20/20 NEW PLAY COMMISSION SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
InterAct Theatre Company is pleased to announce that second round submissions for 20/20 Commissions will be due Monday, December 1, 2008 at 6 pm.
The 20/20 Commissions is an ambitious initiative that will award 20 new play commissions and development grants over six seasons. The first round recipients were Lee Blessing for an as-of-yet untitled new play, Tom Coash for VEILS, Eric Pfeffinger for an as-of-yet untitled new play, Elaine Romero for THE DALAI LAMA ISN'T WELCOME HERE, and Michael Whistler for LITTLE LAMB.
Click Here to Read More About Round One Recipients
15 more new play commissions and development grants will be awarded over the next five seasons. Long established as one of the country’s most devoted producers of provocative, forward-thinking new plays, InterAct seeks to use the commissions to explore the issues our society faces in the next twenty years through the eyes of the playwright.
InterAct Theatre Company, located in Philadelphia, PA, is a theatre for today’s world, producing new and contemporary plays that explore the social, political, and cultural issues of our time. In its first twenty seasons InterAct has introduced Philadelphia audiences to a canon of plays exploring the most important issues of the past two decades – from the fall of communism to the rise of terrorism, from religious fundamentalism to American consumerism, from shifts in the political landscape to major advancements in science, from AIDS to genocide, from race relations to war.
Since its founding in 1988, InterAct has produced 23 world-premiere plays by some of the United States, Canada, and Europe’s most provocative playwrights. Plays originating at InterAct have won numerous Barrymore Awards and nominations, and have gone on to receive productions at dozens of regional theatres across the country.
InterAct is a founding member of the National New Play Network, a nationwide organization of 21 theatre companies devoted to the development, production, and continued life of new plays.
InterAct plans to award roughly 2-5 commissions per season over the next five seasons, for a total of twenty commissions. There are two types of awards associated with the program:
• Development Awards, which may be given to works already in progress, and put toward further development with InterAct’s assistance. Plays receiving Development Awards cannot have had a professional production.
• New Play Commissions, in which a new, previously (or substantially) unwritten play is commissioned and aided in the development process by InterAct.
Development Awards will be $2500, while New Play Commissions will range from $5000 - $10,000. InterAct will accept proposals on an annual basis, with application cycles in each of the next four years.
Round 2: 2008-2009 Season
The application consists of three parts, which must be submitted simultaneously and postmarked by December 1, 2008:
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Statement of Interest: Please provide a description of the proposed project, including why the issues and themes of the project will be significant to society over the next twenty years, and why you wish to work with InterAct on its development. For Development Award applicants, you may additionally discuss the status of the current work and its development history. Statements of interest should not exceed 2 pages. PLEASE NOTE: Descriptions that have been thoroughly thought-out tend to be more competitive; that is, we prefer proposals that describe a specific interrogation of a particular idea, rather than just a vague exploration of a theme, however worthy and relevant. The clearer the picture you can create for us as to what you are proposing to write, the better. We will not be reading ANY submissions prior to December 1, so use the time to think through your proposal.
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Up-to-Date Playwriting CV: PLEASE NOTE: For Development Award applicants, be sure to include the development history, if any, of the proposed work.
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One copy of a previously completed full-length script: Submitted scripts need not have received previous productions for submission. If possible, playwrights should submit a script that fits within InterAct’s central mission. If the playwright does not feel that they have a script suitable for InterAct’s mission, they may send whatever script they feel best expresses their ability to balance complex themes and ideas in their playwriting. PLEASE NOTE: For Development Award applicants, a copy of a previously completed script is asked for in addition to the proposed script for development.
Please note: Only full-length plays are eligible for commission or development. Musicals and bills of related one-act plays will not be considered. Collaborations are welcome.
All parts of the application must be sent via regular mail. Submitted scripts will not be returned. Email applications will not be accepted. There is no fee for application.
For all 20/20 New Play Commissions awarded by InterAct, the company reserves the right of first production upon completion of the commission. Recipients of Development Awards are not required to give right of first production to InterAct, though they may choose to do so.
The postmark deadline for completed second cycle applications is December 1, 2008, and InterAct will notify all playwrights of its decision by March 1, 2009.
Applications may be sent to:
InterAct Theatre Company
20/20 Commissions
2030 Sansom St
Philadelphia, PA 19103
All inquiries related to the commissions may be directed via email to Rebecca Wright, Literary Director.
INTERACT MAINSTAGE SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
InterAct's mission is to produce new and contemporary plays that explore political, social, and cultural issues of our time, and to use theatre as a tool to explore difficult questions about the world we live in. For more details see the mission statement and list of produced plays elsewhere on this site.
