STRANGE COURTESIES by L. Peter Callender 

Citizens of South Africa are confronting a painful past through the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which has heard thousands of reports about murders, tortures and other human rights abuses of the apartheid era. The TRC is grounded in a constitutional commitment to the African concept of ubuntu, or humanness. Amnesty is available on a conditional basis to alleged perpetrators. STRANGE COURTESIES explores the potential restorative power of truth telling; the significance of sympathetic witnesses; and the tasks of both perpetrators and bystanders in the TRC process. Can dignity be restored to victims and their families while offering a basis for individual healing, and promoting the reconciliation of a divided society?

L. Peter Callender is Artistic Director of African-American Shakespeare Company in San Francisco, an award-winning actor and director; mentor/coach and writer from Trinidad, West Indies, living in Oakland, California. He received his formal training in theater at the Juilliard School, in New York, Webber-Douglas Academy in London, and the Waseda Sho-Gekijo in Toga-mura Japan. Peter’s first play, STRANGE COURTESIES was born from the ultimate sacrifices and undying grace of Black South Africans during and after the nightmare of apartheid. It received it’s early readings and workshops at Alter-Lab in San Rafael, California and subsequent readings throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. Inspired by Shakespeare, Wilson and Fugard, Peter wishes to unveil the mask of history’s harsh reality in his plays through his use of poetry, imagination, theatricality and, always, humor.

THE IMPOSSIBLE ESCAPE OF DON MISTERIOSO by Hal Borden

Nine months after a CIA-backed coup, the warden of a Guatemalan prison agrees to an interview request from Maxine Whitman of Life magazine. When Max arrives at the prison, she reveals that her true agenda is to interview Francisco, a prisoner who she believes is the last living assistant of Harry Houdini. With the warden’s grudging cooperation, Max urges Francisco to divulge Houdini’s secrets before they’re lost to history, but she ultimately becomes more interested in Francisco’s own career as a magician—and when he attempts a daring prison break, Max plays an unexpected role in his final performance.

Hal Borden earned his M.F.A. degree from the UCLA School of Theater, Film & Television, where he won the Hal Kanter Comedy Writing Award.  His first stage play, A POSITION OF RELATIVE IMPORTANCE, has been performed at numerous theaters and festivals, including Theatre Conspiracy in Fort Myers, the American Actors UK Playreading Festival in London and Dayton Playhouse’s FutureFest.  His new play, THE IMPOSSIBLE ESCAPE OF DON MISTERIOSO, was selected for the 2019 New American Voices Playwriting Festival at The Landing Theatre Company in Houston. Hal is a member of the Dramatists Guild.

YOU TOO? By Taylor Leigh Lamb

Liza is a strong advocate for the #MeToo movement and is pretty clear on a few things: all men who sexually assault women deserve to be exposed and, as a journalist, it is her job to help make that happen. In the course of her work, she discovers that her own father – the only Black partner at his law firm, and Liza’s biggest supporter – may be a perpetrator of sexual assault.  As she chases the story, she uncovers complicated and conflicting motivations, and grapples with the questions of loyalty to family versus belief in one’s own personal values.

Taylor Leigh Lamb is a writer and theatre artist living and working in the D.C./Maryland area. She graduated from the University of Virginia with a Bachelor’s Degree in English with a minor in Drama. Taylor is interested in creating stories about and for Black women that impact social change. From this interest, YOU TOO? was born. YOU TOO? is her first full-length play. YOU TOO? was part of the METLab 2019 Plays in Progress festival, as well as read on the Inkubator on Air podcast. Helping fulfill her desire for Black women centered storytelling, Taylor is also the Digital Media and Marketing producer for the web series Black Enough.

