15th Annual Staged Reading Series - June 2012 

Staged readings presented at the Provincetown Playhouse, 133 MacDougal Street

Each June since 1998, the Program in Educational Theatre at New York University has offered a play development series at the landmark Provincetown Playhouse.  The tradition and practice of developing new scripts and new talents dates back to the early days of the Playhouse, originally the Playwrights Theatre, which fostered the early works of Eugene O’Neill, Susan Glaspell, and Edna St. Vincent Millay and where future stars, such as Bette Davis and Claudette Colbert, made their debuts.

Now in its 15th season, the New Plays for Young Audiences (NPYA) play reading series focuses more specifically on the development of scripts for child and young people’s audiences.  The creative vision of the Program in Educational Theatre’s co-founders, Lowell and Nancy Swortzell, was to establish a program to encourage the development of plays for youth written by both NYU students and noted authors in the U.S. and abroad. As a playwright himself and editor of several books of plays for children and adults, Lowell Swortzell understood that playwrights need a home where they can take risks in a supportive atmosphere—a place designed to both nurture and evaluate. This is precisely what O’Neill and his colleagues achieved in their small theatre, and what NPYA achieves for young audiences today.

Find out more about the New Plays for Young Series  as well as follow us on Twitter (#npya) and Facebook.

Course Offering

Auditions

Auditions for New Plays for Young Audiences will be held:

Thursday April 12 from 7 p.m. to 9:40 p.m.

Friday April 13 from 5:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.

Callbacks will be on Sunday April 14 from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

Call for scripts

New Plays for Young Audiences seeks new unpublished and unproduced scripts for young audiences (ages 4-21).

New Plays for Young Audiences is an annual summer play development series located in the historic Provincetown Playhouse. Founded in 1997 by Lowell and Nancy Swortzell, NYU's prize-winning New Plays for Young Audiences has developed over thirty new plays written by leading playwrights for young audiences and families including Carl Miller, Y York, Laurie Brooks, Suzan Zeder, Bryony Lavery, Lois Lowry, Angela Betzien, and José Cruz González. These plays go on to receive publication and production throughout the world. 

To submit your new play for young audiences for consideration in our 2013 series, send your script by October 31, 2012, to Artistic Director, David Montgomery at dm635@nyu.edu or to

Dr. David Montgomery
Program in Educational Theatre
Department of Music and Performing Arts Professions
New York University
Education Building, 35 W. 4^th Street, 12^th floor
New York, NY, 10012.