2024/25 INFORMATION
WHAT
A creative community for advanced playwrights and storytellers. Through group workshops, one on one mentorship, and opportunities to hear your work out loud the Resident Playwrights program will give you the chance to dive deeper into your work alongside a cohort of committed playwrights.
WHO
Resident Playwrights is an invited students program. Students in Grade 7-12 who have taken part in the Playwrights Incubator, had a play produced by Philly Young Playwrights, or who have already completed the Playwriting Intensive will receive an invitation to apply and the registration link. If you have any questions about this process, email Madeline at [email protected]
WHEN AND WHERE
On Zoom from 4-6pm every other Thursday, from January 9th to June 5th, with select in person production opportunities. Virtual meetings with your mentors to be scheduled at your own discretion.
As a Resident Playwright you’ll get access to:
-Personalized prompts and playwriting instruction from professional writing facilitators.
-A writing mentor who will work with you on your individual writing goals.
-Guest workshops, show tickets, and other opportunities to experience innovative theatrical techniques.
-An end of year celebration of your work, featuring your writing read aloud by professional actors.
A creative community for advanced playwrights and storytellers. Through group workshops, one on one mentorship, and opportunities to hear your work out loud the Resident Playwrights program will give you the chance to dive deeper into your work alongside a cohort of committed playwrights.
WHO
Resident Playwrights is an invited students program. Students in Grade 7-12 who have taken part in the Playwrights Incubator, had a play produced by Philly Young Playwrights, or who have already completed the Playwriting Intensive will receive an invitation to apply and the registration link. If you have any questions about this process, email Madeline at [email protected]
WHEN AND WHERE
On Zoom from 4-6pm every other Thursday, from January 9th to June 5th, with select in person production opportunities. Virtual meetings with your mentors to be scheduled at your own discretion.
As a Resident Playwright you’ll get access to:
-Personalized prompts and playwriting instruction from professional writing facilitators.
-A writing mentor who will work with you on your individual writing goals.
-Guest workshops, show tickets, and other opportunities to experience innovative theatrical techniques.
-An end of year celebration of your work, featuring your writing read aloud by professional actors.
TUITION
Thanks to the generous support of our funders, Philadelphia residents can register tuition-free as enrollment numbers allow. Tuition for students outside of Philadelphia, tuition is on a sliding scale.
Deadline:
December 20th, 2024, or when registration reaches capacity.
Questions?
Please contact [email protected].
Thanks to the generous support of our funders, Philadelphia residents can register tuition-free as enrollment numbers allow. Tuition for students outside of Philadelphia, tuition is on a sliding scale.
Deadline:
December 20th, 2024, or when registration reaches capacity.
Questions?
Please contact [email protected].
MEET YOUR MENTORS:
MADELINE CHARNE is a teaching artist, dramaturg, facilitator, and arts administrator with a lifelong love of storytelling. Having worked as a teaching artist for over a decade, she has worked with students aged 3-93 at theaters, schools, libraries, day programs, prisons, hospitals, and camps across the east coast. Madeline graduated from the Yale School of Drama in 2020 with an MFA in Dramaturgy and Dramatic Criticism and a focus on dramaturgies of disability and community based theater making. Although she loves her research and time spent in the rehearsal room, her true passion lies in teaching and she is grateful to have exercised that passion through theaters all over Philadelphia, teaching with the Wilma, the Walnut, Philadelphia Young Playwrights, the Arden, InterAct, Theater Horizon, the Lantern, and Wolf PAC. Madeline is coming to Philadelphia Young Playwrights from a position as the Director of Education and Community at the Philadelphia Film Society, where she built a program of field trips, residencies, and community screenings that served over 8000 young people each year. In addition to this work, Madeline has dramaturged productions at Swarthmore College, La Jolla Playhouse, and Roundabout Theater Company, among others, and has had her writing published in Theater Magazine.
