5 Questions with Teaching Artist Tara Henderson

Tara Henderson has a long history with Playwrights Theatre both as a teaching artist and an actor. She's currently teaching a playwriting residency at Torey J. Sabatini Elementary School as part of the annual Madison Young Playwrights Program.

Young playwrights share the current drafts of their plays with Tara

We recently asked Tara 5 Questions about being a teaching artist, an actor/singer and what it's like to be a princess. Here's what she had to say:

1. How many years have you been a teaching artist? What do you love best about being a teaching artist?

I have been a teaching artist for 5 years. I love introducing and developing young people’s abilities in something that it is such an integral part of my own life. I also love watching my students’ growth and seeing the confidence that it instills in them.

2. What do you bring to the classroom from your own personal artistic experiences?

I use a lot of the same warm-ups, games and exercises that I myself have used as an actress and a singer throughout my many years of training and performing. As a performer first, I feel that it gives me a great sense of what works and enables me to teach my students on a more personal level.

3. You’ve performed as an actor for the MYPF and the NJYP Festival. Can you explain what kind of impact this has had on your teaching methods for the classroom?



Tara rehearses a NJ Young Playwrights Festival
script with fellow actors

 It has been a great help to me performing as an actor in these festivals prior to teaching the young playwrights program. Having in-depth experience with the program on a performance level prior to stepping in to the classroom has enabled me gain insights of how to structure my lesson plans and give better feedback to my students during the revision process. In addition, I was able to watch other teaching artists give feedback to the young playwrights during rehearsals. I was able to learn first hand what methods are effective in order to best help encourage and also develop their work.

4. Why do you enjoy performing the plays in the MYPF and NYP Festival? How is this different or the same as performing in an play that has been written by an adult?

It is a lot more fun! I get to play all kinds of characters that I would never get to play. Our young playwrights in some ways are much more imaginative than adult playwrights because they approach writing with a child’s creativity, imagination and enthusiasm. I also love doing plays where I get to play multiply characters within a piece and both play festivals often give me that opportunity.

5. We’ve heard that you are a Princess at Medieval Times. What can you tell us about that experience? Has it helped you in any way guide students that want to write fantasy plays?

Every girl dreams of being a princess, so in many ways I am living every girl’s dream. But in all seriousness I love performing in a role that so many young girls look up to; the look in their eyes when they first see me is so heartwarming! I love being a part of something that encourages audiences both young and old to embrace their imagination and child like sense of fantasy. Performing as the princess has enabled me to form a greater connection to my own imagination and sense of fantasy, which has definitely helped become more in tune with my students who long to explore fantasy writing. Having first hand experience with that type of world I feel gives me the opportunity to guide my students’ writing from an insider’s approach.

5 Questions with Joe Sutton

The 9th reading in our FORUM "Soundings" series is THE LISTING by Joe Sutton. This reading will begin at 7pm on December 22, 2012, and will be held at Fairleigh Dickinson University, Dreyfuss Theatre, 285 Madison Avenue, Madison, NJ. Click here for directions. Click here for a printable map of the campus (the Dreyfuss Theatre is located in Building 9).

Rich has landed a job out of state and the sale of  beloved home reveals a long-simmering rift between him and his wife Nora. Moving backwards in time from the present to the presidential election of 2000, this couple’s life in their house is set against the backdrop of the national events of the past 12 years.

Joe Sutton plays include Voir Dire (nominated for the Pulitzer Prize and the Best Play Award of the American Theatre Critics Association), As It is in Heaven, The Winner,The Third Army, and Restoring the Sun. Joe co-wrote The Predator’s Ball with Karole Armitage, and saw the piece premiere in Florence, Italy before enjoying a run at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.  Other theatres producing Joe’s plays include New York Theater Workshop, Long Wharf, Arena Stage, the Cleveland Play House, and the Old Globe in San Diego.  After Hurricane Katrina, Joe initiated The Breach, a New Orleans-centered theatre piece co-written with Catherine Filloux and Tarell Alvin McCraney which premiered at New Orleans’ Southern Rep before going on to play at Seattle Rep.  More recently, Joe’s play Complicit opened at London’s Old Vic with Artistic Director Kevin Spacey directing. Joe has also recently been developing a pilot of USA television called Scales of Justice, about an overweight detective in post-Katrina New Orleans. Joe is a recipient of numerous awards and honors, among them fellowships from NYFA, the NEA, and NJ Arts.  When not in rehearsal, Joe teaches playwriting at Dartmouth College.  There he lives with his wife Anne and their son Nicholas.

1. What inspired your to write THE LISTING?
The immediate inspiration is we sold our house (of ten years) and moved to New Hampshire. So some of the experience of the play (but pray not all the dysfunctionality) resembles our own. In a larger sense, I wanted to write about this moment in our history, our economy, and about the baby boomer generation and the decisions we've made.

