Play Crawl 2019
Playwrights
ellen k. graham
Choose your own Adventure
Ellen K. Graham is a Denver native and a graduate of the University of Chicago, Her plays have been produced in Columbus, Ohio; New York City; and in Denver, where she has worked with many companies, including And Toto too, Buntport, Benchmark, Pandemic Collective, Athena Project, the Edge, Paragon, and the Denver Center Theatre Company. She is the founder of Feral Assembly, a resident playwright at Theater 29 Denver, a co-founder of Shocking Beyond Belief! Films (“The Sword of Truth Behind the Shield of Entertainment”), and a member of the Dramatists Guild of America.
Jenny Stafford
Boss bitch
Jenny Stafford is a book writer, lyricist, and playwright. Her lyrics have been heard on Broadway (Cirque du Soliel’s Paramour, Original Broadway Cast Album available), and she holds an MFA from the Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts. Her works include The Homefront (with Sam Salmond, Village Festival of New Musicals), The Artist and the Scientist (with Brandon Anderson, produced Off-Off-Broadway at CAP21), Extended Stay (with Scotty Arnold, Florida Festival of New Musicals), Prodigy (workshop productions through Collaborative Development Project, Two Rivers Theatre Company, and Indiana University), To Have and to Hold (produced by Prospect Theatre Company and Barrington Stage), Cinderella (commissioned and produced by the Spotlight Youth Theatre), Two Bugs are Better Than One (commissioned and produced Off-Broadway by the New York City Children’s Theatre, all with Willem Oosthuysen), The Star Child (with Sarah Underwood and Josh Freilich, produced at French Woods), Awakening (with Joel B. New and J. Oconer Navarro) and Beating a Dead Horse (winner of the 2017 Reva Shiner Comedy Award, produced through the Bloomington Playwrights Project and the Athena Project). Her work has been featured at the Lincoln Center Songbook Series (The Lyrics of Jennifer Stafford), Prospect Theatre Company, The National Alliance for Musical Theatre Songwriter Salon, the New York Musical Theatre Festival, 54 Below, Ars Nova, Joe’s Pub, and numerous other NYC venues, including multiple inclusions in William Finn’s Ridiculously Talented concert series. Awards include the 2017 Reva Shiner Comedy Award, finalist status for the Yale Institute for Music Theatre, the Eugene O’Neill Musical Theatre Conference, and the Ronald M. Ruble New Play Competition, as well as second prize in the McLean Drama Company Playwriting Competition, and the Paulette Goddard Award. She’s been an Artist in Residence at the Rhinebeck Writer’s Retreat, Village Theatre, Goodspeed Musicals, CAP 21, the Ross Ragland Theatre and the Berkshire Playwrights Theatre. Dramatists Guild member.
Rebecca Gorman O'neill
BEWARE THE SUN SQUID
Rebecca Gorman O’Neill was born in Akron, Ohio; she escaped at age 17 to attend Dartmouth College. Rebecca went on to earn her M.F.A. in Dramatic Writing from Carnegie Mellon University. Her original plays have been produced across the country, and productions in Denver include Auto-da-Fe at the LIDA Project and The Greater Good at And Toto too. Her play Mynx & Savage was a semi-finalist at the O’Neill Theatre Conference, and her plays Tell-Tale and The Greater Good are available through Eldridge Publishing and Next Stage Press, respectively. She is Professor of English at Metropolitan State University of Denver, where she teaches playwriting, screenwriting, cinema studies, and the graphic novel. https://newplayexchange.org/users/5673/rebecca-gorman-oneill
eDITH WEISS
Signage of the times
Edith Weiss is a writer, director, and actor. Her latest projects in Denver, writing the immersive play First, Do No Harm at Rose Medical Center,and her short play Holy Couch was chosen to be part of the Denver Center's Bite Size at the BookBar last year. She has also been using the same headshot for far too long. Switching to first person- the Play Crawl is one of my favorite things and thank you wonderful hiking audience.
LINDA BERRY
BLOW IN’S
Linda Berry's published credits include short fiction for children and adults, preschool curriculum, a newspaper entertainment column, craft articles, poetry, and six cozy mystery novels, in addition to plays. This is her sixth year with the play crawl. She loves the challenge of telling a story in such a compressed form. www.ogeechee.avigne.org
NINA ALICE MILLER
new and GENLTY USED
Nina Alice Miller is a playwright, occasional dramaturg and theatrical community-builder. She is co-founder and co-producer of Rough Draught Playwrights: A Theatrical Playground and a founding member of Dirtyfish Theater. Her plays include Nomads of Disaster (Millibo Art Theatre), Fisheaters (Vintage Theatre New Play Festival and a Creede Headwaters New Play finalist), The Living (Athena Project Festival), Nano Diving (Red Rocks Western Showcase), Bullies and Friends (commissioned for Mirror Image Arts), Delaware and American Herring (both And Toto too).
Jessica Austgen
barbershop
Playwright: Sin Street Social Club (Arvada Center), DragON (DCPA), A Boy’s Guide to Brutal Honesty (And Toto too Play Crawl 2018), The Last Apple Tree (Catamounts) Actor: Measure for Measure (Theatreworks); Men On Boats (Catamounts); The Second City’s Twist Your Dickens (Aurora Fox); Between Us: The Deck of Cards, Corduroy, Cult-Following, Shakespeare in the Parking Lot: Romeo & Juliet and A Midsummer Night’s Dream (DCPA); Sense and Sensibility, All My Sons, Tartuffe, The Crucible (Arvada Center), ComedySportz Denver. Awards: 2018 True West Award: Theater Person of the Year
LISA WAGNER ERICKSON
a strange burd
Lisa Wagner Erickson is the founder and creative director of Theater 29, a playwright-driven venue in Denver, Colorado, and the founder of Lulubird Project: Theatre, Slightly Absurd. She has been a semi-finalist for the PlayPenn New Play Development conference and the Landing Theatre's New American Voices series. Her plays have been developed and/or produced by the Lulubird Project, the Edge Theatre Company, And Toto too Theatre Company, Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, Manhattan Theatre Source, Stickball Productions, and No Strings Theatre, among others. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing for Stage & Screen from Lesley University and is a member of the Dramatists Guild.
melissa lucero mccarl
what do you smell?
Painted Bread, Melissa’s full length play about the life of Frida Kahlo, was voted "Best New Play" by the Denver Post. She was commissioned by the Jewish Community Center to write Poignant Irritations, about the life of Gertrude Stein ("Best Local Playwright" by Westword), and commissioned by Bonnie Metzgar to write for The War Anthology at Curious Theatre Co. Her one act play, Carlene Yakkin is a recipient of the Steven Dietz award. Her critically acclaimed play Lost Creatures was produced in November 2016 by And Toto too Theatre Company and was nominated for a Henry award. She currently teaches playwriting at Lighthouse Writer’s Workshop
CHRISTIE BRENNER WINN
the day dreamer
Christine Brenner Winn is a native of Colorado where her plays have been produced throughout the state. She received her BA in Theater at UNC Greeley, and a MAT from Northeastern in Chicago. Christie is the founder of ‘Girls’ Write,’ a playwriting development program for young girls. Recently, her play, Cabaret Kalisz,was produced at Theatre 'O' in Boulder. Christie is currently a teacher at Van Arsdale Elementray in Arvada.