Sloan Foundation

In 2000, Manhattan Theatre Club began a partnership with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to commission, develop and produce new plays about math, science and technology. Since first collaborating on MTC’s Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize winning production of David Auburn’s Proof, the partnership has expanded to include four to five annual commissions for emerging, mid-level and established writers. With the Foundation’s support, MTC has commissioned twenty-seven plays. The Foundation also provides a production grant to stage Sloan-related works, and has supported MTC's production of Charlotte Jones's Humble Boy, in addition to Proof.

MTC/Sloan Commissioned Plays

Submission Policy

While it is generally Manhattan Theatre Club’s policy not to accept unsolicited submissions, we make an exception for plays that explore themes of math, science and technology. We are also happy to read two page proposals with an accompanying resume for commission consideration. Please send scripts and proposals to Annie MacRae, Literary Manager/Sloan Project Manager, at lit@mtc-nyc.org. Scripts will be considered throughout the season. In order to be considered for this year’s commission cycle, please submit proposals by March 1, 2010.

MTC/Sloan Commissioned Writers

Stephen Belber's plays include Match (Broadway), The Geometry of Fire (Rattlestick), Tape (Naked Angels--NYC/LA/London; Access Theater; Humana Festival 2000...), One Million Butterflies (Primary Stages), Drifting Elegant (Magic Theater), The Transparency of Val (Theater Outrageous, NYC), The Wake (Via Theater, NYC), Through Fred (Soho Rep, 78th St. Theater) and The Death of Frank (Araca Group, NYC). Tape has been produced in Spain, Australia, Germany, Canada, Greece and Japan. Stephen also wrote the screenplay for the film of Tape, directed by Richard Linklater (Sundance; Berlin). He is a member of Tectonic Theater Project and was one of the three Associate Writers (and an actor) for The Laramie Project, performed around the world and made into an HBO movie (Emmy nomination for screenwriting). He is a graduate of Juilliard’s Playwrights Program, has received commissions from Playwrights Horizons, The Huntington Theater, Arena Stage, Manhattan Theatre Club and Philadelphia Theater Company, and is currently working on several screenplay commissions. TV credits include “Rescue Me,” a year and a half with “Law & Order: SVU” and (currently) a pilot for HBO.

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Glen Berger’s plays include Underneath the Lintel (2001 Ovation Award, 2003 Sterling Award for Best Play, Time Out New York’s Ten Best Plays of 2001), The Wooden Breeks, O Lovely Glowworm (2005 Portland Drammy Award for Best Script; 2002 BugNBub Primary Stages Award), the musical A Night In The Old Marketplace (Loewe Award), Great Men Of Science, Nos. 21 & 22 (1998 Ovation Award and 1998 L.A. Weekly Award for Best Play), I Will Go…I Will Go (published in Applause Book’s 2001 Best Short Plays Anthology) and On Words And Onwards (Manhattan Theatre Club/Sloan Foundation Commission). Mr. Berger has received commissions from the Children’s Theatre of Minneapolis and the Lookingglass Theatre, was selected for the 2003 Old Vic/New Voices program, participated in the 2001 A.S.K. Playwrights Retreat and was playwright-in-residence at New York Stage & Film. He has written several episodes for the PBS children’s series “Arthur,” (2 Emmy nominations), its spin-off “Postcards From Buster” (Emmy nomination), “Time Warp Trio” (NBC), “Peep” (The Learning Channel) and is the head writer for “Fetch” (PBS).

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Charles Evered has written screenplays and teleplays for Universal Pictures, NBC, Dreamworks and Paramount Pictures. He has won awards including The Berrilla Kerr Award, The Chesterfield/Amblin Fellowship, The Edward Albee/William Flanagan Fellowship, The Bert Linder Fellowship, The Lucas Artist Fellowship and the Crawford Playwriting Award. His published plays include: The Size of the World and Other Plays, The Shoreham, Wilderness of Mirrors, Teds' Head, Clouds Hill, Celadine and Adopt a Sailor. Mr. Evered's film and television credits include Running Funny, Adopt a Sailor, Visiting, starring James Waterston and Amy Locane, and the double episode of “Monk” titled “Mr. Monk and the Leper.” Mr. Evered’s newest full-length play Class, was given its first public reading in Princeton, NJ starring Roger Rees and directed by Bebe Neuwirth. He is currently an Assistant Professor at the University of California-Riverside.

