Monthly Archives :

February 2022

Lyric Blockbusting, with Marcy Heisler

 640 433 Play Penn

Creating contemporary lyrics via an interactive lyric writing workshop.

Class Description

Join Marcy Heisler in a hands-on interactive writing workshop in which lyricists expand the boundaries of their creative toolkit. With a core of instructor-based assignments grounded in professional experience, writers will complete assignments built on themes of adaptation, collaboration, production environment, and more.

Dates & Times

March 10, 17, 24, 31, 6:30-9:30pm EST

Where

Online (via Zoom)

Bio

Marcy Heisler is a bookwriter/lyricist, performer, poet, author and educator. Primarily working with composer Zina Goldrich, current collaborations include: Ever After (Book/Lyrics), Breathe (Lyrics), Hollywood Romance (Lyrics), Dear Edwina (Book/Lyrics, Drama Desk nomination), Snow White, Rose Red and Fred (Book/Lyrics, Helen Hayes nomination), Junie B Jones, The Musical (Book/Lyrics, Lucille Lortel nomination) Junie B’s Essential Survival Guide to School (Book/Lyrics), The Great American Mousical (Lyrics), and others. Additionally, she is working on Williamsburg, which was recently workshopped at New York Stage and Film in collaboration with Pultizer-prize winning composer Tom Kitt, Emmy Award winning author Jason Katims, and Hamilton producer Jeffrey Seller. She collaborated with Concord composer Georgia Stitt on Alphabet City Cycle, which was based upon her poetry. Her songs have been featured in numerous projects for Disney, ABC, NPR and PBS, and she is co-lyricist of Little Did I Know, a podcast musical collaboration with Doug Besterman and Dean Pitchford. Awards include the 2012 Kleban Prize for Lyrics, 2009 Fred Ebb Award (co-recipient) for outstanding songwriting, the 2012 ASCAP Rodgers and Hart Award, the ASCAP New Horizons Theatre Award, and the Seldes-Kanin Fellowship. She is a Concord publishing artist and her collected works are available at Hal Leonard.

$225

Tuition

Register Here

Click the link below to visit our Reservation Page, where you can view all classes and register for this course. For questions or to inquire about payment plans, please email classes@playpenn.org.

Sign Up

“Writing can be a lonely road. I’m thankful that Philadelphia offers the supportive, talented PlayPenn community.”

-Joe G., 2020 Participant

“I walked away with an arsenal of guidelines for what makes a high-concept play, but also with half a notebook full of fantastic off-the-cuff breakthroughs and exercises.”

-Danielle B., 2019 Participant

Building a First Draft, with Phillip Christian Smith

 640 433 Play Penn

The focus of the class will be on moving forward without getting stuck, and making that great idea, a visceral reality, words on paper.

Class Description

Students will bring in 5-10 pages a week, those pages will be workshopped in a safe Lerman styled manner. Through, what stuck out to you (popcorn), questions the class has, and questions the writer has, we hope to inspire the playwright to write vigoursly and more effectively by seeing what impact it is having on the class IE what is coming across. A little positive and kind feedback can be a strong motivational factor for an emerging playwright.

Dates & Times

March 18, 25, April 1, 8, 7-9pm EST

Where

Online (via Zoom)

Required Prep

Bring 5 pages of a new idea to the first class, if possible – from there in, 5-10 pages of writing will be required for each week’s class.

Bio

Phillip Christian Smith is a 2021 O’Neill (NPC) Finalist for his drag ball adaptation of The Importance of Being Earnest titled: A Handbag is Not a Proper Mutha, 2020-21 Playwrights Realm Fellow, Lambda Literary Fellow, Winter Playwrights Retreat, Blue Ink Playwriting Award Semi-Finalist, Finalist for The Dramatists Guild Fellowship and New Dramatists, Finalist and Semi-finalist PlayPenn, Two time Semi-finalist for The O’Neill (NPC), and runner- up in The Theatre of Risk Modern Tragedy writing competition for his play The Chechens, which also won Theatre Conspiracy’s playwriting award, and recently had its third production at Alliance for the Arts. He has been a semi-finalist for Shakespeare’s New Contemporaries (ASC), finalist for Trustus, former Playwright in Residence Exquisite Corpse and founding member of The Playwriting Collective. 2021 Playwright in Residence: Quicksilver Theatre’s Playwrights of Color Summit. Co-Literary Director of Exquisite Corpse Company. His work has been supported by The Fire This Time Festival, Bennington College, Primary Stages (Cherry Lane) ESPA, Fresh Ground Pepper, and the 53rd Street New York Public Library. MFA Yale School of Drama, BFA University of New Mexico. MFA Hunter ’23.

$150

Tuition

Register Here

Click the link below to visit our Reservation Page, where you can view all classes and register for this course. For questions or to inquire about payment plans, please email classes@playpenn.org.

Sign Up

“Writing can be a lonely road. I’m thankful that Philadelphia offers the supportive, talented PlayPenn community.”

-Joe G., 2020 Participant

“I walked away with an arsenal of guidelines for what makes a high-concept play, but also with half a notebook full of fantastic off-the-cuff breakthroughs and exercises.”

