The Department of Theatre Arts & Performance Studies presents

WRITING IS LIVE 2023
featuring new pays in progress by brown mfa playwrights

part 1: the readings
February 9 – 12

part 2: the thesis shows
March 15 – 19

part 1. part 2. reserve tickets.

part 1: the readings
February 9 – 12
Leeds Theatre

Wall of Death
by Harley Elias ’24 mfa
directed by JaMario Stills ’23 mfa
Cold War Choir Play
by Ro Reddick ’24 mfa
directed by Molly Houlahan ’23 mfa
Beautiful Princess Disorder
by Kathy Ng ’25 mfa
directed by Talley Murphy
Penguin Sex With Mr. Morgan:
A Cabaret for an Apocalypse

by Dhari Noel ’25 mfa
directed by Andrew Watring ’23 mfa
undergrad underground
an afternoon of new play excerpts

part 2: the thesis shows
March 15 – 19
Leeds Theatre

Play House
by Alexa Derman ’23 mfa
directed by Molly Houlahan ’23 mfa
Spread
written and directed by
Jesús I Valles ’23 mfa

schedule

part 1: the readings 

Thursday, February 9, 2023
8:00 PM: Wall of Death by Harley Elias ’24 mfa
Friday, February 10, 2023
4:00 PM: undergrad underground: an afternoon of new play excerpts

8:00 PM: Cold War Choir Play
by Ro Reddick ’24 mfa
Saturday, February 11, 2023
11:00 AM: Penguin Sex With Mr. Morgan: A Cabaret for an Apocalypse by Dhari Noel ’25 mfa

1:00 PM: Beautiful Princess Disorder
by Kathy Ng ’25 mfa
4:00 PM: Wall of Death by Harley Elias ’24 mfa
8:00 PM: Cold War Choir Play by Ro Reddick ’24 mfa
Sunday, February 12, 2023
11:00 AM: Beautiful Princess Disorder

by Kathy Ng ’25 mfa
1:00 PM: Penguin Sex With Mr. Morgan: A Cabaret for an Apocalypse by Dhari Noel ’25 mfa
4:00 PM: Cold War Choir Play by Ro Reddick ’24 mfa
8:00 PM: Wall of Death by Harley Elias ’24 mfa

part 2: the thesis shows

Wednesday, March 15, 2023
8:00 PM: Play House

by Alexa Derman ’23 mfa
Thursday, March 16, 2023
8:00 PM: Spread
by Jesús I Valles ’23 mfa
Friday, March 17, 2023
1:00 PM: Spread
by Jesús I Valles ’23 mfa

8:00 PM: Play House
by Alexa Derman ’23 mfa
Saturday, March 18, 2023
1:00 PM: Play House
by Alexa Derman ’23 mfa
8:00 PM: Spread
by Jesús I Valles ’23 mfa
Sunday, March 19, 2023
1:00 PM: Spread
by Jesús I Valles ’23 mfa

8:00 PM: Play House
by Alexa Derman ’23 mfa

free admission
Tickets to the readings are free but reservations are required.
Click here to order your ticket(s).
(tickets available mid-January)


Beautiful Princess Disorder

Kathy Ng Headshot

by Kathy Ng ’25 MFA
Directed by Talley Murphy, PhD Candidate


2/11 1 PM

2/12 11 AM

CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS

Triangle Person is a “human body” with a triangle “head”. The “head” part is made of something like cardboard. The” human body” part wears a navy-blue no-nonsense swimsuit. Triangle Person lives in a patch of sky right next door to heaven. God has never come by with a casserole, though. Triangle Person’s roommates are Mother Teresa and Tilikum the bull orca. There’s lots to do and luckily, all the time in the world. A fuzzy-edged sibling drama for the only child.