2. You have co-written THE PREDATOR'S BALL and THE BREACH. What do you enjoy this type of collaboration? 
They were not quite the same. On THE PREDATOR'S BALL, I was brought into the process rather late. On THE BREACH, I initiated the process. Both were challenging. Theater is by nature a collaborative art form; so one is always in dialogue with other artists. However, adding another layer to that discussion – one that involves other writers for instance – can make an already challenging situation even more challenging. That said, there are projects one must become involved in, no matter what the challenges. These were that type.

3. Your play COMPLICIT opened at London's Old Vic with Artistic Director, Kevin Spacey, directing. Did you work closely with him on the rehearsal process?
Once we got into rehearsal, I was involved in many of the rehearsals. We also had a very lengthy preview period, and I was involved in that as well.

4. What can you tell us about the pilot you are developing for USA television?
Again, it was an interesting process -- but unfortunately the pilot was not picked up. The idea for the show amused me a greal deal. First, it was set in New Orleans -- and I picked that city because I'd grown to love it during the writing and research for THE BREACH. The actual show idea involved a grossly overweight homocide cop who is fired from his job because of weight issues. Or at least that's the pretext for his firing (he also has  big mouth). His respose to the firing is to become a private eye -- but he comes to this idea after he's enrolled in Weight Watchers...and finds himself the only man in a roomful of ladies -- all of who seem to dote on him...and offer themselves to him as his information posse. The character was named Bartholomew Justice...and the show, punning on the weight/Weight Watchers idea, was called SCALES OF JUSTICE.

5. Besides seeing the premiere of THE PREDATOR'S BALL in Florence, what was your favorite thing in this city?
The Pitti Palace. There is a room in this famous museum/gallery where you can stand and see about a half dozen Titans...in various other rooms. I was stunned by that.

♦ Playwrights Theatre will present these readings free of charge, with an optional donation of $10

♦ A $25 dollar donation will get you a FORUM pass that covers all of the readings.

♦ A $250 donation will get you a rehearsal pass that allows access to all reading rehearsals.

♦ Reservations can be made online at or call (973) 514-1787 X10

Click here to reserve your seat to see THE LISTING.
You can also find additional information on our website about the entire FORUM reading series.

5 Questions with John Biguenet

The 8th reading in our FORUM "Soundings" series is BROOMSTICK by John Biguenet. This reading will begin at 7pm on December 21, 2012, and will be held at Fairleigh Dickinson University, Dreyfuss Theatre, 285 Madison Avenue, Madison, NJ. Click here for directions. Click here for a printable map of the campus (the Dreyfuss Theatre is located in Building 9).

In Broomstick, a witch confesses all—her first love affair, how she discovered her powers, how she has used them. But more than that, it is a funny and frightening return to our childhoods, where we first wrestled with evil and justice. For the witch is a completely unsentimental moralist who knows everything about the human heart—having been both its victim and avenger all her long life—and who metes out inexorable justice, immune to our pleas for mercy, cackling at our excuses. In Broomstick, whiners wind up in casseroles.

John Biguenet has published seven books, including Oyster, a novel, and The Torturer's Apprentice: Stories, released in the U.S. by Ecco/HarperCollins and widely translated. His work has received an O. Henry Award for short fiction and a Harper's Magazine Writing Award among other distinctions, and his poems, stories, plays, and essays have been reprinted or cited in The Best American Mystery Stories, Prize Stories: The O. Henry Awards, The Best American Short Stories, Best Music Writing, Contemporary Poetry in America, Katrina on Stage, and various other anthologies. His work has appeared in such magazines as Granta, Esquire, North American Review, Oxford American, Southern Review, Storie (Rome), Story, and Zoetrope. Named its first guest columnist by The New York Times, Biguenet chronicled in both columns and videos his return to New Orleans after its catastrophic flooding and the efforts to rebuild the city.

Biguenet’s radio play Wundmale, which premiered on Westdeutscher Rundfunk, Germany's largest radio network, was rebroadcast by Österreichischer Rundfunk, the Austrian national radio and television network. Two of his stories have been featured in Selected Shorts at Symphony Space on Broadway, the Long Wharf Theatre, and elsewhere. The Vulgar Soul won the 2004 Southern New Plays Festival and was a featured production in 2005 at Southern Rep Theatre; he and the play were profiled in American Theatre magazine. Rising Water was the winner of the 2006 National New Play Network Commission Award, a 2006 National Showcase of New Plays selection, and a 2007 recipient of an Access to Artistic Excellence development and production grant from the National Endowment for the Arts as well as the 2007 Big Easy Theatre Award for Best Original Play; it has had numerous productions around the country. In 2008, Biguenet was named Theatre Person of the Year at the Big Easy Theatre Awards, the region’s major professional theater awards. Shotgun, the second play in his Rising Water cycle, premiered in 2009 at Southern Rep Theatre, with subsequent productions at the Orlando Shakespeare Theater, Florida Studio Theatre, and elsewhere; it won a 2009 National New Play Network Continued Life of New Plays Fund Award and was a 2009 recipient of an Access to Artistic Excellence development and production grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. Shotgun is published by Dramatists Play Service, Inc. He was awarded a Marquette Fellowship for the writing of Night Train, his new play, which he developed on a Studio Attachment at the National Theatre in London and which premiered at New Jersey Rep Theatre in 2011. Broomstick, currently in development, has had staged readings over the past year at Stages Rep in Houston, the Tennessee Williams Festival in New Orleans, and Portland Stage in Maine; it will premiere at New Jersey Rep Theatre in 2013. The third play in his Rising Water cycle, Mold, will premiere in 2013 at Southern Rep Theatre. This ongoing cycle of plays about the flooding of New Orleans has been the subject of articles in American Theatre, The American Scholar, and elsewhere. He is the recipient of the 2012 Louisiana Writer Award.