All of our main stage work has political content on the surface of the drama. We try to define political in the broadest possible ways, and we tend to like highly theatrical plays. One good example is Israel Horovitz' LEBENSRAUM which we did in our 1999-2000 season. LEBENSRAUM is a play about a future German Chancellor who invites 6 million Jews back to Germany. It has roughly 70 characters played by 3 actors. In our 2000-2001 season, we did Russell Lees' NIXON'S NIXON which imagines, in a highly theatrical way, the meeting between Kissinger and Nixon on the night of Nixon's resignation from the presidency. The two characters play-act half a dozen other characters of national and international renown. DRINK ME, a play by Mary Fengar Gail, in our 2000 season, created a richly imaginative world of modern day witches who set out to slaughter all of the men in London as retribution for the sexual abuse of the woman who had imagined them into existence in her childhood. From our 2000-2001 season, IT'S ALL TRUE, by Jason Sherman, tells the story of the consequences of staging of Mark Blitzstein's The Cradle Will Rock in the context of political and artistic upheaval that roiled the country in the late 1930's. While these plays have distinctly political themes, we do not seek work which merely peddles a single point of view. We do not seek work which offers pat answers. We are not interested in kitchen sink family dramas, dysfunctional relationship dramas (gay or straight), zany caper comedies, yuppie angst dramas, conventional musicals, and bills of related one-act plays. We seek work which asks disturbing and provocative questions about life in our times and the world we live in. We only consider full length plays.
Though all of our plays tie in to contemporary political, social, and cultural issues, this does not necessarily require that they take place in the present day. NIXON’S NIXON and IT’S ALL TRUE, to give two examples, both take place in different eras. The key is that each of them has themes that resonate strongly with certain elements of the political climate today. Our recent production of Thomas Gibbons’ A HOUSE WITH NO WALLS is another example, taking place both in the present and in the 1790’s, showing in one era the struggle of one of George Washington’s slaves with the decision to flee for her freedom, and in the other the political and racial questions involved with building a proper memorial to Washington’s slaves on the site where their house once stood. Plays taking place in other eras will be considered if it is judged that they may contain some strong parallel to the present day.
There are two ways to submit plays to us. The conventional way is to send a query letter (with SASE) with a brief (about one page) description of your play, a bio, and an excerpt from the script (maximum ten pages). If we are intrigued by your description we may request the whole play. The preferred way is to submit your query by e-mail in the following manner: attach in text or Microsoft Word your description, bio, and excerpt to a query e-mail. While we prefer electronic queries, our response time tends to be the same for both regular and electronic queries.
As InterAct receives between 500 and 600 queries and submissions per season, we ask that you please be patient in waiting for a response from us. Responding to a query letter generally takes one to two months, though it can take less and rarely will take more. Should you be invited to submit your play, it is possible you may get a response on the script in as little as three months, but it is more likely that it will take between six and twelve months to turn the script around. Every query and script that satisfies the proper submission guidelines will be given a response.
SOME TIPS FOR SUBMITTING YOUR PLAY TO INTERACT:
- DO take at least two or three paragraphs with the synopsis of the play. It is not required to submit a detailed breakdown of plot by act and by scene. Just make sure we get the general themes and major plot points. DO NOT give a one-or two sentence statement with a few buzzwords. They don’t tell us anything useful, and greatly reduce the chances of your play being solicited.
- DO include a character breakdown and BE SPECIFIC about how many actors the play requires, especially if it is not clear from the cast list. Keep in mind that InterAct rarely produces plays that require more than six actors, and any play with nine actors or more is very unlikely to be asked for.
- DO NOT submit a roster of ten to twenty plays and ask if we may be interested in reading one of them. These inquiries will not be responded to. Take the time to study our mission and select one, at most two, plays to inquire about.
- DO NOT submit a full script without first submitting an inquiry, unless you are a literary agent. These plays will not be read, and will not be responded to.
- DO NOT submit a full script via email unless we have specifically asked you to. It may save you time, but makes us waste paper. Typically the only exceptions to this rule are international playwrights for whom the costs of shipping may not be reasonable.
- DO NOT query by phone. Please query by email or regular mail.
- DO NOT call or email to check on the progress of your script once you have submitted it. We will get it back to you in due time. Do, however, feel free to let us know of the progress your script makes, and if it is chosen for development or production elsewhere.
Please note: due to changes in U.S. postal security regulations, InterAct no longer returns full scripts submitted to the company. For those submitting a play with an SASE, please submit only a simple letter envelope with standard postage.
Send all inquiries to:
Rebecca Wright , Literary Director
InterAct Theatre Company
2030 Sansom Street
Philadelphia, PA 19103
Or email
Thank you very much, and we look forward to reading your work!
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