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Melissa James Gibson’s plays include [sic] (OBIE Award for playwriting, Kesselring Prize, The Best Plays of 2001-02); Suitcase or, those that resemble flies from a distance (NEA/TCG Theatre Residency Program for Playwrights, Rockefeller Foundation’s Multi-Arts Production Fund); Brooklyn Bridge, with a song by Barbara Brousal (AT&T Onstage award); All is Not (New York State Council on the Arts Theatre Artist Commission); and Current Nobody, a loose adaptation of Homer’s Odyssey (2005 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize Finalist; 2006 Sundance Theatre Lab). Gibson’s work has been produced at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Soho Rep, La Jolla Playhouse, and The Children’s Theatre Company, as well as many other theaters, regionally and internationally. Currently, Gibson is working on commissions for Center Theatre Group and the Atlantic Theater Company. A graduate of the Yale School of Drama, Gibson has been a Jerome and MacDowell Colony Fellow, a recipient of a Whiting Writers Award and commissions from Playwrights Horizons, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, La Jolla Playhouse and The Children’s Theatre Company/ New Dramatists Playground program. Gibson is a graduate of New Dramatists and the recipient of a 2006 Lucille Lortel Foundation Playwrights’ Fellowship and a 2007 Guggenheim Fellowship. Her play This will premiere at Playwrights Horizons in the fall starring Parker Posey.

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Rinne Groff’s plays include The Ruby Sunrise, Jimmy Carter was a
Democrat, Moliere Impromptu, Orange Lemon Egg Canary, What Then, Inky and The Five Hysterical Girls Theorem and the musicals In the Bubble (book & co-lyrics) and Saved (co-book & co-lyrics). Her work has been produced by the Public Theater, Playwrights Horizons, Trinity Rep, Actors Theatre of Louisville, the Women’s Project, PS122 and Clubbed Thumb among others. Rinne is a recipient of a Whiting Writers’ Award, a Guggenheim Award, an OBIE Award grant, the Rita and Burton Goldberg Playwriting Award, a NYSCA Individual Artist grant and Vortex Theater Prize. Residencies: the MacDowell Colony, the Sundance Theatre Lab and the Australian National Playwrights Conference. She has been commissioned by PS122 (Jerome Foundation grant), Trinity Rep, the Guthrie Theater, Manhattan Theatre Club and Playwrights Horizons. Rinne is a founding member of Elevator Repair Service Theater Company. Other affiliations: New Dramatists, the Dramatists Guild, New York Theatre Workshop Usual Suspect, Clubbed Thumb, Target Margin and NYU Tisch School of the Arts, where she teaches in the Department of Dramatic Writing. Yale B.A. ’91. NYU M.F.A. ’99.

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Ron Hutchinson: Latest theatre work includes Moonlight and Magnolias, Goodman Theatre 2004, Manhattan Theatre Club 2005 and Tricycle Theatre 2008; Topless Mum, Tricycle Theatre 2008; Head/Case, Royal Shakespeare Company 2004; Believers, for Playbox Young People’s Theatre, 2003; LAGS, national tours 2002-’03; Beau!, Theatre Royal Bath, national tour and Haymarket, Leicester Square 2001; Burning Issues, Hampstead Theatre Club 1999; an adaptation of Mikhail Bilgakov’s Flight at the National Theatre 1997; Rat in the Skull (revival, Duke of York’s Theatre 1995). Mr. Hutchinson lives in Los Angeles where he is a writer/producer for features and television. Winner of an Emmy for Ben Kingsley’s “Murderers Among Us: The Simon Wiesenthal Story,” 1989. His latest projects include the USA Network mini-series “Traffic” (nominated for three Emmys in 2004) and rewrites on Fox Pictures’ remake of Flight of the Phoenix.

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Lucy Kirkwood finished her English literature degree at the University of Edinburgh in 2007. Grady Hot Potato is her first full length stage play. She wrote a short play Guns or Butter for the Terror 2007 Festival at the Union Theatre, London. Her next play, Tinderbox, was produced by the Bush Theatre in April 2008 and her adaptation of Ibsen’s Hedda was produced by the Gate Theatre, London in August 2008. Lucy is one of three writers currently developing a TV series with Kudos Film and Television and she writes for the Company Pictures TV series “Skins.” Lucy is also working with Clean Break Theatre Company.