Having served twice as president of the American Literary Translators Association and as writer-in-residence at various universities, he is currently the Robert Hunter Distinguished University Professor at Loyola University in New Orleans.

1. What inspired you to write BROOMSTICK?
When an actress who had been in two of my previous shows asked if I had a one-woman script she could perform, I thought it might be interesting to write a play about the confessions of a witch.  The funny, formidable character I’ve wound up with returns us to our childhoods, where we first wrestled with notions of evil and justice.  But the story she tells is certainly not appropriate for children and certainly makes clear why men were frightened enough of old women—full of experience and knowledge and not in need of a man for anything—to brand them as witches.

2. Does this play have a strong New Orleans witch influence or would you say it is more universal?

After writing so much about the flooding of New Orleans following the collapse of its levees, I wanted to work on something unrelated to my daily life in a city in ruins.  The witch is an old mountain woman with a country accent, perhaps Appalachian.  She has never been to Louisiana or anywhere else far distant from the woods where she lives.  But she shares characteristics and kinds of knowledge widely associated with witchcraft around the world.  Her neighbors, for example, think she has a third nipple to suckle her familiars.  Of course, maybe she’s just a half-crazy old hag who tells people she’s a witch to frighten them off.  Then again, though, maybe she really is exactly what she says she is.

3. Your radio play Wundmale premiered on Westdeutscher Rundfunk, Germany's largest radio network, and was rebroadcast by Österreichischer Rundfunk, the Austrian national radio and television network. Was it written and performed in English or did they translate it? If it was translated, how close was it to your original words? 
Wundmale was translated from my English text by Denis Scheck, a wonderful German critic and translator.  So it was as close to the English as German can get.  I later wrote a full-length stage version of Wundmale entitled The Vulgar Soul, which premiered at Southern Rep Theatre and became the best-selling new play in its history.  The Vulgar Soul is the story of a man without any religious faith who develops the stigmata of the Crucifixion, his efforts to rid himself of the wounds, and what happens to him when they disappear.

4. Your play Rising Water had its New Jersey premiere on our stage in October 2008 and was written in response to Hurricane Katrina. With Hurricane Sandy recently destroying the Jersey Shore what advice would you give to a playwright who wanted to write a play about this disaster?
Before living through the flooding of New Orleans and its aftermath, I would not have guessed that love stories might serve as the best narrative structures to examine the consequences of a massive catastrophe.  But all three plays in my trilogy use love as the lens through which the human toll of such events can be understood.  So my advice to New Jersey playwrights is simply show what saltwater can do to a relationship.

5. If you were going on an adventure, who would you choose as your travel partner: witch, werewolf or vampire? And why?

Considering what I learned writing Broomstick, I’d have to choose a witch as my traveling companion.  An older, independent woman has seen it all and knows what to do about most problems—and don’t forget the great stories she has to tell on a long journey about all those whining children and hypocritical women and cruel men she encountered in her life who wound up in casseroles!

♦ Playwrights Theatre will present these readings free of charge, with an optional donation of $10

♦ A $25 dollar donation will get you a FORUM pass that covers all of the readings.

♦ A $250 donation will get you a rehearsal pass that allows access to all reading rehearsals.

♦ Reservations can be made online at or call (973) 514-1787 X10

Click here to reserve your seat to see BROOMSTICK.

You can also find additional information on our website about the entire FORUM reading series.

5 Questions with Rufus Caleb

The 7th reading in our FORUM "Soundings" series is THE MOST FAMOUS NEGRO IN AMERICA by Rufus Caleb. This reading will begin at 7pm on December 20, 2012, and will be held at Fairleigh Dickinson University, Dreyfuss Theatre, 285 Madison Avenue, Madison, NJ. Click here for directions. Click here for a printable map of the campus (the Dreyfuss Theatre is located in Building 9). 

Huddie “Ledbelly” Ledbetter, the famous convict and blues man, and John Lomax, the cultural anthropologist for the Smithsonian Institute, were an odd pair traveling through the South collecting prison songs during the Great Depression. This play traces the often humorous, often tense, relationship that developed as Huddie became a musical sensation under the watchful eye Lomax, and looks at the choices artists must make to practice their craft in America.