kathy ng (she/they) writes plays and makes mixed-media crafts. She was born in Hong Kong. Her work attempts to create stretchy human-adjacent spaces, nursing grounds for newborn languages, and giant magnifying glasses for all the tiny things underneath. Recent works include bacon sausage veggie noodles (Clubbed Thumb Reading Series) and happy life (O’Neill Finalist ‘21, The Hearth). Kathy made her nyc debut in the summer of 2022, when happy life received its world premiere production at Walker Space. The production was called “porous but sticky” – New York Times and “a kinky, violent, tentacle-porno masterpiece”- Stagebuddy, which makes her blush. She is a New Georges Affiliated Artist and an alum of Clubbed Thumb’s Early-Career Writers’ Group. BA from Brown in Writing for Performance. She currently lives in Providence, a home-like place, where she’s back at Brown and pursuing her MFA in playwriting.

Talley Murphy is a stage director, video artist, and performance studies scholar based in New York, NY and Providence, RI. Talley is a founding member and director at Fullscreen Blackbox, a digital-age theatre company, where they direct new and devised work. In summer 2023, Talley will be directing geography, which will be staged both in person and online via surveillance cameras. At Fullscreen Blackbox, Talley collaborates with actors, writers, and multimedia artists to create work at the intersection of performance and new technology. Fullscreen Blackbox partners with national nonprofits and community organizations, including, recently, Stonewall Community Foundation, New Sanctuary Coalition and the 246 for 2021 campaign, and the Safe Passage Project.
Other recent directing projects include Antigonick (UN Women HeForShe), Romeo and Juliet (Awake at 3), and Catastrophe: An Improvisation (developed at the Rhode Island School of Design). Talley has been a teaching artist for children and young adults in southwestern Maine and Washington, DC. Talley is currently a PhD Candidate in Theatre Arts and Performance Studies at Brown University researching gesture, carcerality, and digital capitalism as they converge in the United States. Talley has a BA in Theatre from Barnard College. talleymurphy.com / fullscreenblackbox.com


Penguin Sex With Mr. Morgan: A Cabaret for an Apocalypse

Dhari Noel Headshot

by Dhari Noel ’25 MFA
Directed by Andrew Watring ’23 MFA

2/11 11 AM
2/12 1 PM

CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS

A burlesque apocalypse in three parts. As the ice melts melts melts, Baby, a punk rock penguin, leads a revolt. And the clothes can’t help but fall off. But wait, Morgan Freeman’s voice looms, telling us what to do, what not to do, what we must do, what do we want him to do, this Body-Named-Black. Ice melts melts melts. Another layer peels to the ground. It’s so cold that it’s fiery hot. Twenty minutes left: and wait, there’s more… but I thought you said this was a burlesque? Ice melt melt melt. A striptease down to our raw parts.

Dhari Noel (he/him) is a Queer Black-Caribbean playwright, performer, and educator born and raised in Harlem. Dhari’s writing often explores the incoherence of race, the failures of gender, and inherited ways of being. His recent plays include: Man Made, Spirit Junkie (Cherry Picking, The Wild Project), Exorcism for The DEI Practitioner (Cherry Picking), and Keep The Orange (ECFS). Dhari’s recent performances include: Man Made, Spirit Junkie (Cherry Picking, The Wild Project), Black Exhibition (Bushwick Starr), In The Penal Colony (Next Door at NYTW, The Tank), Floater, Ride (Cherry Picking). As a teacher, Dhari uses storytelling, social justice, and interdisciplinary studies all in an effort to examine systems of power. Dhari has a BA in Sociology from Columbia University. He is currently pursuing his MFA in Playwriting at Brown University. He is adjusting but misses the Harlem noises.