MLM IS FOR MURDER (OR, YOUR SIDE HUSTLE IS KILLING US) by John Bavoso

Side hustles. It seems like everybody has at least one these days. For Minerva Ross, the way to escape the doldrums of her graphic design job in Washington, DC is to write and narrate her own feminist true crime podcast about how and why women commit murder. Meanwhile, across the country, Felicity Evanston, a Mormon stay-at-home wife and mother—and Minerva’s high school nemesis—has just started selling ridiculously patterned leggings for the multi-level marketing company Linen & Fate, as much as a way of having something that’s just hers as to supplement her husband’s income. The two haven’t crossed paths in years, but when the bubbly and unassuming Felicity snaps and realizes the only way to get ahead in a rigged pyramid scheme is to literally start killing off the competition, both women suddenly experience the kind of overnight success they’ve been so desperately craving—but risk losing their families, freedom, and very souls in the process.

John Bavoso is a Washington, DC-based playwright, book and theatre reviewer, marketer and aspiring wrangler of unicorns. He mostly writes plays about women and queer people who are awkwardly attempting (and generally failing) to engage with serious subject matter using only dry wit and impeccably timed combative taunts. John is a member of the Dramatists Guild of America, a Pinky Swear Productions company member, a 2019 Lambda Literary Fellow and the recipient of District of Columbia FY18 and FY19 Arts and Humanities Fellowships. His plays have been produced and/or developed in DC, Virginia, New York, Colorado, Texas, California, Florida, South Carolina, Wisconsin, Washington, Illinois, Maryland, Maine, Massachusetts, Kansas, and Arizona; Toronto, Canada; and Gold Coast and Sydney, Australia. More at http://john-bavoso.com/

PREDICTOR by Jennifer Blackmer

PREDICTOR is the real-life story of Margaret Crane who, in 1967, defied all odds and expectations to become the inventor of the first home pregnancy test. Based on interviews with Ms. Crane herself, and told with a witty nod to 1960’s pop culture, this is a fascinating true account of a time when men had even more control over a woman’s right to choose her own reproductive fate.  

Jennifer Blackmer’s plays have been produced off-Broadway and across the country, and include Human
Terrain, Unraveled, Margaret Atwood’s Alias Grace (Joseph Jefferson award for Best Adaptation),
Delicate Particle Logic, Borrowed Babies and Predictor. Jennifer was the recipient of the 2015 PEN/Laura
Pels International Foundation for Theatre Award for Emerging American Playwright, and her screenplay
for Human Terrain won the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation award through the Tribeca Film Institute. Jennifer
is a two-time O’Neill finalist, her writing has been short-listed for the Princess Grace Award and the
Shakespeare’s Sister Fellowship, and has been developed by Seven Devils, Illinois Shakespeare Festival,
Nashville Repertory Theatre, The Playwrights’ Center, The Lark and Activate Midwest. She serves as
Professor of Theatre and Director of the Virginia B. Ball Center for Creative Inquiry at Ball State
University. Visit Jennifer on the New Play Exchange, and at www.jenniferblackmer.com.

21st Century Voices: New Play Festival 2017

STRAIT OF GIBRALTAR by Andrea Lepcio – Selected for American Stage’s 2017-2018 mainstage season

FLYING by Sheila Cowley

RISE OF THE PRICKLY PEAR by Radha S. Menon

PRUDENCE by Stefan Lanfer

21st Century Voices: New Play Festival 2018

LENI AND JOSEPH by Jacob Marx Rice

IF NOW WERE HENCE by Tess Light

POSTLINGUAL by Brooke Downs

GROUP by Alex Rubin

GOOD BAD PEOPLE by Rachel Lynett

21st Century Voices: New Play Festival 2019

THE COLONY by Gina Stevensen

SHRUTI GUPTA CAN TOTALLY DEAL by J.Stephen Brantley

THE FLORA AND FAUNA by Alyson Mead

THE DIARY OF ANNIE MAE FRANKLIN by Crystal V. Rhodes

THE PEOPLE DOWNSTAIRS by Playwright-In-Residence Natalie Symons