Rufus Caleb theatre credits include FROM GOOD EVENING TO GOOD NIGHT: RICHARD & JIMI, FATHERS AND SONS, SLAVE COFFLE WITH OBSERVER, WASTED, MY DUNGEON SHOOK, JEAN TOOMER’S CANE, PROLOGUE TO FREEDOM, CITY LIGHTS—AN URBAN SPRAWL. He has also written for television: I WALKED A DARK AND DANGEROUS MOON (WHYY-TV, PBS, Philadelphia), JEHOVAH’S WITNESS (WHYY-TV, PBS, Philadelphia), MEN OF BRONZE (ABC-TV mini-series, unproduced) and BENNY’S PLACE (ABC-TV). For radio, Rufus has written THE REHEARSAL (WNYC’s The Radio Stage), TEN NOTES (WNYC-Radio), MOODS FOR JAZZ (a choral adaptation of Langston Hughes’s ASK YOUR MAMA: TWELVE MOODS FOR JAZZ), THE BALLAD OF MISTUH JACK (commissioned by New American Radio) and THE DEVIL AND UNCLE ASA (commissioned for WNYC’s The Radio Stage).

His play FATHERS AND SONS was nominated for “Best New Jersey Play” by THE STAR-LEDGER in 2000. THE REHEARSAL was selected for “The Best Short American Plays, 1996-1997” by Applause Books. He received the “Special Achievement Award” in the 1993 Community Radio Awards, National Federation of Community Broadcasters for THE DEVIL AND UNCLE ASA. He received additional artistic recognition for BENNY’S PLACE as it was nominated for “Original Television Drama” in the 1982 Writers Guild of America TV/Radio Writing Awards. His received the “The Humanitas Certificate” for humanizing achievement in television from the Human Family Education and Cultural Institute. He had a nomination for “Best TV Movie” at the 1982 Beverly Hills-Hollywood NMCP Image Awards as well as “The 10 Best TV Movies of 1982” selection by Judith Christ for TV Guide Magazine. Rufus was a “Theatre Award” recipient for best conference play, 1981 Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference.

His publications include: SLAVE COFFLE WITH OBSERVER, in Rowing To America: The Immigrant Project. Edited by John Pietrowski. Woodstock, Illinois: Dramatic Publishing Company, 1999. THE REHEARSAL, was published in THE BEST SHORT AMERICAN PLAYS 1996-1997. Edited by Bert Sugarman. New York: Applause Books. OEDIPUS AND ME, poem and dramaturgy notes for Gospel at Colonus production, The People’s Light and Theatre Company, 1995. STRENGTHENING ORGANIZATIONS TO FULFILL COMMUNITY NEEDS, in CULTURAL DIVERSITY. Edited by Laura Costello. Washington, D.C.: National Endowment for the Arts. He has had a variety of short stories and poetry published in: HOO DOO, BLACK SERIES; JOURNAL OF BLACK POETRY; MARYLAND REVIEW; OBSIDIAN; POETRY, NOW; SALOME; SHENANDOAH; WILLIAM AND MARY REVIEW. He was also the Editor of PENNSYLVANIA ENGLISH, Journal of the Pennsylvania College English Association, 1976-1980 and a Philadelphia and an Arts Reviewer of PEFORMANCE MAGAZINE, 1972-1973, Baltimore, Maryland.

1. What inspired you to write MOST FAMOUS NEGRO IN AMERICA?
I had written a short piece about Little Richard and a young Jimi Hendrix--whom Richard hired as a tour musician in 1963. The conceit in the piece was a rehearsal of the song, "Goodnight, Irene," generally attributed to Lead Belly. the song lead me to Lead belly's life and his release from prison at the height of the Great Depression and the advent of modern celebrity.

2. What is your favorite blues singer and why?
Chester "Howlin' Wolf” Burnett. I love his thick, raspy voice, his superb swooping guitar playing, and the irony in his lyrics.

3. You've written for stage and television both of which are visual mediums. When you write for radio, how do you help create those images for folks that are listening?

Maybe more than creating images is the idea that, over radio, silence is incomprehensible. So I tried for words were interesting and provocative for the ear, placed into continuous ‘sound beds’—the visuals that film presents—making every second accountable.

4. Your play looks at the choices artists must make to practice their craft in America. What choices have you made to practice your craft?

I chose teaching.  Having grown up in a large working class family that hobbled along financially, even with two parents working, I could not not have a job. And college teaching gave me the kind of independence from direct supervision that has been good for me.  I’d also have to suggest that, as much as I wish I could write the kind of scripts that make money, I don’t have that kind of talent. And finally, teaching has allowed me to be sure I live my life.

