News

3/14/24

Well, that was a long hiatus on the updates, but I'm excited that FAR FROM THE TREE has won a Richard Rodgers Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters!   We will receive generous funding for a developmental workshop at a NYC theater.  Very honored to have been selected by this distinguished panel of judges: David Lang (chair), Lynn Ahrens, Mindi Dickstein, Amanda Green, Michael R. Jackson, Richard Maltby, Jr., and John Weidman.

In the meantime, we presented new songs from the show at MusiCoLab's 10th New Works Showcase in Philadelphia in November, and we'll be returning in April to present a longer chunk of new material in their Spotlight Series.

Also, the show was a two-time finalist for the Rhinebeck Writers' Retreat residency, and a semi-finalist for the 2023 O'Neill National Music Theater Conference.

Also, I need to redo this website.  It's on the list.

9/1/21

NYU title is now Clinical Associate Professor.  More at some point ... been busy...

9/2/20

Now officially a Senior Lecturer in Expository Writing at NYU.

8/16/20

Despite the international time-out for all live performance, continuing work on FAR FROM THE TREE with co-writers Rob and Kristin, director Michael Greif, and arranger Lynne Shankel, as well as a commissioned art song for Philadelphia's LyricFest with FFTT composer Rob Maggio.

3/6/20

New on McSweeney's: Hey, Mom and Dad, I Made a Delicate, Stucturally Unsound Craft That You Get to Carry Home in the Rain

7/18/19

New on McSweeney's: A Typical Phone Call to My Congressional Representative, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

5/19/19

FAR FROM THE TREE just completed a very productive one-week workshop in New York, directed by Michael Greif (DEAR EVAN HANSEN, NEXT TO NORMAL, RENT) and featuring Raul Esparza, Javier Munoz, Lisa Brescia, Manu Narayan, Natalie Cortez, Tamika Lawrence, and Nick Cordero.  The show was also a finalist for the 2019 Sundance Theater Lab.

1/14/19

Proud to be finalist for a Jonathan Larson Grant

1/2/19

Proud to have been a finalist for the 2019 Kleban Prize in Musical Theatre for Most Promising Librettist.  Previous winners (lyricists and librettists) include Lisa Kron (Fun Home), Robert L. Freedman and Steven Lutvak (A Gentleman's Guide To Love and Murder), David Lindsay-Abaire (Shrek), Jason Robert Brown (Parade, The Last Five Years), Michael Korie (Grey Gardens, Happiness), Jeff Marx and Robert Lopez (Avenue Q), Michael John LaChiusa (Giant, See What I Wanna See, The Wild Party), Glenn Slater (The Little Mermaid) and John Weidman (Pacific Overtures, Road Show, Assassins).

10/28/18

Selections from FAR FROM THE TREE were performed by a cast of Broadway veterans, including Tony nominee Alex Gemignani, for a celebration of Andrew Solomon's birthday in the rotunda of Federal Hall in downtown NYC.

9/6/18

Started my fifth year in NYU's Expository Writing Program.  I'm now teaching students in its world-renowned Tisch School of the Arts

Also had the privilege of adjudicating auditions for the BMI Musical Theater Workshop

7/3/18

Currently working hard up at the Vineyard Arts Project on Martha's Vineyard!  Robert Maggio, Kristin Maloney, and I are workshopping our musical adaptation of Andrew Solomon's FAR FROM THE TREE under the helm of veteran director Michael Greif (RENT, NEXT TO NORMAL, DEAR EVAN HANSEN).  A public reading will be held on July 5.  Tickets available here!

The Vineyard Gazette also featured our musical in their Vineyard Arts Season Preview.

6/4/18

GHOST LITE has been named a finalist in City Theatre (Miami)'s National Award for Short Playwriting.  It's one of thirty chosen from a field of over 800.  You can currently catch City Theatre's production of it on Azamara Club Cruises (see entry below).

2/19/18

GHOST LITE is set to sail around the world with City Theatre (Miami)'s Shorts on Ships, a program of ten-minute plays that will be performed on Azamara Club Cruises throughout the year.  Bon voyage!