Andrew Watring (Andrew) is a Black trans Object-theatre-creator, director, award-winning playwright, producer, performer, and Anarkata-in-training from sweet home Huntsville, Alabama. Andrew’s career has been dedicated to the creation and continued cultivation of Shakespeare is a White Supremacist, a thearical ritual grounded in Shakespeare’s colonizing effect on the American theatre; most recently staged with Main Street Players (Miami-Dade, FL). Select directing credits include: RENT, Angels in America, The Henriad, Richard III, White Noise, Hamletmachine, Passing: A Stage Play, Coriolanus. Andrew was a member of the Directors Lab North (2021); graduate of the Theatre Lab Life Stories Institutie (2019); an Honored Playwright at the New South Young Playwright’s Festival (2018). Andrew founded and served as the Artistic Director of the Fractal Theatre Collective, an anti-capitalist arts organization that embraced community-led, direct action as an integral element of theatrical design. Andrew’s projects currently in development: Charles Town: A Black. Queer. Providence; Old God, or In The Old Tradition; Trans Racial; The 9th Street Black Preservation Society. Andrew holds a BA in Theatre from American University, and is an MFA candidate at Brown University / Trinity Repertory Company. https://www.andrewwatring.com/


Wall of Death

Harley Elias Headshot

by Harley Elias ’24 MFA
Directed by JaMario Stills ’23 MFA

2/9 8 PM
2/11 4 PM
2/12 8 PM

CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS

Step right up and be transfixed by the Wall of Death! Motorcycle riders flying at breakneck speed around and around in front of your eyes. A man singing his way to redemption. Memories creating their own gravity. It all moves together on the Wall. A meditation. A confession. A song cycle. A carnival. Come ride.

Harley Elias is an Indian-Iraqi-Jewish playwright and performer from New York City, who often writes plays about the strangeness of history, the dismantling of power systems, and revolutions. He has been the recipient of residencies at the Atlantic Center for the Arts, with Resonance Ensemble, a Fulbright Grant, the Wild Epiphanies New Play Award, two Samuel French OOB Awards, a Young Playwrights Award, the Hester-Franklin Prize, and his Play #3 is published by Samuel French. Recent plays include The Handless King (Wild Epiphanies), Thug Play (Resonance Ensemble), The Pardon (Brown University), and 47 Years of Marriage (Samuel French OOB). With the composer Francisco Finck he wrote the libretto for the opera 11:35, set to premiere in Mexico City in 2023. The documentary he co-wrote and directed, Reconquest of the Useless, was shown at the Havana, Zurich, Woodstock, and Virginia Film Festivals. As an actor his credits include Les Miserables (Broadway and National Tour), A Thousand Clowns (Broadway), A Christmas Carol (Broadway), Ragtime (National Tour). He has worked at the Goodspeed Opera House, EST, Workhouse, Second Stage, HB Studio, Soho Rep, and performed solo at the Kennedy Center. He holds a BA and MA in History and Art History from Stanford and is currently pursuing his MFA in Playwriting at Brown. He is currently under commission from Miami New Drama and Theater J.

JaMario Stills (he/him/his) Is a graduate of The Juilliard School where he received a BFA in Acting and is currently an MFA directing candidate at Brown/Trinity Rep. He is also the 2021 Boris Segal Fellowship recipient at Williamstown Theater festival. As a professional actor, JaMario has performed at Lincoln Center’s Avery Fisher Hall, The McCarter Theater, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, The Brooklyn Academy of Music and The Jacksonville Symphony. JaMario founded the Jacksonville based theater company, Phase Eight-in 2017 and serves as its Founding Artistic Director. He has directed a range of plays recognizing time-honored classics and new works by local playwrights while in Jacksonville. Including, MLK Boulevard  by Jacksonville native and Juilliard alumni, Julian Robertson, a multimedia one-woman show On Purpose by acclaimed poet and performer Ebony Payne-English and Women’s Work and Food of Love- two immersive theater pieces developed with prolific Northeast Florida writer, Kelby Siddons for the Museum of Contemporary Art and Cafe Nola. While in attendance at Brown University, JaMario has explored digital adaptations of the works by his favorite writers during the initial breakout of COVID-19. Octavia Butler, Adrienne Kennedy, Moor Mother, Audre Lorde and Gil Scott-Heron, just to name a few. Upon returning to live theater- JaMario and his cohort engaged in a devised adaptation of Shakespeare’s Pericles. Stills has also completed a screenwriting course at RISD (Rhode Island School Design). He intends to continue his studies in filmmaking at RISD while completing his prerequisites for his Master’s in theater directing


