Brown MFA Playwriting
Writing is Live Festival 2025
Assistant Director Information & Application
Would you like to gain experience working with new plays in process?
Are you interested in shadowing an experienced director as they collaborate with Brown playwrights?
Apply to be an assistant director!
You’ll attend rehearsals of a staged reading, reading, or workshop production, assisting the director with note-taking, rehearsal tasks, and more. Be a part of the process!
Assistant Directors on Thesis Productions are eligible to take the 1/2 credit Theatre Production Practicum.
Each play has a different number of rehearsals…see below for info.
Applications are due by Monday Dec 15
Apply Here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSc9lFg0cz4B5kHX0wrxgCPQUrZIRBM_ect4nd0gnSFPD38HzQ/viewform
Please contact Creative Producer, Aileen Wen McGroddy, aileen_mcgroddy@brown.edu, with any questions.
| Third-Year Thesis Workshop Productions (appx. 5 rehearsals per week) First Rehearsal: January 21, 2026 Performances: March 4 - 8 |
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Private Parts by Brian Dang ‘26 MFA Directed by Gregory K Strasser It’s July 23rd, 1982 on the set of Twilight Zone: the Movie. Myca and Renee are waiting to film their scene. Maybe this is what happened. |
Eternity, Arizona by Jimmy Fay ‘26 MFA Night settles over Eternity, Arizona, Population: 43. A teenage girl walks into the wash. An outlaw arrives, running |
| Second-Year Staged Readings (appx. 3-4 rehearsals per week) First Rehearsal: no earlier than February 2, 2026 Performances: March 4 - 8 |
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Untitled Surrogacy Play / Carry by Savannah Lyons Anthony ‘27 MFA Directed by Sarah Blush In 1700’s St. John, Breffu, a slave, plots a rebellion. Hundreds of years later in Los Angeles, Breanna is being sued by the woman who hired her as a surrogate. Both women push themselves to extraordinary lengths in the search for their autonomy and find each other floating in the abyss. |
Deliver Us! by James La Bella MFA ‘27 Directed by Sammy Zeisel A men’s group tries to solve the male loneliness epidemic through the transformative power of drama. In a dingy church basement, they pack up a canoe and take an imagined trip downriver, enacting increasingly unnerving fantasies along the way. |
| First-Year Readings (appx. 2-3 rehearsals per week) First Rehearsal: no earlier than February 2, 2026 Performances: March 4 - 8 |
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bad maidens; the tale of the beginning of the end of the beggar’s benison the beggar’s benison was a sacred order of knights in 1700s Scotland devoted to the study and reverence of male sexuality, to making sex not-weird and not-shameful. “bad maidens” centers on the lass’ (lassies? lassi?) that did the dirty work for the order. we explore the notion that maybe homoerotic hangouts are not just not-weird, maybe it's super awesome. maybe penis-touching and cumming on a plate with your boys is the key to true liberation. and maybe, that story is better told by the maidens, and not the boys. maybe. |