10/23/17

My short play GHOST LITE will be featured in CityReads, a casual playreading event by City Theatre at Books & Books Cafe in downtown Miami on 10/25. City Theater previously produced my short play PARENT INTERVIEW in their annual Summer Shorts series and in several encore presentations.

7/18/17

On July 17, Robert Maggio, Kristin Maloney, and I proudly presented our first full draft of our musical adaptation of Andrew Solomon's FAR FROM THE TREE, for Andrew and other invited guests, at the Dramatists Guild of America's Mary Rodgers Room.  Our cast of Broadway and off-Broadway veterans included Jim Stanek, Tim Ewing, Jennifer Bangs, David Michael Garry, Gina Milo, Brian Michael Hoffman, Trent Saunders, Diane Phelan, and Kelly Jeanne Grant.  The reading was directed by Portia Krieger with music direction by Paul Staroba (Broadway's WAR PAINT, GENTLEMAN'S GUIDE TO LOVE AND MURDER, GREY GARDENS, and more).

6/9/17

New on McSweeney's: The Comey Hearing-inspired Senate Intelligence Committee Post-Show Discussion of Hamlet

6/2/17

Coming up!  A reading of my musical adaptation of Andrew Solomon's FAR FROM THE TREE, Monday July 17, location TBA.  Stay tuned!

5/2/17

New on McSweeney's: Historical Tragedies And The People Who Might Have Prevented Them Had They Not Died Sixteen Years Prior

4/16/17

My feature on author Stephane Gerson and his new book Disaster Falls: A Family Story is in the Winter 2017 edition of HAVERFORD magazine.

3/23/17

My song "Angora" (music by Rob Kendt), from THE PASSION OF ED WOOD, is one of five up-tempo comedy songs for men currently featured on the Contemporary Musical Theatre blog.

2/5/17

Guest moderating the BMI Musical Theater Workshop's first-year class again this Monday night! 

1/8/17

Spent the first week of 2017 working on FAR FROM THE TREE at the glorious HBMG Foundation Winter Playwrights' Retreat in Creede, Colorado.  Many thanks to hosts Manuel Zarate and Ann Pittman Zarate, and all the other artists who made it such a productive week.

12/9/16

This Monday night, Dec. 12, my song "Look, It's Christmas!" (about the first post-Trumpocalpyse holiday), written with composer Rob Kendt, will be featured at the Lincoln Center Holiday Songbook showcase at the Bruno Walter Auditorium.  Free admission, no tickets, 6 pm curtain!

11/25/16

Excited to announce that I've been chosen for the HBMG Foundation's National Winter Playwrights' Retreat in Creede, Colorado!  I'll spend the first week in January there, working on the book to our musical adaptation of Andrew Solomon's FAR FROM THE TREE.

8/7/16

Our musical adaptation-in-progress of Andrew Solomon's FAR FROM THE TREE has received a generous grant from West Chester University (where composer Robert Maggio chairs the Music Theory, History, and Composition department) to make a professional demo.  We plan to record next spring after lots more writing!

I also recently profiled Chester Theater Company's new Artistic Director, Daniel Kramer, in the HAVERFORD alumni magazine.

6/1/16

Wow, it's been a LONG time since I've updated this site.  But not because stuff isn't happening!  Mostly, I've been writing the libretto for an authorized adaptation of Andrew Solomon's stunning and celebrated non-fiction book FAR FROM THE TREE, about parents of kids with extraordinary needs.  My awesome collaborators are Robert Maggio (music) and Kristin Maloney (lyrics). 

We had a wonderful, invite-only reading in April for Andrew and other guests, which presented the first 35 minutes of the show with the fantastic talents of Jim Stanek (FUN HOME, GENTLEMAN'S GUIDE TO LOVE AND MURDER), Jennifer Bangs, Raymond Bokhour (CHICAGO, ONCE national tour), Ryan G. Dunkin (FULL MONTY national tour), Kelly Jeanne Grant (PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, COMPANY), Anna Marie Sell, Michael Winther (FUN HOME, MAMMA MIA, 33 VARIATIONS), James Wordsworth, and Sara Wordsworth.  Sarah Cameron Sunde directed, with music direction by Dan Pardo.