Cold War Choir Play

Ro Reddick Headshot

by Ro Reddick ’24 MFA
Directed by Molly Houlahan ’23 MFA

2/10 8 PM
2/11 8 PM
2/12 4 PM

CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS

It’s 1987 in Ronald Reagan’s America and the specter of nuclear war hangs over the country – but rent is still due on the 1st. Cold War Choir Play is an action packed dark comedy that places a Black family in Upstate New York inside a dizzying kaleidoscope of nukes, disco fries, roller rinks, and spycraft – just in time for the holiday season!

Ro Reddick (she/her) is a queer playwright, performer, and songwriter.  She is a second year MFA Playwriting candidate at Brown University where she is the Adele Kellenberg Seaver Fellow. Her plays include Throwback Island (Bushwick Starr Reading Series ‘22), ROBAMA (Williamstown Theater Festival NYC Reading ‘22, O’ Neill Semifinalist ‘22), Miss Black Syracuse (The Duplex), and The History of Black People Making White People Better People (co-writer Daryl Lathon). Her script The Fam was a semi-finalist for the MACRO x Blacklist Episodic Lab, and her short film A Test In Stamina premiered at the Big Apple Film Festival. Ro is a recipient of the Miranda Theatre Company 2021 Playwright Grant. As an actor, Ro has performed at theaters including the McCarter, Long Wharf, KC Rep, and Hartford Stage, off-Broadway in “Silence! The Musical”, and on screen in The Americans, Louie, and SATC 2. She formerly sang with a country, rock, and blues band and has written over a dozen original songs with musician Ron Gross. She is currently in the Brown Arts Institute Songwriters Workshop. Ro has a BFA in Acting from Ithaca College and an MBA from NYU, which she has no intention of using

Molly Houlahan (she/hers) is a Providence based queer director. She is the previous Associate Artistic Director of Congressional Award-Winning Hypokrit Theatre Company. Hypokrit has developed work with institutions such as The Public, New York Theatre Workshop, Playwrights Horizons, New Georges, Rattlestick, Lincoln Center/LCT3, and UNICEF amongst others. Houlahan’s select directing credits include Transhumance (Austin,TX Fringe, Auckland Fringe, Adelaide Fringe, Edinburgh Fringe), In Search of Maria Theresa (Cell Theatre), Gospel of the Marys (Furnace Festival), R+J (Access Theatre), How To Succeed as an Ethnically Ambiguous Actor starring Zenobia Shroff from “The Big Sick” (Castillo Theatre), Scorched (The Araca Project), and Still Life (NYC International Fringe Festival). Molly has assistant/associate directed for Kate Whoriskey, Anne Kauffman, Rebecca Taichman, Les Waters, Dan Sullivan, Tony Taccone, Lynne Meadow, and Mary Zimmerman among others at institutions such as The Public, Playwrights Horizons, Encores! at NYCC, The Town Hall, Berkeley Rep, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Arena Stage, Manhattan Theatre Club, and the New York Philharmonic. She has worked in the producing department at The Public, the artistic department at Steppenwolf, and as the assistant to the Artistic Director at Berkeley Rep. She has assisted artists such as Mira Nair (“Monsoon Wedding”) and Sarah Jones (“Sell/Buy/Date”). 2019 Manhattan Theatre Club Directing Fellow, 2017 Playwrights Horizons Directing Fellow, 2015-2016 Bret C. Harte Directing Fellow at Berkeley Rep, and the winner of the Louis Sudler Prize upon graduating Yale University.


Undergrad Underground: 
an afternoon of new play excerpts

2/10 4 PM

CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS

Mai HeadshotThe Pharm House (the time we have)
by Mai Newbury ’23
directed by Josephine Bleakley ’23

Friends return to a childhood home rotten with memories of growing up together amid the opioid crisis in rural New England. Ultimately, they find that most of our houses– much like most of our relationships– are not made to stand forever.

