Kron, Nottage, Rapp Among Winners of Lucille Lortel Playwriting Fellowships

Playwrights Melissa James Gibson, David Greenspan, Jessica Hagedorn, Julia Jordan, Lisa Kron, Lynn Nottage, Dael Orlandersmith, and Adam Rapp are the first recipients of $50,000 fellowships from the Lucille Lortel Foundation. This new biennial program provides funding for theater artists and continues the legacy of Lortel's commitment to playwrights and the development of new plays. The recipients are being recognized for the excellence of their work, their potential for continued artistic achievement as playwrights and their strong commitment to working in the theater. The recipients can use their cash awards in whatever way they wish.

The winning playwrights must have been a resident of New York, Connecticut or New Jersey for at least one year, had at least five years experience working in the American professional theater and had at least one full-length play professionally produced in the last five years. One of the foundation's goals is to serve both emerging and more experienced playwrights.

Playwrights were nominated by theater professionals and invited to apply for the fellowships. Applications were then reviewed by a panel comprised of Robert Blacker, lecturer, Yale School of Drama and former artistic director of the Sundance Theatre Labs; Anne Cattaneo, dramaturg at Lincoln Center Theater and head of its Directors Lab; David Henry Hwang, playwright; Kate Loewald, co-founder and producer of The Play Company; Neil Pepe, artistic director, Atlantic Theater Company; Tazewell Thompson, artistic director, Westport Country Playhouse; and Paula Vogel, playwright.

Gibson's plays include [sic], SUITCASE or those that resemble flies from a distance, Brooklyn Bridge, All Is Not and Current Nobody. Greenspan's plays include Jack, The Home Show Pieces, 2 Samuel 11, Etc., Dead Mother, She Stoops to Comedy and The Myopia. Hagedorn's plays include Stairway to Heaven, Dogeaters, Fe In the Desert and Three Vanpires. She has recently written Most Wanted with composer Mark Bennett. Jordan's plays include Dark Yellow, St. Scarlet, Boy and Tatjana In Color. She wrote books for the musicals The Mice and Sarah, Plain And Tall. Her work for children includes Walk Two Moons, Summer Of the Swans and Guitar.

Kron is the author of 2.5 Minute Ride and Well, for which she was earned a 2006 Best Actress Tony nomination. Nottage's plays include Intimate Apparel, Fabulation and Crumbs from the Table of Joy. Orlandersmith's plays include Beauty's Daughter, Monster, The Gimmick and Yellowman. Rapp's plays include Blackbird, Nocturne, Stone Cold Dead Serious, Finer Noble Gases and Red Light Winter.