5. Will you share with us your favorite poem that you have written?

GREAT-UNCLES

Age draped about his back
like the hair shirts of citizen priests
he sits within reach of the sun
has come years to this:
idling in the city’s vortex
legs crossed in the manner
of the old: composed secretly important
he stirs begins to argue
with himself with memories
his face yells out
raised eyebrows speculate
he stops to consider attacks
twisting his mouth flashing purple gums

My great-uncle came home
unbalanced they said
by the Great War stepped
into a swarming street
directed traffic to a standstill
until they whispered him back
to live in the warm part of the house

I lay on the grass
just outside his shallow vision
watching another Black man
slip in and out of battle
pressing his life to himself
like fingers over fresh wounds
promise I will leave this park
before I am old with personal histories


♦ Playwrights Theatre will present these readings free of charge, with an optional donation of $10

♦ A $25 dollar donation will get you a FORUM pass that covers all of the readings.

♦ A $250 donation will get you a rehearsal pass that allows access to all reading rehearsals.

♦ Reservations can be made online at or call (973) 514-1787 X10

Click here to reserve your seat to see MOST FAMOUS NEGRO IN AMERICA.

You can also find additional information on our website about the entire FORUM reading series.

 

5 Questions with Dominique Cieri

The 5th reading in our FORUM "Soundings" series is THE BABY KILLER PLAY by Dominique Cieri. This reading will begin at 7pm on December 18, 2012, and will be held at Fairleigh Dickinson University, Dreyfuss Theatre, 285 Madison Avenue, Madison, NJ. Click here for directions. Click here for a printable map of the campus (the Dreyfuss Theatre is located in Building 9).

On June 3, 2000, 18-year old Martita G. dropped her 17-month old son into the Passaic River. In this intense and probing play, the story leading up to this inexplicable act is set side-by-side with a forty-two year-old woman who is desperately trying to have her first child. Cieri’s play explores the impulses that lead to childbearing and raises questions about the motivations behind having children. Based on a true story.

Dominique Cieri is a playwright, teaching artist, and member of the Dramatists Guild. She is the recipient of the Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation and New Jersey State Council on the Arts Individual Playwriting Fellowship 2003, and 2009.  A graduate of Rose Bruford College in Kent, England, and the recipient of the State University of New York Chancellor’s Medal of Excellence for Scholarship and Creative Activities, Ms. Cieri holds an MFA in Creative Writing at Goddard College, Vermont. Ms. Cieri’s plays: Pitz & Joe, For Dear Life, Last Kiss, Count Down, Safe, and The Baby Killer Play, under development at Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey. Her plays have been produced and developed in New Jersey, New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles.  Pitz & Joe is currently under contract with Warner Brothers with Josh Brolin. Her Essays on Arts and Education have been published in the New York Times, and Teaching Artist Journal. Dominique received the New Jersey Theatre Alliance Applause Award, 2010, for her artistry and dedication.  Current projects include the implementation of her work for addressing bullying through the art of playwriting; a year-long commitment to the development of new work from grant monies received by Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey through the New Jersey Arts Council for the program ‘Women’s Playwrights Project.’

1. What inspired you to write THE BABY KILLER PLAY?

A 17-year-old girl who drowned her son haunted me for many years. At the time of her story a colleague's struggle to have a child led to the idea of combining their stories and exploring the impossible reproductive choices some women have to make and the very fine lines between them.

2. This play is based on a true story. How much of it is the actual story and how much is fiction?

Although the play is based on a true event, (newspaper articles and sentencing transcripts), it is very much a fiction. Almost all of the scenes are imagined.

3. Is THE BABY KILLER PLAY a working title or did you want to elicit a strong response from the get go by naming it that?
It still remains a working title. 

4. What is your favorite holiday and why? 

As a kid, definitely Christmas through New Year. I have very fond memories of "marveling" (with my sister -- we would say, "Let's go marvel at the lights.") at all of the holiday decorations and lights, especially the houses ablaze with every square inch covered in multi-colored, blinking lights.

5. You graduated from Rose Bruford College in England. Why did you choose to go to a college in another country? Can you tell us a little about your experience of being an American in England?
I was told that if I wanted to study theatre, go to England. I was young, lived in the cheapest of "flats" possible, including a row house with an outhouse. I worked in pubs, delivered the mail arriving at 4:00 in the morning to sort the mail and then eat bangers and mash, play some pool and then hit the delivery route- walking, a huge leather satchel filled with mail strapped to my shoulder.

♦ Playwrights Theatre will present these readings free of charge, with an optional donation of $10

♦ A $25 dollar donation will get you a FORUM pass that covers all of the readings.

♦ A $250 donation will get you a rehearsal pass that allows access to all reading rehearsals.

♦ Reservations can be made online at or call (973) 514-1787 X10

Click here to reserve your seat to see THE BABY KILLER PLAY.

You can also find additional information on our website about the entire FORUM reading series.