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Howard Korder was born in New York City and graduated from the State University of New York at Binghamton with a B.A. in Theater. His first play, Night Maneuver, was produced in 1982 by the Floating Rep in New York City. Episode 26 was presented Off-Broadway by the Lamb’s Theater in 1985. The Manhattan Punch Line produced Life on Earth in its 1985 One-Act Festival, and Lip Service the following year. Fun, directed by Jon Jory, premiered at the Actors Theater of Louisville’s 1987 Humana Festival, and received the Heidemann Award for Best One-Act Play. Its companion piece, Nobody, was selected for the 1987 O’Neill Playwrights Conference, where it won the HBO Writer’s Award. Both plays were subsequently presented at the Manhattan Punch Line, the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, and elsewhere. Boys’ Life was produced by Lincoln Center in 1988, directed by William. H. Macy and featuring the Atlantic Theater Company, receiving a nomination for a Pulitzer Prize. It continues to be seen at theaters around the world. The same year HBO broadcast Korder’s television adaptation of his play Lip Service, which won an ACE Award for Best Comedy Special. Korder’s play Search and Destroy was commissioned by California’s South Coast Repertory, premiering there in 1990 under the direction of David Chambers. It received the Los Angeles Theater Critics’ Award for Best New Play, and the Joseph Kesselring Prize from the National Arts Club. A production at Yale Repertory followed, and the play opened on Broadway at Circle in the Square in 1992. The following year The Royal Court Theatre presented a critically acclaimed production in London, under the direction of Stephen Daldry. A film version, produced by Martin Scorcese, was released in 1995. The Lights premiered at Lincoln Center in November 1993, directed by Mark Wing-Davey. It received seven Drama Desk nominations and an Obie Award for Playwriting. It was subsequently produced at the Royal Court, directed by Ian Rickson, and in theaters in the United States and Europe. The Hollow Lands, a epic journey across the physical and spiritual landscape of 19th Century America, premiered at South Coast Repertory in 2000, with a cast of 17 actors in 35 roles, once again under the direction of David Chambers. It was the recipient of a grant from the Kennedy Center Fund for New American Plays. Sea of Tranquility premiered off-Broadway in 2004, and was named one of the ten best plays of the year by Time magazine. His newest play, In a Garden, will be produced at South Coast Repertory in March 2010. Korder is the recipient of a 1996 Guggenheim Fellowship in Playwriting. He has been a guest lecturer at Yale Drama School, Kenyon College, Arizona State University, the University of Utah, and the College of Santa Fe. He has also worked with New York’s 52nd Street Project, both with children in Hell’s Kitchen and on the Navajo Reservation. His works are currently in print in both acting and trade paperback editions, and appear in several anthologies.

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Bryony Lavery’s recent production include Last Easter (Birmingham Repertory Theatre), Stockholm (UK tour and Hampstead Theatre), Smoke (The New Vic Theatre), Yikes (The Unicorn Theatre), Deadpoint (Linbury Theatre) and an adaptation of Mary Webb’s Precious Bane (Pentabus Theatre Company). Other plays include Helen And Her Friends; Bag; Family Album; Missing; Calamity; Origin Of The Species; Witchcraze; Her Aching Heart (Pink Paper Play Of The Year 1992); Wicked; Kitchen Matters; Flight; Nothing Compares To You; Ophelia and A Wedding Story. Her play Frozen, commissioned by Birmingham Rep, was produced on Broadway where it was nominated for 4 Tony awards. Bryony is an honorary Doctor Of Arts at De Montford University. She was a director of Performing Arts Labs Playwriting and taught at Birmingham University. Bryony was an Artistic Director of Gay Sweatshop and of her own company Les Oeufs Malades, and for two years she was Writer-in-Residence for The Unicorn Theatre For Children. Her future plans include Wise Children for The National Theatre, Kursk, The Thing With Feathers for McCarter Theater and an opera 57Hours in The House Of Culture, with John Keane, Peter Wyer and Phyllida Lloyd.