Madeline began her career as a teaching artist with Philadelphia Young Playwrights as an apprentice in 2015. Learning from the resident teaching artists and administrators at PYP to lead from a place of compassion, teach from a place of respect, and create from a place of curiosity. Since then she has taught in over a dozen PYP classrooms and dramaturged nearly 50 student plays. PYP has been Madeline’s artistic home in Philadelphia and she has spread the values of the organization far and wide, building programming in New York City and New Haven, CT that takes a trauma informed, student driven approach to storytelling instruction.
Madeline began her career as a teaching artist with Philadelphia Young Playwrights as an apprentice in 2015. Learning from the resident teaching artists and administrators at PYP to lead from a place of compassion, teach from a place of respect, and create from a place of curiosity. Since then she has taught in over a dozen PYP classrooms and dramaturged nearly 50 student plays. PYP has been Madeline’s artistic home in Philadelphia and she has spread the values of the organization far and wide, building programming in New York City and New Haven, CT that takes a trauma informed, student driven approach to storytelling instruction.
DONOVAN HAGINS finds great joy in working with youth as they learn to cultivate their talent and creativity in the arts. He is the Resident Producer for Philadelphia Young Playwrights and is a Theatre Artist who has worked in numerous capacities of the craft. Donovan has come full circle with PYP since he was introduced to the organization as an actor in one of PYP’s selected plays Angel written by student playwright Tamika Jones in 1999’s new play festival when he was a student at Temple University. After his graduation, he worked as a classroom actor and teaching artist for PYP for two years. Since his return to PYP as the Resident Producer in 2019, he has spearheaded the full professional production of Candles written by Angelina DeMonte, the radio play production of Pandemic written by Katie Lu, and PYP's annual SaturPLAY Festivals. He has also been the co-spearhead in the annual New Voices Festivals in collaboration with Temple University and is the liaison between student playwrights (and their families) and the production teams for each PYP production.
Donovan has performed locally in productions, workshops, and new play development readings with Rutgers-Camden Center for the Arts, Freedom Theatre, Azuka Theatre Collective, New City Stage, The Philadelphia Artist Collective, PlayPenn, Walnut Street Theatre, and First World Theatre Ensemble. Regionally, he has performed in similar capacities with Imagination Stage, Arena Stage, African Continuum Theatre Company, Ford’s Theatre, and Tribute Productions. He has served as an instructor and playwright for Freedom Theatre, a teaching artist for Philadelphia Theatre Company, and an Artist-in-Residence at Rutgers-Camden Center for the Arts and the IDEA Performing Arts Center in Camden, NJ. As a television/film actor, Donovan has appeared in the CBS series Hack, the second season of HBO’s The Wire, and he has appeared in several independent films. He has also worked behind the scenes with actor/director Bill Duke in his 2007 feature film Cover.
Donovan has performed locally in productions, workshops, and new play development readings with Rutgers-Camden Center for the Arts, Freedom Theatre, Azuka Theatre Collective, New City Stage, The Philadelphia Artist Collective, PlayPenn, Walnut Street Theatre, and First World Theatre Ensemble. Regionally, he has performed in similar capacities with Imagination Stage, Arena Stage, African Continuum Theatre Company, Ford’s Theatre, and Tribute Productions. He has served as an instructor and playwright for Freedom Theatre, a teaching artist for Philadelphia Theatre Company, and an Artist-in-Residence at Rutgers-Camden Center for the Arts and the IDEA Performing Arts Center in Camden, NJ. As a television/film actor, Donovan has appeared in the CBS series Hack, the second season of HBO’s The Wire, and he has appeared in several independent films. He has also worked behind the scenes with actor/director Bill Duke in his 2007 feature film Cover.
NIA VARGUS has been working in writing education since her graduation from Goucher College in 2018, with a degree in English Literature and minor in Creative and Professional Writing. Nia has also loved theater since she was a child playing a munchkin in a production of The Wizard of Oz. Nia began freelancing for PYP in 2019 and was overjoyed to become a part of the PYP staff in 2022. When not at PYP Nia also does freelance projects for the National Family Reunion Institute (NFRI), and is a greeter at Winterthur Museum.
