The Playwrights Group
has been meeting weekly since 2007.
Join our nation-wide community of playwrights on Zoom!
has been meeting weekly since 2007.
Join our nation-wide community of playwrights on Zoom!
Here’s how it works:
You bring in anything from a one page scene to an entire full length script. It can be a play, a musical, a film, a TV pilot, a webisode -- whatever. You assign roles and we give it a reading. Then you get feedback — thoughts, feelings; we’ll kick around some ideas — and maybe you’ll get a revelation or two. But what most members find is that simply the discipline of bringing work in and the exposure to other writers and their methods is a great way to keep motivated and focused.
We’re a loose bunch. We have fun. And there’s always a nice mix of folks who have been members for years along with some who are new. And we also have a wide geographic range of playwrights from all over the country.
Throughout the year we bring in guest speakers -- playwrights, directors, artistic directors, actors and others -- who offer their insights on theater-making. Past guests have included Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Margaret Edson (Wit) and Claire Beckman, Artistic Director of the Brooklyn based site specific company Brave New World Rep. Upcoming guests include TPG alum Gary Kupper, whose musical, Rock & Roll Man is currently playing Off-Broadway.
Three times a year we present public readings of completed scripts, with actors and with audience talk back sessions. Sometimes we'll present a series of short plays and sometimes it will be a full length. We get an audience of anywhere from 30-100 people, so it's a great way to get a wider perspective on your work.
The best way to get a feel for TPG is to sit in on a session and see if you like the vibe. If you feel good about it — go for it! We love new faces.
You bring in anything from a one page scene to an entire full length script. It can be a play, a musical, a film, a TV pilot, a webisode -- whatever. You assign roles and we give it a reading. Then you get feedback — thoughts, feelings; we’ll kick around some ideas — and maybe you’ll get a revelation or two. But what most members find is that simply the discipline of bringing work in and the exposure to other writers and their methods is a great way to keep motivated and focused.
We’re a loose bunch. We have fun. And there’s always a nice mix of folks who have been members for years along with some who are new. And we also have a wide geographic range of playwrights from all over the country.
Throughout the year we bring in guest speakers -- playwrights, directors, artistic directors, actors and others -- who offer their insights on theater-making. Past guests have included Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Margaret Edson (Wit) and Claire Beckman, Artistic Director of the Brooklyn based site specific company Brave New World Rep. Upcoming guests include TPG alum Gary Kupper, whose musical, Rock & Roll Man is currently playing Off-Broadway.
Three times a year we present public readings of completed scripts, with actors and with audience talk back sessions. Sometimes we'll present a series of short plays and sometimes it will be a full length. We get an audience of anywhere from 30-100 people, so it's a great way to get a wider perspective on your work.
The best way to get a feel for TPG is to sit in on a session and see if you like the vibe. If you feel good about it — go for it! We love new faces.
- Tuesdays Or Thursdays: 7 - 9:30pm EST
- Public Readings
- Guest Speakers
- Affordable Fee: $100/10 wks
- Email us at scripts@theplaywrightsgroup.com to schedule a visit!
Current Member Playwrights
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Eddie Arredondo (Tues Nite) a Texas expat living on Long Island. Scripts workshopped at TPG include: This God Thing, about YHWH facing some domestic issues; Lisa Ann, about a young woman who suddenly finds herself without choice under the new Texas abortion law; “Tina’s Rose”, a mystery thriller about child abuse; “The Moneydigger”, about Mormon Church founder, Joseph Smith; “McDonald Drumpf”, about you know who; “Blutbad” about the Armenian holocaust; and “Sister Irene”, about the death of a sibling from COVID 19.
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Don Bartalo (Tues Nite) lives in Rochester, NY and has spent over 55 years acting, directing, producing, & coaching in community theatre. Bart embarked on playwriting with one goal in mind: Direct one of his own plays on stage. His love for all aspects of theatre cannot be under or over stated. The “boss”, as he sometimes refers to Richard, has given Bart a huge boost in a never-ending quest to learn all he can about the performing arts. REMEMBER: THIS IS NO DRESS REHEARSAL.
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Benn Bell (Tues Nite) Writer, photographer, raconteur. I was born in a small cabin in Kentucky in a little town called Hope. I worked in business and industry for many years, now I am anybody’s dog that wants to hunt.
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Jeanne Beckwith (Thurs Nite) Primarily a playwright, Jeanne's plays have been staged from New York to California and as far away as Dublin and Istanbul. Most recently, her full-length play, Sam and Jim in Hell was performed October 5-22, 2023 at Lost Nation Theater in Montpelier, Vermont. Throughout her life, Jeanne has worked as a playwright, director, actor and dramaturg in academic, professional, and community theaters around the country. She is a founding member of the Vermont Playwrights Circle and holds professional memberships with the Dramatists Guild, and the International Association for the Fantastic in the Arts. For more on Jeanne and her work go to: jeannebeckwith.com
Cate Berg (Tues Nite) lives in Kingston, NY. She's currently working on "The Hardest Cut", a full-length drama about a woman struggling to make a future with her girlfriend while being pulled back into the past by her brother's mental illness. Catherine earned her MFA/Fiction from the Iowa Writers' Workshop many, many moons ago.