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Rebecca Lenkiewicz’s first play, Soho – A Tale of Table Dancers, won a Fringe First at Edinburgh then toured Israel with the British Council and opened at the Arcola Theatre in 2001. The Night Season, which opened at the National Theatre in 2004, received the Critics’ Circle’s Most Promising Playwright Award and was nominated for an Evening Standard Award and the Susan Smith Blackburn Award. Other plays include Shoreditch Madonna, Blue Moon Over Poplar (Soho Theatre, 2005), A Soldier’s Tale (Old Vic, 2006), Invisible Mountains (RNT Education Department, 2006), Faeries (Royal Opera House and Theatre Royal Bath, 2008), Justitia (for the Jasmin Vardimon Dance Company, UK Tour and Sadlers Wells), an adaptation of Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People (Arcola Theatre, 2008), Her Naked Skin (Olivier Theatre, Royal National Theatre, 2008). Rebecca’s work for radio includes Fighting for Words (BBC Radio 4, Observer Critics’ Choice, Pick of the Day) and Caravan of Desire (BBC Radio 4, 2006, Telegraph Critics’ Choice, Radio Times Choice, Pick of The Week). TV and film work includes a one-off drama on the life of Marie Stopes for BBC 3 and she is currently working on a film version of Her Naked Skin for Fragile Films. Rebecca’s adaptation of Ibsen’s Ghosts for the Actors’ Touring Theatre will open at the Arcola Theatre later this year and she is currently under commission to the Royal National Theatre.

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Kenneth Lin’s plays have been produced, developed and/or commissioned by the Alliance Theatre, South Coast Repertory Theatre, the Williamstown Theatre Festival, the Wilma Theater, Manhattan Theatre Club, P73 Productions, NY Stage & Film and Arena Stage. He is the winner of the Princess Grace Award, the L. Arnold Weissberger Award and the Kendeda Graduate Playwriting Competition. Lin is an alumnus of Cornell University, the U.S. Fulbright Scholarship Program and the Yale School of Drama, where he was awarded the ASCAP Cole Porter Prize for Excellence in Playwriting.

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Craig Lucas is the author of Missing Persons, Blue Window, Reckless, Prelude to a Kiss, God’s Heart, The Dying Gaul, Stranger, Small Tragedy, The Singing Forest and Prayer for My Enemy. His screenplays include Longtime Companion, The Secret Lives of Dentists, Prelude to a Kiss, Reckless, Blue Window and The Dying Gaul, which he also directed. In New York, he directed Harry Kondoleon’s Saved or Destroyed (Rattlestick Theater) and Play Yourself (New York Theater Workshop), as well as his own play This Thing of Darkness (co-authored with David Schulner) at the Atlantic Theater. With director Norman René he created Marry Me a Little: Songs by Stephen Sondheim. In addition to the book for The Light in the Piazza (music and lyrics by Adam Guettel), Mr. Lucas has written the musical play Three Postcards (composer/lyricist Craig Carnelia) and the libretto for the opera Orpheus in Love (composer Gerald Busby). His adaptations include Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya and Three Sisters and Strindberg’s Miss Julie. Twice nominated for a Tony (Prelude to a Kiss and The Light in the Piazza), three times for the Drama Desk (Prelude, Reckless and Missing Persons), he has received the Sundance Audience Award (Longtime Companion), L.A. Drama Critics (Blue Window), Obie Awards for Best Play (Prelude and Small Tragedy) and Best Director (Saved or Destroyed), American Theater Critics/Steinberg Award for Best American Play (The Singing Forest), New York Film Critics Award for Best Screenplay (The Secret Lives of Dentists), Excellence in Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and Laura Pels/PEN Mid-Career Achievement Award.

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Elizabeth Meriwether wrote The Mistakes Madeline Made, developed in the Out Loud reading series at Ars Nova and at New York Stage and Film. It was produced in New York by Naked Angels and also at the Yale Repertory Theatre. Meriwether wrote an adaptation of Hedda Gabler with live robots, Heddatron, produced by Les Freres Corbusier and directed by Alex Timbers. Her play Nicky Goes Goth was produced in the NY Fringe Festival 2004, directed by Shira Milikowsky, with subsequent productions in Berkeley and Phoenix. Liz is a member of Youngblood Writers’ Collective at Ensemble Studio Theatre, an associate artist of Les Freres Corbusier, and Playwright-in-Residence at Ars Nova Theatre.