Mai Newbury is a senior from Weybridge, Vermont studying Literary Arts and Political Science at Brown. She hopes to use her writing to provide new perspectives on social issues– beginning with more nuanced and empathetic depictions of poverty and addiction in rural America.

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Ilana HeadshotA Dryad and a Golem
by Ilana Jacobs ’23
directed by Charles Shi ’23

A golem is a creature made of mud. A dryad is a spirit of a tree. What if their daughter told you how they fell in love?

Ilana Jacobs (they/she/he) is a nonbinary Jewish writer and artist with an interest in the intersections of queer and Jewish culture. Originally from Waltham, MA, they began writing fiction and poetry but transitioned to playwriting for its ability to tell a live and alive stories. They have taken part in the Brown Undergraduate Advanced Playwright Workshop, as well as the Hey Alma Writing Fellowship and the Rising Voices Fellowship. They have worked as the editorial intern for Legend Publishing in Hong Kong and the education intern at The Steel Yard in Providence, RI. They are currently finishing their senior year at Brown in Providence and are excited (though a little anxious) to find a new home soon.

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Kaitlin HeadshotMelodrama of the Unknown Woman
written and directed by Kaitlin Goldin ’23

Something happened to Daphne. This play is the dissociative, fragmented, healing aftermath of that something.

Kaitlin Goldin (she/her) is a director, writer, performer, and storytelling from the Bay Area. She is a senior at Brown, where she created an Independent Concentration in Storytelling as a combination of theater, writing, and journalistic research. Her writing deals largely with violence, queerness, and female identity. Outside of playwriting, she is a Founding Member of Kitchen Sink Theater Company, a Staff Writer for the Rib of Brown, and a Podcast Production Assistant at Rococo Punch. 


Play House

Alexa Derman Headshot

by Alexa Derman ’23 MFA
Directed by Molly Houlahan ’23 MFA

3/15 8 PM
3/17 8 PM
3/18 1 PM
3/19 8 PM

CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS

Jo and Mona are married, Jo and Mona live in a beautiful house, Jo and Mona have wonderful friends visiting for the weekend, Jo and Mona don’t know about the two Teen Things lurking in the shadows, waiting, waiting… A queer horror play about freaky deer, performing adulthood, pre-prom rituals, and the violent pleasures of Kitchen-Aid stand-mixers.

Alexa Derman is a playwright from Jersey who writes about gender, systems, and speculation. Her plays include PSYCHOPSYCHOTIC (Relentless Award Honorable Mention), GIRLISH (Fresh Ink Theatre), RESTORATION MASTER RESET (Cutting Ball in WAYS TO LEAVE A BODY), and I’LL BE IN MY HANUKKAH PALACE (sold-out at Ars Nova ANT Fest). She is a 2022-2023 Core Apprentice at the Playwrights Center and currently under commission from Manhattan Theatre Club via the Sloan Foundation. Alexa has been a finalist for Jewish Plays Project, Playwrights Realm’s Writing Fellowship, the Starr Reading Series, Pegasus PlayLab, Kitchen Dog New Works, and Unicorn Plays-in-Progress; semifinalist for Bay Area Playwrights Festival, and the O’Neill.  Other honors and experiences include Orchard Project Audio Lab, Fresh Ground Pepper’s BRB Retreat, an upcoming residency with Ragdale, nomination for the Cherry Lane Mentor project and the Susan Smith Blackburn, a residency with StageFemmes at Kenyon College,  and at Yale the Marina Keegan Award for Excellence in Playwriting. Her work has been developed with Cutting Ball Variety Pack and Fresh Ink. BA from Yale in Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies. She is currently pursuing her MFA at Brown and is a staff writer on an upcoming Netflix series. alexaderman.com