5 Questions with Carrie Louise Nutt

The 6th reading in our FORUM "Soundings" series is SCREWED! by Carrie Louise Nutt. This reading will begin at 7pm on December 19, 2012, and will be held at Fairleigh Dickinson University, Dreyfuss Theatre, 285 Madison Avenue, Madison, NJ. Click here for directions. Click here for a printable map of the campus (the Dreyfuss Theatre is located in Building 9).

This play traces the rise and fall of a disaffected Jersey-boy with a video camera, who, on a whim, decides to go to Los Angeles, and falls into directing porn videos. He quickly rises to the top of the field, and just as suddenly, sabotages his success. Based on a true story, Screwed! is a dark take on a classic American tale.

Carrie Louise Nutt's play Agua was a 2011 semi-finalist at the O’Neill. It was workshopped at The Lark and PTNJ, while Carrie was NNPN’s Emerging Playwright in Residence. Her play The Lamb was produced off-Broadway at 59E59 and was a finalist for the Heideman Award. She recently finished shooting the pilot for her web series Meg. Carrie is a member of The Dramatists Guild of America and The Playwrights Center. She holds an MFA in Playwriting from Rutgers, where she teaches Screenwriting.

1. What inspired your to write SCREWED?
I met a guy and this is a fictionalized version of his story.  His story felt so quintessentially American to me.  In this country, we are taught to have a dream and to believe that we can change the circumstances we are in.  There's a certain amount of truth in that, but there are also a lot of people who dream big and fall short of that dream, and have to figure out how to pick up the pieces and to be okay with where life has taken them and how it turned out.  Some never do figure it out.  Disappointment can be crushing.

2. This play is based on a true story. Is this something you read about or did you know the person?
What's interesting is since having met the inspiration for this story, I have met a handful of other people who made the same journey, more or less, as him.  They have become part of the story in different ways, so that the main character, Eli, is really an amalgamation of different people.  He includes a little of myself, but please don't guess what parts.

3. How did you research for this play?
I definitely watched porn.  I also conducted interviews with former-industry actors and producers.  There are also great resources on legit cable networks like "Pornucopia."

4. Tell us about your web series "Meg"?
MEG is s a comedy web series about a super neurotic, mid-30s actress living in Brooklyn, trying really hard STILL to make her dream happen. All hell breaks loose for Meg when her best friend and roommate threatens to evict her if she doesn't make rent. It's about struggling hard to grow up when your dream might never make you any money.

5. If you were given a thousand dollars and you had to spend it on jewelry, purses or shoes, which would you choose and why?
I bet I could buy all of the above, and even have a little left over. Shoes are my favorite, but I would hate to be among the likes of Imelda Marcos. Antoinette and Marcos sort of live in the same lineage for me. $1,000 can go a long way or be one, big gluttonous purchase. Like a Humvee, which is also somehow emblematic of the America we are and not the America we imagine ourselves to be. 

  ♦ Playwrights Theatre will present these readings free of charge, with an optional donation of $10

♦ A $25 dollar donation will get you a FORUM pass that covers all of the readings.

♦ A $250 donation will get you a rehearsal pass that allows access to all reading rehearsals.

♦ Reservations can be made online at or call (973) 514-1787 X10

Click here to reserve your seat to see SCREWED!

You can also find additional information on our website about the entire FORUM reading series.

5 Questions with R.N. Sandberg

The 4th reading in our FORUM "Soundings" series is ROUNDELAY by R.N. Sandberg. This reading will begin at 7pm on December 17, 2012, and will be held at Fairleigh Dickinson University, Dreyfuss Theatre, 285 Madison Avenue, Madison, NJ. Click here for directions. Click here for a printable map of the campus (the Dreyfuss Theatre is located in Building 9).


A wild, multi-character, globe-hopping tale of love in all of its complexity. From the Bronx to India to the Kenyan coast, playwright R.N. Sandberg spins a rich, funny, and deeply moving tapestry that explores what it means to pursue, run away, and finally surrender to the siren song of love and desire.

R.N. Sandberg's  plays have been seen in Australia, Canada, England, Japan, Panama, South Korea and throughout the U.S. He’s been commissioned by, among others, McCarter, Seattle Rep and Seattle Children’s Theatre. Current work includes IRL for George Street Playhouse, What Can’t Be Seen, recently read in San Francisco, and Judgment of Bett, at Kennedy Center’s New Visions/New Voices. His plays are published by Playscripts and Dramatic Publishing. He teaches playwriting, acting and dramatic literature at Princeton University. Roundelay will have its premiere at Passage Theatre in March.

1. What inspired your to write ROUNDELAY?
A convergence of two things: desires to explore what connection was in the age of electronic communication and to create a play that reached out into the world

2. You teach playwriting, acting and dramatic literature at Princeton University. What is the one thing you hope your students gain from your classes?
Open, flexible minds: the ability to see and make a wide variety of choices in their writing, acting and analyses. My hope is that this leads to them becoming more open people.