We're moving forward in writing the show this summer and are excited to take it forward!

2/1/16

New today on McSweeney's: 1970s Hits Updated For The 21st Century.  Also recently published: my profile of playwright Don Fried in HAVERFORD magazine.

7/7/15

THE MASKED ZINFANDEL has made it to the semi-finals for Chicago's FWD: Theatre Project.  Updates as they come in!

6/1/15

Once again, I'll be a judge for the second-year presentations/Advanced Composer-Lyricist Workshop auditions in the BMI Musical Theatre Workshop.  Last month I was also honored to co-moderate a session of the Advanced Composer-Lyricist Workshop with Andy Monroe

I also just finished my first extremely busy year teaching in NYU's Expository Writing Program.  Lots of work ahead this summer! 

3/1/15

Profiled fellow musical theatre writer and Haverford College alumnus J. Linn Allen in the latest Haverford magazine.  

2/6/15

Miami's City Theatre brings back PARENT INTERVIEW for "Island Shorts in Key Biscayne," a 20th anniversary "best of the fest" from their annual Summer Shorts Festival.

12/11/14

Project Y Theatre presents a reading of my full-length play A WIRE IN WATER this Sunday, 7 pm, at CAP 21 (18 W. 18th, Suite 605).  Directed, again, by Sarah Cameron Sunde, with most of the cast from the April reading at Luna Stage.  Come by!

10/26/14

Short plays in production this fall: PARENT INTERVIEW in Core Artist Ensemble's "Twisted Shorts" in Manhattan, and GHOST LITE in the South Street Players (Spring Lake, NJ)' Tri-State Theatre Festival, Halloween Edition. 

7/18/14

NYC's Core Artist Ensemble will feature two of my ten-minute plays in their Summer Reading Series: GHOST LITE on Sunday, July 20, and PARENT INTERVIEW on Sunday, July 27.  Both evenings, which feature 7 ten minute plays by various authors, start at 7 pm at the Barrow Group Theatre, 312 W. 36th Street.

7/7/14

New on McSweeney's Internet Tendency: My only mildly fictional Submission Opportunities For Emerging Playwrights.

6/10/14

My short play GHOST LITE just wrapped up another run in Toronto's InspiraTO Festival.  Thanks to all involved!

I'm also excited to announce that I've been appointed to the faculty of New York University as a Lecturer in Expository Writing!  I start teaching in September.

4/28/14

I have another book review in the May-June issue of AMERICAN THEATRE, this time about Glen Berger's Song of Spider-Man: The Inside Story Of The Most Controversial Musical In Broadway History. 

Also, I returned to co-moderate another session of the first year BMI Musical Theater Workshop.  I was also invited to serve on the committee that evaluates final second-year presentations in May and June, which serve as auditions for the Advanced class.

4/24/14

Had a wonderful reading of my new play A WIRE IN WATER at Luna Stage in West Orange, NJ, on Monday night, directed by Sarah Cameron Sunde.  Stay tuned for more!

3/6/14

My review of three new books on ensemble theatre making appears in the March 2014 issue of AMERICAN THEATRE.

2/11/14

Original Works Publishing ran this Q&A with me about my play AMERICAN WHUP-ASS, which was featured in their "FreePlayMonday" series. 

Also, my new play A WIRE IN WATER, about Alexander Graham Bell's alleged theft of a key part of the telephone patent, will have its first public reading at Luna Stage on Monday, April 21.  Details to follow.

1/13/14

My short play GHOST LITE will be featured in the 9th Annual InspiraTO Festival in Toronto, May 29-June 7, 2014.  It was previously performed in Chicago, IL, Reading, England, and Carrboro, NC (Raleigh-Durham area).  12 plays were selected for InspiraTO from a record 614 submissions. 

For earlier posts, see the News Archive.