Writing is Live 2015 runs February 6th through 8th at the Leeds Theatre on campus at Brown. Writing is Live celebrates the diversity and strength of new theatrical voices while simultaneously exploring the meaning of text in performance. The festival emphasizes the idea of what it means for writing to be Live. It also provides space for the development and evolution of new work, putting writers in conversation with directors, actors, designers, and the audience.
This year’s festival showcases one workshop and three readings. Rick Burkhardt ’16 MFA working with co-writer, Jermaine Golden, will workshop a new music-theater piece, Above The Noise. Readings of new plays by Diane Exavier ’17 MFA, Carlos Sirah ’17 MFA, and Sophie Netanel ’15 MFA will also be presented. The plays are acted and directed by students in the Brown/Trinity M.F.A. programs, Brown University’s undergraduate programs, and the community at large. This year the winter festival focuses exclusively on work-in-development. A fully realized production of work by graduating writer, Katie Pearl ’15 MFA, will follow in the spring.
A central site in New England for the formation of new playwrights, Brown’s graduate Playwriting M.F.A. program grants its students broad inventive license while offering close mentorship and profound resources in the department, the university, and the greater local to international communities. Run by playwright and department Chair, Erik Ehn, the program cultivates writers dedicated to the development of their craft, the deep interrogation of the forms and purposes of their art (and of the place of art in the larger world), and a leaning into authentic transformation of society through theatrical action. Alumni of the program include Pulitzer Prize winner, Quiara Alegría Hudes ’04 MFA (In the Heights, Water by the Spoonful); MacArthur Genius Grantee, Nilo Cruz ’94 MFA (Anna in the Tropics); and Pulitzer Prize nominee, Sarah Ruhl ’01 MFA (The Clean House, In the Next Room). The festival (formerly the New Plays Festival) is made possible through support from an endowed fund for the Adele Kellenberg Seaver ’49 Professorship in Literary Arts.
Writing Is Live runs February 6th through 8th in Leeds Theatre, 83 Waterman Street, Providence, RI 02912. Tickets for all festival events are free and available online at brown.edu/tickets or from the Brown Theatre Box Office. Call (401) 863-2838, or visit the Box Office in the Leeds Theatre Lobby (83 Waterman St, Providence), Tuesday - Friday from 12pm - 4pm, or email boxoffice@brown.edu.
A full schedule and biographies of the writers are available at www.writingislive.com.
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If you have any questions or to schedule an interview with any of the festival’s participants, including the Playwriting M.F.A. students and program head, Erik Ehn, please contact writingislive@gmail.com or call 401-863-2730.
Contact: Paul Margrave, Marketing Coordinator
(401) 863-2730 / paul_margrave@brown.edu / brown.edu/tickets