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Warren DeLange (Thurs Nite) lives in Mission Viejo, California and is working on Third Floor Please, a physical comedy play about 4 kids, one very pregnant, getting stuck in an elevator. It is his first full length play. Not long ago, his short play “Woke” was part of TPG’s public reading series and it was selected for production in the North Park Theater Festival in San Diego this past April.
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L. Jan Eira (Tues Nite) was born in Portugal and immigrated to the US when he was 15. He pursued his first dream of becoming a physician and now works as a cardiologist at Franciscan Health Network in Indianapolis, Indiana. His plays have been staged in central Indiana and elsewhere. He is most proud of a contest he won where one of his plays was staged Off-Off Broadway. www.theMDwriter.com www.Facebook.com/theMDwriter.
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Joël Doty (Thurs Nite) lives in Ann Arbor, MI after spending most of her adult life in Evanston, Il. Her short plays have been produced around the country. Action and Reaction, the most popular, is published by ArtAge Publications Senior Theatre. On the other end of the spectrum, her children’s play, Furry Tales, is often produced in schools and published by Youth Plays. Many of her full-length plays have done well in contests. Mea’s Unique Garage Sale was selected for a reading at Capital Stages and the most fun she ever had was producing and directing it in Ann Arbor right before the pandemic.
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R.G. Gaffney (Thurs Nite) lives in Manhattan. She is the author of The Bicycle Play, known as “the most controversial play ever read” at The Playwrights Group. Several of R.G.’s other works - Santa Redux (working title) and Eleven Minute Play have been read at Naked Angels and at The Barrow Group in NYC respectively. She is currently working on a revise and expansion of The Bicycle Play. Stay tuned.
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Michael Greenspun (Tues Nite) is a playwright, librettist, and lyricist. A selection of Michael’s works includes “A Scene from a Philly Lunch Counter at Noon,” (The Tank, New York, New York), “The Battle Between Good and Evil,” (book writer), (The Colony Theatre, Burbank, CA); and “Marriage Counseling,” (book writer / colyricist), (New Musicals Inc., North Hollywood, CA). Michael is proud to have earned The Dramatists Guild Institute Certificate in Dramatic Writing. Michael’s credo: Strive for the transformation of the characters, the audience, and me; keep the audience entertained.
Nina Howes (Thurs Nite) is a nurse, an activist, and a writer. Her plays have been performed at the Metropolitan Playhouse, Theater for the New City, the Clemente Soto Velez Center, and the Dorothy Strelsin Theater. Her stories have been published by Kaplan Publishing, and University of Iowa Press. Her book "Lower East Side Oral Histories" is available on Amazon.com. For more info visit her website, www.ninahowes.com. |
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Dana Jaffe (Tues Nite), a playwright in Great Neck, NY, belongs to the Dramatist’s Guild and studied playwriting with Richard Caliban at Gotham Writer’s Workshop. She is a member of “The Playwright’s Group” in NY. Her play "No Good Deed" was presented at ELT-NYC in 2017. Her play "Harold's Road" was accepted for production in NYC in 2018. Her full-length play “Voices of Me Too” had two staged readings in Douglaston, NY. She enjoys working with TPG!
Stuart Loeb (Tues Nite) lives in Rochester, New York and is currently working on a play about a teenage pianist in a mental hospital near London in 1943. He’s written two plays which had amateur productions in Rochester: Bravura, about David Hochstein, a concert violinist who died in WWI, which was directed by Don Bartalo, and Ashcakes, a play about Frederick Douglass and his family. |
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Angela Mitchell (Thurs Nite) lives in Seattle and is currently working on the full-length works THE BETRAYALS OF WOMEN, BETWEEN THE WISH AND THE LIFE, and AGGRO, and is working with Kimberly Ferse to workshop their musical ANGRY ANNIE and on the new musical NO INTERMISSION.
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Rosemary Parrillo (Thurs Nite) is a New Jersey playwright and journalist. Her work centers on people caught in the crosshairs of calamity and self-doubt. Her post-9/11 play, “The New Normal Trilogy,” was selected as a semifinalist for the 2017 Eugene O'Neill Theater Center National Playwrights Conference. “The Nature of Stars,” was a 2024 finalist for the Tennessee Williams One-Act Contest, marking her fourth finalist placement in the New Orleans competition. Her play "On the Road to Tikrit" was recently performed at the 8 Tens @ 8 Festival at Actors Theatre in Santa Cruz, Ca., and will be featured on an upcoming podcast at Sell Yourself Short, by Curtain and Mic Productions in New York. “Sheila and the DMV” will be performed in June at the Ritz Theatre Company One-Act Play Festival in Haddon Heights, N.J. And her new full-length, “Spaghetti Western,” will have a staged reading in August at the Waterfront South Theatre in Camden, N.J. Parrillo is a member of the Dramatist Guild, the New Play Exchange, The New York Playwrights Group, The Philadelphia Dramatists Center, The Theater Project in Cranford, N.J. the International Centre for Women Playwrights, and New York Women in Film and Television.