3. Your play hops all over the world from the Bronx to India to the Kenyan coast. Are these all places you have visited? Why did you choose these specific locations?
I chose the specific places where English was spoken but the cultures might seem very different from the ones we typically see on stage. I've only been to one of the places in the play. It may not be the one you think.

4.Given the choice between cheesecake and cheesesteak, which do you choose?
Both. I believe in well rounded meals.

5. What is your favorite book and why?
That's like asking what's my favorite food. There are too many wondrous, delicious things in the world to spend time narrowing them down to one. Experience as many different books, food and ideas as possible.

.

♦ Playwrights Theatre will present these readings free of charge, with an optional donation of $10

♦ A $25 dollar donation will get you a FORUM pass that covers all of the readings.

♦ A $250 donation will get you a rehearsal pass that allows access to all reading rehearsals.

♦ Reservations can be made online at or call (973) 514-1787 X10

Click here to reserve your seat to see ROUNDELAY.

You can also find additional information on our website about the entire FORUM reading series.

5 Questions with Dania Ramos

The 2nd reading in our FORUM "Soundings" series is HIELO by Dania Ramos. This reading will begin at 7pm on December 15, 2012, and will be held at Fairleigh Dickinson University, Dreyfuss Theatre, 285 Madison Avenue, Madison, NJ. Click here for directions. Click here for a printable map of the campus (the Dreyfuss Theatre is located in Building 9).

In Cayey, Puerto Rico, Lucia finds her hours cut at the local big box store. So she decides to start her own business selling limber, a smooth ice treat. She finds herself encroaching on the territory of Antonio whose piraqua, a shaved ice treat, is a popular concession at the local park. We have in this romantic comedy the beginnings of an ice war that includes Lucia’s daughter, her budding entrepreneur friend, and a champion skateboarder spy.

Dania Ramos co-created Mi Casa Tu Casa, a bilingual holiday show produced by Luna Stage. She’s currently developing the stage adaptation of Pura Belpre’s children’s novel Firefly Summer. Dania was a participant of the 2011-2012 New Jersey Emerging Women’s Playwriting Project at PTNJ. She received a New Jersey State Council on the Arts Playwriting Fellowship in 2003. Dania’s a member of the Dramatists Guild of America and received an MA in Creative Writing from Wilkes University.

1. What inspired you to write HIELO?There’s a bit of family history that sparked the homegrown business storyline in Hielo. For years, my grandmother really did sell homemade limber ice from her house to save money for cigarettes. According to my father, she ended up having cash left over to put toward household bills. In the script, that account morphed into a battle of frozen treats, which took on a life of its own. Overall, I wanted to write a play set in present-day Puerto Rico that had certain cultural touchstones, but still felt universal through its characters and their journeys.

2. Can you tell us a little about your experience co-creating Mi Casa Tu Casa? How was it similar/different from the way you usually write?Jane Mandel and Mona Hennessy of Luna Stage came up with the concept for a bilingual holiday show—a mix of music and storytelling—which ultimately became Mi Casa Tu Casa. The other co-creators are Michael Aquino (my husband), Deivis Garcia, and Jane Mandel, who also directed the show.

It was a true collaborative effort throughout the entire development process of Mi Casa. Early on, we only had big chunks of the script—four tales, eight songs, a classic holiday poem, and personal memories written by cast members. We had to find the form in which these elements could be threaded together into a seamless performance piece. Half of the show is music but since the band and storytellers rehearsed separately in the beginning, the integration of music, storytelling, and transitions weren’t solidified until pretty late in the rehearsal period. Another unique aspect of the play is that only certain sections of the script are set while other portions change depending on who is performing in the production. In a sense, I feel less like the playwright of Mi Casa and more like a weaver of other people’s stories.

[Editor's Note: Luna Stage brought back Mi Casa, Tu Casa this year. The final performances are this weekend.]

3. You are working on a stage adaptation of Pura Belpre’s children’s novel Firefly Summer. How do you go about translating a book for the stage? In developing the adaptation for Pura Belpre’s Firefly Summer, I’m focusing on capturing Belpre’s delightful voice and staying true to the main story arc of the novel, which takes place about a century ago on a small family farm in Puerto Rico. A main part of this process is transforming Belpre’s charming narration and description into dialogue and dramatic action that works for the stage. Since a novel is a longer form than a play, I’ve had to merge some plot points and create composite characters to make everything fit into a theatrical script of appropriate length.

4. Your play involves a smooth and a shaved ice treat. Do you prefer ice treats over ice cream?
When it’s hot outside, I love eating flavored ice of any texture, especially if it’s made with real fruit…because then I can justify eating it daily. (It’s nutritious, right?) Ice cream I’ll enjoy every once in a while, usually at a fancy celebration or holiday.

5. What can you tell us about the Young Adult Fantasy Novel you are working on?
There’s a teen girl warrior. There are venom-spewing gargoyles. It’s set in Puerto Rico.


♦ Playwrights Theatre will present these readings free of charge, with an optional donation of $10.

