Annie Baker

ANNIE BAKER’S plays have been developed and performed at the Soho Rep, Atlantic Theater Company, Playwrights Horizons, the Ontological-Hysteric, the Magic Theatre (New Voices West), the Brick, EST, and the 2007 Bay Area Playwrights Festival. She is the recipient of a Sloan Foundation Grant for screenwriting and a Michener Fellowship in playwriting. She graduated from the Department of Dramatic Writing at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and was a member of the 06/07 Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab. Her play BODY AWARENESS will be produced by the Atlantic Theater Company in May/June 2008.

Bekah Brunstetter

BEKAH BRUNSTETTER received her BA in Theater from UNC Chapel Hill in 2004 and holds an MFA in Dramatic Writing from The New School for Drama. Her Plays have been read and staged by The Rattlestick Playwright’s theater, NYU’s HotINK Festival of New Plays, Canada’s NEXTFEST, The Alliance Theater, SPF, The Emerging Artists’ Theatre, Boston Theater Works, Working Mans Clothes Productions, Manhattan Theatre Source, the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival, Old Vic New Voices, the Soho Think tank. Her play TO NINEVEH received Six New York Innovative Theatre Awards in September 2006, including Best New Full Length Play. Her play SICK won the 2006 Samuel French Short Play Competition. Bekah’s plays are published by Samuel French, United Stages and Smith & Krauss.

Evan Cabnet

Recent writing credits include: I SEE LONDON I SEE FRANCE (Obstruction Plays/Slant Theater Co.), PRIDE AND PREJUDICE (Couchworks/ The Tank). Recent directing: Elizabeth Meriwether’s THE MISTAKES MADELINE MADE (Naked Angels/Culture Project), Molly Smith Metzler’s TRAINING WISTERIA (Summer Play Festival), Mat Smart’s KEEP ISHMAEL (White Horse Theater, Chicago), Five seasons at the Williamstown Theatre Festival, including the 2003 Bill Foeller and 2004 Boris Sagal Fellowships. Currently in development with his first screenplay, based on his play MY RENAISSANCE FAIR LADY, which has been optioned and is slated to shoot next fall. Upcoming: Kyle Jarrow’s HYPOCHONDRIA.

Dylan Dawson

DYLAN DAWSON is a writer and actor who has performed with or at The Women’s Project, Peculiar Works, Here Arts Center, The Shalimar and The Cherry Lane Alternative among others. As a writer his most recent play, Movie Geek, has been produced in New York City (NYFringe – Award Winner, The Culture Project), L.A. (The Complex) and Maine (The Penobscot Theater). It is currently in development at Ars Nova. His short film GREAT AMERICAN WARS: EPISODE 6 was recently seen in The Naked Angels’ Armed and Naked in America.

Liz Flahive

LIZ FLAHIVE is a graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts Department of Dramatic Writing. Her plays have been read at Williamstown Theater Festival’s Friday’s @ 3 series as well as Ars Nova’s Out Loud Reading Series and Next Step Workshop. Her first full length play, FROM UP HERE, will be produced by Ars Nova in 2007. She was a finalist in last years Naked Angels/Fox TV Naked TV competition. She is a former full-time beauty editor (Lucky, Seventeen, Teen People) and continues to write about things like shampoo and wrinkles to pay her rent.

Sam Forman

SAM FORMAN recently co-created (with Beau Willimon) the Civil War era television pilot Hickory Hill for AMC.

SAM FORMAN, a writer for the stage, screen and TV, recently co-created (with Beau Willimon) the Civil War era television pilot Hickory Hill for AMC. Sam is also currently writing the book and lyrics for The Big Show, a new musical produced by Harbor Entertainment. His most recent play, The Rise and Fall of Annie Hall is about to have a workshop at the Roundabout Theatre Company (dir. Alex Timbers). Sam is the lyricist and co-book author for the musical I Sing! which has been produced off-Broadway and in theaters around the world. Sam’s other plays and musicals include: The Grille Room (Cherry Lane Mentor Project, dir. Thomas Kail), Quarterlife (workshop dir. by Mark Brokaw) Fringical! (Ars Nova, NYC; American Theatre of Actors, NYMF, dir. Thomas Kail) The Quiet Game (Hangar Theater, Ithaca NY and Chashama, NYC, dir. Daniel Kramer) Krankenhaus Blues (Blue Heron Theater, NYC, The Abingdon Theatre, NYC) Please Stop Talking (The Cherry Lane Theatre, NYC dir. Melissa Kievman) Sam is also the proud producer of Creation Nation which the New York Times has called: “A late night cabaret phenomenon.”