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D.L. (Deb) Patrick (Thurs Nite) is a member of the Dramatists Guild and a native Detroiter who holds a B.A. in Creative Writing from New York University. Her play, STUDY IN BLACK, a.k.a, The Study, about the infamous USPHS Syphilis Study at Tuskegee, was produced by the Frank Silvera Writers Workshop, NYC, and was nominated for an AUDELCO Award. Other works include: ECLIPSED: THE SUN, THE MOON, AND GLADYS ATKINSON SWEET (Michigan Playwrights Festival 2024 and Theatre NOVA Inaugural Developmental Residency); KINGDOM COME (Barter Theatre Black Stories/Black Voices 2024); RIGHT BEHIND YOU (OnyxFest 2023); and SALLIE’S CRYING TREE (Barter Theatre Black Stories/Black Voices 2023), among others. She is a finalist in the Black Motherhood & Parenting New Play Festival 2024 and was a semi-finalist for the Dramatists Guild Foundation 2023 National Virtual Fellows Program.
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Daniel Perez (Thurs Nite) lives in New York City and is writing Nuyorican Novela. His play Taina En El Yunque was given a public reading at TPG.
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Darcy Heller Sternberg (Tues Nite) lives in New York City. Rhyme Scheme: a one minute play will be published in Fresh Words: An International Literary Magazine under "SHHH! BREATHE SLOW." Volume 2. A Perfect Love was a finalist among 600 blind submissions for 2024 Waterworks Festival based in Charlottesville ,Virginia. Turkey Perky Hotline at the Queens Short Play Festival. Hearts Afire, inspired by my students at CUNY’S Borough of Manhattan Community College, premiered at The New York International Fringe Festival My first person essays and fiction have been published in journals and newspapers including The New York Times.Thanks TPG!
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Ron Stoltz (Tues Nite) is a native of Ottawa Canada. Retired, I now have more time for writing. I co-produced my first play, Maîtres Chez Nous, at Theatre Wakefield (Quebec) in November 2019. My play, One Act of Redemption, is scheduled for a professional production in New York City in November 2024, by Kingdom Theatre group.
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Gretchen Roselli (Thurs Nite) had a career as an actor, dancer, singer, and model and owned a performing arts school in New York. She now writes plays and non-fiction. Her articles have been published in Red Rock Life Magazine, The Colorado Sun and bioStories Magazine. She has had two plays produced and is a member of The Playwrights Group. She loves theatre, running, travel, fostering dogs, and doing handstands. She lives in Colorado with her husband.
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Joe Salembier (Thurs Nite) lives in Scottsdale Arizona and is working on Kitchen Confidential, a romantic conversation between a baker and a devil’s food cake and he’s also rewriting two shorts after being workshopped by TPG. Joe is planning a reading of Wisteria Blooms, about a college student who visits her Christian parents to tell them she’s pregnant. He’s also working on No Excuses -- a play about what happens when wise cracking performance artists stage their own deaths.
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Jim Sampson (Thurs Nite) holds a BFA in Musical Theater from Syracuse University. He has been an actor, singer, dancer, musician, choreographer and director. He is the author of Boldness Rewarded, a modern Restoration comedy, ASKEW, a comedia dell'arte farce based on three Vermeer paintings, In the Shadow of the Sun, a biographical play about Louis XIV's brother, Queen, King, Pawn, a play about the woman responsible for bringing Joan of Arc to the king's attention, and many short plays. He was named Playwright in Residence at Tempest Productions for their First Fridays readings series for the 2020-21 season.
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Ellen Snortland (Thurs Nite) is a non-practicing lawyer, teacher, media, theater, creative writing teacher, first-time author book coach and empowerment self-defense instructor. She is a regular opinion columnist for the Pasadena Weekly, Los Angeles Downtown News and the West Los Angeles Argonaut. Ellen has been a speaker, U.N. Press Corps credentialed journalist and delegate for major United Nations World Conferences: the Women’s conference in Beijing and Conference Against Racism in South Africa, and the Commission on the Status of Women in NYC. Snortland got her BA in Theater and Film at UC Irvine and her J.D. at Loyola Law School in LA. Ellen is the playwright and performer of a one-woman show, “Now That She’s Gone,” which premiered at the New York and Edinburgh Fringe Festivals. She is currently writing two full length plays, “The Fairy Project” and “Claudia Claus.” Snortland co-founded the first all woman theater company in the U.S. in the early 70s where she collaborated on two original plays, Rainbow, and, The Pitz. She is the author of “Beauty Bites Beast: Awakening the Warrior Within Women and Girls,” featured on Dateline NBC and NPR. She is the director/writer/producer of the documentary Beauty Bites Beast: The Missing Conversation About Ending Violence. (Movie trailer here: http://tinyurl.com/BBB-Trailer-2016) Snortland lives in Altadena, CA, with her husband and their 3 naughty dogs. Cellular: 626-354-8421 Website: www.beautybitesbeast.com Email: ellensnortland@mac.com
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Not Pictured: Evan Alvarado, Carolina Cardona, Christina Carlson, Kim Ferse, Michael Hoft, Tom, Hugh-Jones, Rebecca Roe, Peter Rowan
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