Molly Houlahan (she/hers) is a Providence based queer director. She is the previous Associate Artistic Director of Congressional Award-Winning Hypokrit Theatre Company. Hypokrit has developed work with institutions such as The Public, New York Theatre Workshop, Playwrights Horizons, New Georges, Rattlestick, Lincoln Center/LCT3, and UNICEF amongst others. Houlahan’s select directing credits include Transhumance (Austin,TX Fringe, Auckland Fringe, Adelaide Fringe, Edinburgh Fringe), In Search of Maria Theresa (Cell Theatre), Gospel of the Marys (Furnace Festival), R+J (Access Theatre), How To Succeed as an Ethnically Ambiguous Actor starring Zenobia Shroff from “The Big Sick” (Castillo Theatre), Scorched (The Araca Project), and Still Life (NYC International Fringe Festival). Molly has assistant/associate directed for Kate Whoriskey, Anne Kauffman, Rebecca Taichman, Les Waters, Dan Sullivan, Tony Taccone, Lynne Meadow, and Mary Zimmerman among others at institutions such as The Public, Playwrights Horizons, Encores! at NYCC, The Town Hall, Berkeley Rep, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Arena Stage, Manhattan Theatre Club, and the New York Philharmonic. She has worked in the producing department at The Public, the artistic department at Steppenwolf, and as the assistant to the Artistic Director at Berkeley Rep. She has assisted artists such as Mira Nair (“Monsoon Wedding”) and Sarah Jones (“Sell/Buy/Date”). 2019 Manhattan Theatre Club Directing Fellow, 2017 Playwrights Horizons Directing Fellow, 2015-2016 Bret C. Harte Directing Fellow at Berkeley Rep, and the winner of the Louis Sudler Prize upon graduating Yale University.


Spread

Jesus HeadshotWritten and directed by
Jesús I Valles ’23 MFA

3/16 8 PM
3/17 1 PM
3/18 8 PM
3/19 1 PM

CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS

Take some dry ramen and throw it in a plastic bag. Add Hot Cheetos, beef jerky bits, beans, Hot Fries, and hot water. Mayonnaise or mustard (if you like that shit). Let it sit. Enjoy. Anything can be lunch in 9th grade. Anything can be anything. Jeffrey, Andrew, Chris, and Jordan are 9th grade boys and they’re trying their absolute best, and the thing about 9th grade is nobody knows what they’re doing. Here they are, at lunch. Here they are, at home. Here they are, together, in 9th grade, hoping they’ll get through it.

Jesús I. Valles (they/them) is a queer Mexican immigrant, educator, storyteller, and performer from Cd. Juarez/El Paso. Jesús is a 2021 CantoMundo fellowship recipient at the Palm Beach Poetry Festival, a 2019 Lambda Literary fellow, a 2019 Walter E. Dakin Playwriting Fellow of the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, a recipient of the 2019 Letras Latinas Scholarship from the Community of Writers’ Poetry Workshop, and a poetry fellow at Idyllwild Arts Writers Week. Jesús is also a 2018 Undocupoets Fellow, a 2018 Tin House Scholar, a fellow of The 2018 Poetry Incubator, and the runner-up in the 2017 Button Poetry Chapbook Contest. Their work has been published in The Shade Journal, The Texas Review, The New Republic, Palabritas, The Acentos Review, Quarterly West, The Mississippi Review, Palette, The Adroit Journal, BOAAT, The McNeese Review, and PANK. Their poetry has also been featured on NPR’s Code Switch, The Slowdown, The BreakBeat Poets’ LatiNext Anthology, and the Best New Poets 2020 anthology. As an actor, they are the recipient of four B. Iden Payne Awards, including Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama (2018), and Outstanding Original Script (2018) and they were nominated for the Mark David Cohen New Play Award for their play, (Un)Documents. They most recently starred as Penny Marshall in Victor I. Cazares’ Pinching Pennies with Penny Marshall: Death Rituals for Penny Marshall for New York Theatre Workshop. Jesús is currently OUTSider festival’s OUTsider-in-residence and an MFA playwriting student at Brown University

Writing is Live is made possible through support from an endowed fund for the Adele Kellenberg Seaver ’49 Professorship in Literary Arts