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Peter Morris’ work has been staged professionally at the Bush; the Gate; the Latchmere and the Union Theatres in London, and in New York at Soho Rep; the Belt; HERE and Dixon Place. He twice won the London Sunday Times Playwriting Prize, in 2000 and 2001. His play The Age of Consent premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe 2001, then transferred to London’s Bush Theatre in 2002. The play has since been staged professionally in Dublin, Rome, Berlin, and Tokyo, and as a television play in Reykjavik. His play Guardians also premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe and was subsequently staged by the Culture Project in New York. Readings and workshops in the UK include the Old Vic, the King’s Head, and the Arts Theatre in London. Peter has also written for BBC1 (Born and Bred), BBC2 (adapting John Lanchester’s The Debt to Pleasure), Film Four (adapting Paul Murray’s novel An Evening of Long Goodbyes) and for film director Robert Altman (BBC Films), a 6-part adaptation of Roald Dahl’s Tales of the Unexpected.

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Hannah Moscovitch’s writing for the stage includes Essay, The Russian Play, USSR, Mexico City, and East of Berlin. Her plays have been produced at the Tarragon Theatre in Toronto where she is playwright-in-residence, the Factory Theatre, the Magnetic North Theatre Festival, Harbourfront Centre, the SummerWorks Theatre Festival and the Lab Cab Festival. As part of the 2008-2009 season, Hannah’s work will be produced at The Thousand Islands Playhouse in Gananoque, The Winnipeg Jewish Theatre, Urban Curvz Theatre Collective in Calgary, Chester Playhouse and Theatre Antigonish in Nova Scotia and Alberta Theatre Projects. Tarragon Theatre is remounting their acclaimed production of East of Berlin which then tours to the Firehall Theatre in Vancouver. Hannah has been commissioned by Manhattan Theatre Club, Prairie Theatre Exchange, Great Canadian +Theatre Company, Volcano Theatre, 2b theatre company, Theatrefront, Theatre Panik and Youtheatre Montreal. Her play USSR has recently been made into a short film for Bravo Television Network. Hannah is a graduate of The National Theatre School of Canada and the University of Toronto.

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Itamar Moses’ work for the stage includes the full-length plays Outrage, Bach at Leipzig, Celebrity Row, The Four of Us, Yellowjackets, Back Back Back and the book for the musical The Chromium Hook. His work has been produced or workshopped regionally by the Wilma Theater, Milwaukee Rep, The Hangar Theatre, Florida Stage, Portland Center Stage, the American Conservatory Theatre, The Old Globe and Berkeley Rep and in New York by Manhattan Theatre Club, New York Theatre Workshop, New York Stage and Film, HERE Center for the Performing Arts and La Mama Etc. Awards include the Reva Shiner New Play Award; Portland Critics Circle Drammy Award; NEA Residency Grant; SWTA National New Play Award; Plays for the 21st Century Award; Dramarama Long Play Award. Itamar has been commissioned by the Wilma, the McCarter Theatre, Manhattan Theatre Club and Playwrights Horizons. He holds an M.F.A. in Dramatic Writing from NYU, has taught playwriting at Yale, and is a New York Theatre Workshop Usual Suspect.

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Rona Munro was Senior Playwriting Fellow for the Traverse Theater in Edinburgh. Credits for the Traverse include: Strawberries in January, Iron (also Manhattan Theatre Club), Fugue and Your Turn to Clean the Stair. Other theatre credits include The House of Bernarda Alba (translation for Shared Experience); Snake (Hampstead Theatre); The Maiden Stone (Hampstead Theatre & Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh; Peggy Ramsay Memorial Award Winner); Gilt (Co-Writer); Bold Girls (Susan Smith Blackburn Award, Evening Standard Most Promising Playwright Award, Plays International Award, Critics Circle and Plays and Players Most Promising Playwright Award); Saturday Night at The Commodore (7:84); The Way to Go Home (Paines Plough! Royal Court); Piper's Cave (Paines Plough Workshop & Boilerhouse). Film credits include Ladybird Ladybird directed by Ken Loach (FilmFourlParallax Pictures Ltd); Aimee and Jaguar (Senator Film Production). For television, recent credits include “Rehab” (BBC2); Almost Adult (Channel 4). Rona wrote two of the plays in the latest Stanley Baxter Playhouse series for Catherine Bailey Ltd/BBC Radio 4.