Kyle Jarrow

KYLE JARROW is a Brooklyn-based writer and musician. He writes for film and for television as well as for the stage, and he plays in the glam rock band The Fabulous Entourage.

KYLE JARROW is a Brooklyn-based writer and musician. He writes for film and for television as well as for the stage, and he plays in the glam rock band The Fabulous Entourage. He won an OBIE Award at age 24 for his Off-Broadway hit A VERY MERRY UNAUTHORIZED CHILDREN’S SCIENTOLOGY PAGEANT, which also had a successful run in Los Angeles in fall 2004 and was revived in NYC, Boston, and Atlanta in winter 2006. Kyle’s play ARMLESS won the Overall Excellence Award at the New York International Fringe Festival, and productions of his plays PRESIDENT HARDING IS A ROCK STAR and GORILLA MAN (now available from Samuel French) played in NYC to critical acclaim. Kyle’s playwriting work has been presented at Performance Space 122, New York Theatre Workshop, The John Houseman Theatre, HERE Arts Center, Boston Theatre Works, New Dramatists, The Flea, The Hangar Theatre, and Dad’s Garage in Atlanta among others. Kyle was a 2005-2006 Dramatists Guild Fellow. He was nominated for a 2004 Los Angeles Drama Critics’ Circle Award and a 2004 Backstage West Garland Award for A VERY MERRY…, and was runner-up for the 2002 Princess Grace Playwriting Award for his play Hypochondria. He was winner of the 2001 John Golden Prize. Kyle has guest-lectured at Juilliard and Pratt and done art design for the hip hop company Full Circle. He produced the cast album of A VERY MERRY…, released on Sh-K-Boom Records. THE FABULOUS ENTOURAGE has appeared as part of the 2006 Whitney Biennial, on the Knitting Factory Mainstage, at Joe’s Pub, Viper Room, Bowery Ballroom, and with bands such as Hot Chip and We Are Scientists. They recently released their debut full-length album “Play Nice Now.”

Nick Jones

NICK JONES is a playwright, director, puppet designer, and performer. He is a founding member and artistic director of Jollyship the Whiz-Bang, which is (alternately or simultaneously) a puppet troupe, band, and theater production company.

NICK JONES is a playwright, director, puppet designer, and performer. His work has been performed at chashama (CANADA’S MID-RIFF) the Bowery Poetry Club (SLEEPLESS FISHES AND CRABQUISTADOR: SCAVENGER OF GOD) as well as the Portland Institute of Contemporary Art’s TBA Festival, the Dublin Fringe Festival (first runner up, “Most Entertaining”), Ars Nova, the Brick Theater, The Kitchen, P.S. 122, NYMF, The Public, The Edinburgh Fringe, Galapagos Art Space (Little Building) and at the O’Neil Puppetry Conference. He is a founding member and artistic director of Jollyship the Whiz-Bang, which is (alternately or simultaneously) a puppet troupe, band, and theater production company. He has been an artist-in-residence at Galapagos, the Bowery Poetry Club, and at the Hoontown Puppet Festival in Bangkok. As a puppet designer, he has created work for the All Stars Youth Project, The Castillo Theater, the 2004 Dream Parade in Taiwan, and is the recipient of a 2007 grant from the Jim Henson Foundation. He graduated in 2001 from Bard College, and was born and raised in Anchorage, Alaska.

Steven Levenson

STEVEN LEVENSON’S plays include AIRLESS, THE PLAY ROOM and ALMOST STUCK. His play THE LANGUAGE OF TREES has been read and developed by Roundabout Theatre, New Dramatists, and Ashland New Plays Festival. His original musical TORAH! TORAH! TORAH! (co-written with Andrew Hertz) received a workshop production at Brown/Trinity Playwrights Repertory Theatre. Steven is also a member of Youngblood Playwrights Group at Ensemble Studio Theatre, and a graduate of Brown University.