♦ A $25 dollar donation will get you a FORUM pass that covers all of the readings.

♦ A $250 donation will get you a rehearsal pass that allows access to all reading rehearsals.

♦ Reservations can be made online at or call (973) 514-1787 X10.

Click here to reserve your seat to see HIELO.

You can also find additional information on our website about the entire FORUM reading series.

5 Questions with Lia Romeo

The 3rd reading in our FORUM "Soundings" series is REALITY by Lia Romeo. This reading will begin at 7pm on December 16, 2012, and will be held at Fairleigh Dickinson University, Dreyfuss Theatre, 285 Madison Avenue, Madison, NJ. Click here for directions. Click here for a printable map of the campus (the Dreyfuss Theatre is located in Building 9).

Annie and Matt met on ”Looking for Love,” a popular reality dating show. But now that the cameras have stopped rolling, their fairy tale is looking a lot less perfect than it seemed. Add to the mix producer Josh, who will do anything for ratings, and the show runner up Krisandra, an aspring actress who’s desperate to make her mark in Hollywood. Will there be a happy ending or a scandal? In our model society, where everything from breasts to feelings are likely to be fake, playwright Lia Romeo explores what “reality” really mean.

Lia Romeo is a playwright, novelist, and humor book author. She earned her B.A. from Princeton University and her M.F.A in playwriting from Rutgers, ending up with staggering quantities of student loans and no marketable skills whatsoever. She managed to secure a part-time job writing standardized test questions, and spends the rest of her time writing plays and novels and daydreaming about pretty shoes. Her play Hungry premiered at Unicorn Theatre in Kansas City in the 2011-2012 season, and was produced by Stillwater Theater subsequently. Her play Green Whales premiered at Unicorn Theatre in 2010, and was produced by Renegade Theatre Experiment in 2012. Her play Right Place, Right Time premiered at Renegade Theatre Experiment in 2010, and was produced by Stillwater Theatre subsequently. Her play LoveSick was produced by Project Y Theatre Company at 59E59 in New York in 2012. Her play Connected will premiere at HotCity Theatre in St. Louis in 2013. She has been a part of the Forum New Play Reading Series at Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey for the past five years, and her plays have also been developed at the Kennedy Center, Orlando Shakespeare Theatre, New Jersey Repertory Theatre, Kitchen Dog Theatre, HotCity Theatre, Abingdon Theatre, and elsewhere. She has been a finalist for the O’Neill Playwrights Conference, PlayPenn, WordBridge, the Reva Shiner Comedy Award, and the Heideman Award. She was the 2008-2009 National New Play Network Emerging Playwright-in-Residence at Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey, and she is currently a member of the New Jersey Women Playwrights’ Project and Boston’s Interim Writers Accomplice. Her humor book, 11,002 Things to Be Miserable About, was published in 2009 by Abrams Image. It is currently in its second printing, with over 30,000 copies sold, and has earned favorable reviews in the Boston Globe and other national publications. Her first novel, Dating the Devil, will be published by BelleBooks in 2013, and is in development as a TV movie with Vast Entertainment.

1. What inspired your to write REALITY?
I'm something of a reality TV fanatic, for reasons that are mysterious even to myself, and I figured that if I wrote a play about it then I could count all those hours watching "The Bachelor" as research :) Seriously, though, I'm fascinated by the way that television and the promise of fame acts as a crucible to bring out these very extreme things in people, and by the differences between reality as presented on TV and reality as it actually plays out in the "real world" (whatever that means).

2. You are a playwright, novelist and humor book author. Do you approach each of those differently when you write or is your process the same?
I approach them all totally differently, actually. Even though I write comic plays, theater is the medium I tend to turn to when I feel like I have something serious to say. Writing novels and humor books is more of a lark for me - and as a result, often more fun - but I don't necessarily feel the same obligation to have some sort of important message.

3. What are your favorite pretty shoes?
Right now I'm really loving a pair of tall brown leather boots I just bought. They're flat, so they're comfortable for walking, but still stylish - I think I've worn them every day since I got them.

4. Your book is called 11,002 Things To Be Miserable About. What were reasons 11,001 and 11,002?
11,001 - Unfathomable darkness
11,002 - Happiness

5. You have a part time job writing standardized test questions. What is your favorite question?That's actually strictly confidential, since the questions I work on often end up getting administered on the TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language). I will say, though, that it's a really interesting job, because I learn all kinds of random information about a variety of topics - from biology to psychology - which sometimes ends up showing up in my plays.


♦ Playwrights Theatre will present these readings free of charge, with an optional donation of $10

♦ A $25 dollar donation will get you a FORUM pass that covers all of the readings.

♦ A $250 donation will get you a rehearsal pass that allows access to all reading rehearsals.

♦ Reservations can be made online at or call (973) 514-1787 X10

Click here to reserve your seat to see REALITY.

You can also find additional information on our website about the entire FORUM reading series.