Continued Life of New Plays Fund
Our flagship program, the Continued Life of New Plays Fund (CLNPF), supports three or more theaters which choose to mount the same new play within a twelve-month period. The result is a “Rolling World Premiere” through which the playwright develops a new work with at least three different creative teams, for three different communities of patrons, ensuring the resulting play is of the highest possible quality. And, with a minimum of three productions in a single year, the play attains the momentum it needs to join the repertoire of frequently-produced new American works. NNPN provides grants of $7,000 to each participating theater.
To date, NNPN has championed the continued life of new plays with a quarter million dollars in grants and supported 99 productions nationwide of 31 plays. Those plays have gone on to nearly 150 additional productions in cities across the country.
Click here to download Program Guidelines.
read moreProgram Rationale
All over the country, hundreds of new plays are developed each year, yet only a handful receive full productions. Among the plays that do, only a fraction receive second, third or fourth productions outside their immediate regions. Without subsequent productions, plays have little opportunity to evolve artistically or to generate significant critical attention and momentum. In addition, without the "hype" generated by an Off-Broadway run or a major festival, new plays struggle to attract audiences equal to those enjoyed by classic plays, musicals, and star-studded pre-Broadway tryouts. So new plays of merit by emerging writers are often shelved after their first productions because subsequent producers are only interested in the "world premiere." CLNPF was created to develop an alternative producing model, and change the way theaters and audiences understand the term "world premiere."
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Quiara Alegría Hudes  |
Steve Yockey  |
Aditi Kapil  |
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Zina Camblin  |
Kara Hartzler  |
Stephen Sachs  |
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Seth Rozin  |
Allison Moore  |
A. Rey Pamatmat  |
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Deb Laufer  |
William Missouri Downs  |
Eric Coble  |
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Caridad Svich  |
Robert Caisley  |
Allison Moore  |
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Thomas Gibbons  |
David Rambo  |
Joan Ackermann  |
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Jack Canfora  |
Yussef El Guindi  |
Aditi Kapil  |
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Sean Christopher Lewis  |
Luis Alfaro  |
Thomas Gibbons  |
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Steve Yockey  |
Andrew Case  |
Octavio Solis  |
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John Biguenet  |
Zayd Dohrn  |
Sharr White  |
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Dan Dietz  |
Seth Rozin  |
Theresa Rebeck  |
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Steve Yockey  |
Steven Dietz  |