Barry Levey

BARRY LEVEY’S play ALL THE WAY FROM CHINA, developed in Ars Nova’s Out Loud series last spring, receives a workshop production by Cleveland’s Fourth Wall in March. In 2005 his play CRITICAL DARLING was produced by The New Group, following development by the Williamstown Theatre Festival, Arena Stage, and the Baldwin New Play Festival at the University of California, San Diego, where Barry received his MFA. Other plays include 2006 O’Neill finalist CITIZENS OF ROME, 2005 Hangar Lab finalist LUNCHMEAT and TWO HANDS, VERY TIRED.

Carly Mensch

CARLY MENSCH’S plays include THE DELICATE BUSINESS OF BOY AND MISS GIRL (2006 New York International Fringe Festival), THE WASH CYCLE, PAINT THE TOWN BLACK, SALLY and BRADSHAW (Lorring Dodd Drama Prize). She is currently a fellow at The Juilliard School’s Lila Acheson Wallace Playwrights Program.

Rachel Shukert

RACHEL SHUKERT is a playwright and author based in New York City. Her plays include BLOODY MARY (NYIT Award nominee), THE RED BEARD OF ESAU, SEQUINS FOR SATAN, THE BLACKSTONE HOTEL, and SOILED LINENS. Her work has been developed and produced at Ars Nova, the Williamstown Theater Festival, the Culture Project, the Ontological/Hysteric, and the EVOLVE series at Galapagos. In 2003, she was the Playwright-in-Residence at e74 productions in Amsterdam, and her work was performed extensively throughout the Netherlands. As a performer, she has appeared with Richard Foreman’s Ontological/Hysteric Theater, in New York and internationally; Les Freres Courbusier, the T.E.A.M., Salt Theater, e74, and with her own company, the Bushwick Hotel, which she co-founded in 2002. Her upcoming collection of essays, Have You No Shame? will be published by Random House/Villard.

Mat Smart

Recently, he wrote the book and lyrics for KEEP ISHMAEL, a new rock musical based on Moby-Dick with music by Ethan Deppe (dir. by Evan Cabnet) that was produced in 2006 at White Horse Theatre Company in Chicago. Last season, THE HOPPER COLLECTION received productions at the Magic Theatre in San Francisco (dir. by Chris Smith) and Huntington Theatre Company in Boston (dir. by Daniel Aukin). He is currently working on THE 13TH OF PARIS a commission from South Coast Rep, and THOMAS REPAIR, a commission from Huntington. He is a founding member Slant Theatre Project and a member of the Board of Directors for the New Harmony Project. Originally from Naperville, IL, he now lives in Brooklyn. Undergrad: University of Evansville. MFA: UCSD.

Adam Szymkowicz

ADAM SZYMKOWICZ (playwright) is currently studying with Marsha Norman and Christopher Durang at The Juilliard School in the Lila Acheson Wallace American Playwrights Program.

ADAM SZYMKOWICZ (playwright) is currently studying with Marsha Norman and Christopher Durang at The Juilliard School in the Lila Acheson Wallace American Playwrights Program. In 2004, he received his playwriting MFA from Columbia University where he was the Dean’s Fellow. His work has been produced throughout the U.S., and in Canada, England and Lithuania. Plays include DEFLOWERING WALDO, THE RELATIONSHIP GAME, ONE WEDNESDAY AT WEST HADDAM HIGH, SOMEONE I DON’T KNOW, OPEN MINDS, ANNE, THE ART MACHINE, PRETTY THEFT, FOOD FOR FISH, HERBIE, INCENDIARY, BEE EATER and NERVE. Several of his plays have been published by Dramatists Play Service. Szymkowicz is a two-time Lecomte du Nouy Prize winner, a member of the Dramatists Guild, and of the Ars Nova Play Group.

Samuel Brett Williams

SAMUEL BRETT WILLIAMS received his B.A. in English and Political Science from Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia, Arkansas, and his M.F.A. in Playwriting from Mason Gross School of the Arts. Brett’s plays have been produced at Mile Square Theatre, New Orleans Theatre Experiment, Stageworks/Hudson, Readers Theatre Repertory, and the District of Columbia Arts Center. His plays have been selected for the Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights’ Conference, the Cherry Lane Theatre Mentor Project and the Philadelphia New Play Festival. Brett’s play ARKADELPHIA will be published in Best New American Plays 2007-2008 by Applause Books. Brett is the playwright in residence at Playwrights’ Theatre of New Jersey. He teaches Screenwriting, Expository Writing, and Playwright/Director Relationship for Rutgers University.