residencies at MacDowell Colony and Yaddo. She is an associated artist with The Civilians, Clubbed Thumb, New Georges, Chochiqq Backyard Theater, and is an alumna of New Dramatists. 

World Premieres at Studio

*Studio-commissioned work