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Brett Neveu: Upcoming productions include Weapon of Mass Impact with A Red Orchid Theatre (Chicago) and the musical Old Town with Strawdog Theatre Company (Chicago). Other productions include Gas for Less at the Goodman Theatre, Harmless with TimeLine Theatre Company (Chicago), The Meek with A Red Orchid Theatre (Chicago), Heritage with American Theatre Company (Chicago), Eric LaRue with the Royal Shakespeare Company (London and Stratford-Upon-Avon), American Dead with American Theatre Company (Chicago), The Last Barbecue with The Aardvark Theatre Company (Chicago) and 29th Street Rep (New York) and the film version of The Earl with Sikorafilms. Brett has worked with The Playwright's Center in Minneapolis, The New Group in New York and is a resident-alum with Chicago Dramatists. He has been commissioned by Steppenwolf Theatre Company and The Goodman Theatre (Ofner Prize) and was the recipient of the League of Chicago Theatre’s first Emerging Artist Award. Brett has taught writing at Northwestern University, DePaul University, Second City Training Center and currently lives in Los Angeles.

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Mark Schultz: Recent plays include: Everything Will Be Different or A Brief History of Helen of Troy (Soho Rep/True Love Productions) for which he won the 2005 Oppenheimer Award and the 2006 Kesselring Prize; Polar Bear (Birmingham Rep, UK) and Gift (Rising Phoenix Rep / NY Fringe Festival). Everything Will Be Different, was produced by the Actors Touring Company with Theatre Royal Plymouth under the title A Brief History of Helen of Troy at the Soho Theatre in London after a UK tour. Other plays include Deathbed (McGinn/Cazale Theater); Magic Kingdom; Brightness (workshop at Labyrinth Theater). His latest play, The Gingerbread House, will premiere at the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater in Spring 2009. His play Passion was featured in Francis Ford Coppola’s Zoetrope magazine. He is a founding member and artistic associate of Theater Mitu, a member of Rising Phoenix Rep, and co-coordinator of MCC Theater’s Playwrights’ Coalition. He holds an MFA in playwriting from Columbia University.

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Eric Simonson‘s plays include Work Song: Three Views of Frank Lloyd Wright (co-written with Jeff Hatcher), Bang the Drum Slowly, Nomathemba (written with Ntozake Shange and Joseph Shabalala), Slaughterhouse-Five, The Last Hurrah, Carter’s Way, Lombardi/The Only Thing, Speak American, Honest and Fake. They have been produced across the country and in Japan, at theatres including Steppenwolf, The Huntington, Arizona Theatre Company, Madison Rep, L. A. Theatreworks, Kansas City Rep, The Kennedy Center and Crossroads. His adaptation of Moby Dick at Milwaukee Rep was chosen one of the top ten productions of the year by Time magazine. Mr. Simonson is an accomplished director for theatre, film and opera. His production of The Song of Jacob Zulu received six Tony awards including one for best direction; he received the 2006 Academy Award for his short documentary A Note of Triumph, as well as the Princess Grace Statue Award for sustained artistic achievement in 2005. He is also an ensemble member of Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago. His adaptation of Slaughterhouse-Five recently received its Off-Broadway premiere at Godlight Theatre, and his play Carter’s Way was produced at Steppenwolf in March of 2008. Upcoming productions of new plays include Honest for Steppenwolf Theatre’s First Look Series this summer; and Fake, which will open at Steppenwolf in September, 2009.

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Dava Sobel, a former New York Times science reporter, is the author of Longitude, Galileo’s Daughter, Letters to Father and The Planets. In her thirty years as a science journalist, she has written for many magazines, including Audobon, Discover, Life and The New Yorker, served as a contributing editor to Harvard Magazine and Omni, and coauthored six books, including Is Anyone Out There? with astronomer Frank Drake and The Illustrated Longitude with William J.H. Andrewes. For her efforts to increase the public understanding of science, Sobel has been awarded the National Science Board’s prestigious Individual Public Service Award, the Bradford Washburn Award from the Boston Museum of Science and the Harrison Medal from the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers.

