Eventide Theatre Company Launches Playwrights ETC

We’re delighted to announce the launch of a new-works lab that will give Cape Cod playwrights a path from concept to production. 

According to Eventide Artistic Director Chris Edwards, “We expect Playwrights ETC to be a nucleus in fulfilling Eventide’s mission to nurture the Cape theater community. With peer-to-peer feedback, playwrights will explore new opportunities and create new insights. We can’t wait to see what Cape Cod’s playwrights will produce.”

Each quarter, the lab will accept 12 playwrights who wish to develop new works into a core working group. Three additional “drop in” seats will be open each meeting for playwrights looking for more casual feedback.

Experienced as well as first-time playwrights will be welcomed equally. Each meeting will include 20- and 30-minute slots that playwrights will use to share works in progress and receive constructive feedback from other lab members. 

Each year, the lab will name a Playwright in Residence. For the inaugural year, Wellfleet’s Candace Perry will take the chair, serving as a peer in the lab as well as a source of feedback. Perry, whose full-length play Meridian Summer was a Kaplan award winner, recently taught Eventide’s summer Masterclass on writing the short play.

Perry notes, “We’re creating a place of shared creativity that provides two very important things for successful playwrights: honest feedback and deadlines. We’re also thrilled to be providing a way for playwrights to get beyond the page to the stage.”

The playwrights lab will meet biweekly beginning October 11th.

For more information or to secure a slot, please send an email to: playwrightsetc@eventidearts.org.

Playwrights ETC will produce quarterly showcases of new works developed during each session, as well as twice-yearly festivals (Spring and Fall) of general new works under the Eventide Theatre Company umbrella.

Each quarterly showcase will feature top Cape Cod acting and directing talent performing for producers and other invited audience members. The twice-yearly festivals will feature staged productions of finished works of one act or less, and be open to the public. Lab members working on full-length plays will be encouraged to enter Eventide’s annual Kaplan New Playwrights / New Plays competition.

The Lab is the fourth artistic-development program created by the theater company. It joins the Kaplan competition, the New England Songwriting Competition, and a recently launched Masterclass series, which embraces topics from acting to directing, to stage management and other technical arts.

*Please note that you must be a member of Eventide Theatre Company in order to join the Playwrights Lab. For more information about membership, please click on the button below.