-Danielle B., 2019 Participant

The Polish, with Jule Selbo

 640 433 Play Penn

It’s important for a playwright, after the first solid draft of a play is completed, to be able to step back and analyze the elements of their work.

Class Description

Are the characters clear? Is there a purpose for the piece? What themes are creeping to the forefront? What does the writer want the audience to “get” from the piece? Is it ready to be produced? Do all elements have a clarity to them, so the reader/producer will understand the writer’s intent? We will work as a group, and also individually, to explore the questions (and more) stated above. Exercises will help generate new content. The plays will be workshopped during the class sessions.

Dates & Times

March 21, 28, April 4, 11, 7-9pm EST

Where

Online (via Zoom)

Required Prep

A completed first draft of a play. Instructor will provide reading material.

Bio

Jule Selbo loves story – and she writes in many mediums (theatrical plays, screenplays, novels, non-fiction). Her plays have been produced in New York and Los Angeles and in regional theaters. Isolate (directed by Allan Wasserman) was awarded the LA Women’s Playwrighting Prize (1992), Boxes, a nominee for the Valley Awards (directed by Mary Lou Belli), premiered at Theater West (2015) and most recently produced (in 2019) at Good Theatre in Portland, Maine to sold out houses and excellent reviews. One-acts include Open Door (Theater West) The Wedding (Actors Theater Louisville), Two Not So Tall Women (Interact Theatre); her short play Miss Julie was chosen for the LA Pride Festival Zoom reading series and for Acorn Theater’s Spring Festival (postponed because of Covid). Her play, Lake Girls has enjoyed staged readings and is on a short list for possible 2021 production. She’s a produced screenwriter in both film and tv, she’s written “story podcasts” and also for bookshelves (four books so far); her latest novel, 10 DAYS, A Dee Rommel Mystery has been nominated for a 2021 Clue Award. She has also written academic texts on screenwriting, film history. She helped shape the playwriting department at California State University and started a one-act festival at the university; she has taught playwriting workshops in LA, NYC, Maine and Florence, Italy. Her focus, as an instructor, is to help each writer find the core of the work and to help get it ready for an audience. Check out her website https://www.juleselbo.com

$200

Tuition

Register Here

Click the link below to visit our Reservation Page, where you can view all classes and register for this course. For questions or to inquire about payment plans, please email classes@playpenn.org.

Sign Up

“Writing can be a lonely road. I’m thankful that Philadelphia offers the supportive, talented PlayPenn community.”

-Joe G., 2020 Participant

“I walked away with an arsenal of guidelines for what makes a high-concept play, but also with half a notebook full of fantastic off-the-cuff breakthroughs and exercises.”

-Danielle B., 2019 Participant

Dynamic Dialogue, with Chisa Hutchinson

 640 433 Play Penn

How to (you know) write dynamic dialogue.

Class Description

We’ve all been there. You’ve ruminated on an idea for a play. Dreamed up some really compelling characters. Even outlined major plot points in the shower one morning. Like you know exactly how you want the thing to end and everything. But then you sit down to start writing it and read that first scene out loud and go, “Ughch, all my characters all sound the same,” or “Man, this feels so flat.”

THAT. That’s what this class is for: avoiding that shit. I’ll break dialogue down into elements and give you some tips for how to create dialogue that feels both authentic to your characters and engaging to your audience. Along the way, I will give you two short assignments that will challenge you to flex your dialogue muscles, and we will workshop your work.

Dates & Times

March 26, 2-5pm EST

Where

Online (via Zoom)

Required Prep

Just bring something to write on or with.

Bio

Chisa Hutchinson (B.A. Vassar College; M.F.A NYU – TSoA) has presented her plays, which include She Like Girls, Somebody’s Daughter, Surely Goodness And Mercy, Whitelisted and Dead & Breathing at such venues as the Lark Theater, Atlantic Theater Company, CATF, the National Black Theatre, Second Stage Theater and Arch 468 in London. Her radio drama, Proof of Love, can be found on Audible (with a pretty boss rating). She has been a Dramatists Guild Fellow, a Lark Fellow, a NeoFuturist, and a staff writer for the Blue Man Group. She’s won a GLAAD Award, a Lilly Award, a New York Innovative Theatre Award, a Helen Merrill Award, and the Lanford Wilson Award. Currently, Chisa is standing by for production on a new TV series she helped write for Showtime, and is about to embark on another with producers Karamo Brown (Queer Eye) and Stephanie Allain (Hustle & Flow, Dear White People). Her first original feature, THE SUBJECT, an indie about a white documentarian dealing with the moral fallout from exploiting the death of a black teen, is available on various VOD platforms after a successful film festival circuit during which it won over 30 prizes. To learn more, visit www.chisahutchinson.com .

$50

Tuition

Register Here

Click the link below to visit our Reservation Page, where you can view all classes and register for this course. For questions or to inquire about payment plans, please email classes@playpenn.org.

Sign Up

“Writing can be a lonely road. I’m thankful that Philadelphia offers the supportive, talented PlayPenn community.”

-Joe G., 2020 Participant

“I walked away with an arsenal of guidelines for what makes a high-concept play, but also with half a notebook full of fantastic off-the-cuff breakthroughs and exercises.”

-Danielle B., 2019 Participant