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Shelagh Stephenson’s play The Memory of Water premiered at the Hampstead Theater, and transferred to the West End (Olivier Award) before arriving at Manhattan Theatre Club. Other plays include An Experiment with an Air Pump (Royal Exchange, Manchester, Hampstead Theatre, Manhattan Theatre Club; Peggy Ramsay Award), Five Kinds of Silence (Hammersmith Lyric), Ancient Lights (Hampstead Theatre), Mappa Mundi (National Theatre) and Enlightenment (Abbey Theatre). Before You Go, her feature adaptation of ‘The Memory of Water’ was filmed in 2001, directed by Lewis Gilbert and starring Julie Walters. Shelagh has been commissioned by Live Theatre, the Hampstead Theatre, Manhattan Theatre Club and the Atlantic Theater Company. TV credits include “Casualty,” an adaptation of Frances Fyfield’s Shadow Play (Arrowhead/ITV). Recent film and TV commissions include Not a Love Story for Headline/C4, Lifes a Dream for Headline/BBC and Dragon Ladies for Lime Pictures.

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Catherine Trieschmann’s plays include The Bridegroom of Blowing Rock (Williamstown Theatre’s L. Arnold Weissberger award), Before the Fire, crooked, The World of Others and Hot Georgia Sunday. Her work has been produced Off-Broadway at the Women’s Project, London’s Bush Theatre, Florida Stage, the Summer Play Festival, Actor’s Theatre of Louisville, Theatre in the Square, and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, as well as developed with LARK, LAByrinth, Williamstown, Florida Studio Theatre, Ars Nova, and the Dallas Theatre Center, among others. Her plays are published by Samuel French, Methuen, and Smith & Kraus. Originally from Athens, Georgia, she currently resides in a small town in western Kansas, where she’s working on a commission for South Coast Repertory Theatre and a screenplay adaptation of the novel Angel’s Crest for Process Media.

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John Walch's full-length plays include The Dinosaur Within, Circumference of a Squirrel, The Nature of Mutation, Jesting With Edged Tools, Craving Gravy or Love in the Time of Cannibalism and Alice Threw the Looking Glass. His plays have been produced at The Mark Taper Forum, Actor's Theatre of Louisville, Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey, Kitchen Dog Theatre, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and Off-Broadway at Urban Stages. His work has been developed or commissioned through the Public Theater, Manhattan Theatre Club, The Playwrights' Center/PlayLabs, the Mark Taper Forum and the Theatre Royal Haymarket in London. Awards include: Kennedy Center Fund for New American Plays; the American Theatre Critics Association's Osborn Award; the Charlotte Woolard Award from the Kennedy Center; the Marc Klein Playwriting Award; and three Austin Critic's Table Awards. He was a James Michener Fellow at the Michener Center for Writers at UT-Austin, where he earned his MFA in Playwriting. John served as artistic director of Austin Script Works and taught playwriting at UT-Austin/Michener Center for Writers, Florida State Univeristy and the Playwrights Workshop at University of Iowa. His plays are published through Playscripts and other works have appeared in anthologies including Humana Festival 2004: Complete Plays, Best Stage Scenes and Best Men's Stage Monologues.

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Jason Wells has performed on stage at St. Louis Shakespeare Company, where he played the title role in Richard III; at Williamstown Theatre Festival, Victory Gardens, Chicago Dramatists, American Theater Company and others. He played Jonesy in Steppenwolf's productions of Side Man in Chicago; Galway, Ireland; Melbourne, Australia; and Beaver Creek, Colorado. In the last few years, Jason has turned his hand to writing. His first screenplay, From Missouri, was accepted for development at the New Harmony Project 2002. His first play, Men of Tortuga, was a semi-finalist at the Sundance Theatre Labs 2004 and premiered at Asolo Repertory Theatre in 2006. His play Perfect Mendacity, commissioned by Manhattan Theatre Club/Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, will also premiere at Asolo Repertory Theatre in 2009.

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Beau Willimon’s play, Farragut North, had its world premiere this fall at the Atlantic Theater in New York, and his feature adaptation of the play is set up at Warner Brothers, with Smoke House and Appian Way producing. His play, Lower Ninth, recently ran at The Flea Theater. He is also writing A Tale of Two Cities for Warners and DiCaprio and The Jury for Fox 2000. He is a recipient of the Lila Acheson Wallace Juilliard Playwriting Fellowship, the Lincoln Center Le Compte du Nuoy Award. Willimon holds an M.F.A. in playwriting from Columbia University.