The Alcove

September

Kate Cortesi – Sept 15

Kate Cortesi’s plays have been performed nationally and internationally, including in translation. Full-length: Great Kills (Princess Grace Award), A Patron of the Arts (Cherry Lane Theatre), ONE MORE LESS (NYFA, Relentless Award Finalist), Love (Sky Cooper New American Play Prize, Marin Theatre Company, Ojai Playwrights Conference), Is Edward Snowden Single? (Pool Plays, Jungle Theatre, Players’ Ring, among others; 7 BroadwayWorld nominations including Best New Play), Ten Grand (Pacific Playwrights Festival, Weissberger Finalist) and Daylight (Ground Floor, Berkeley Rep). Commissions: Playwrights Horizons, Keen Company, South Coast Rep. Publications: Samuel French, Dramatists Play Services. Residencies and Affiliations: New Dramatists, Huntington Theatre, Colt Coeur, New Georges, O’Neill Theater Center.

 

Hassan Abdulrazzak – Sept 29

Hassan Abdulrazzak is of Iraqi origin, born in Prague and living in London. His plays include The Special Relationship (Soho Theatre, 2020), And Here I Am (Arcola Theatre, 2017 and touring), Love, Bombs and Apples (Arcola Theatre, 2016 and UK tour; Golden Thread, San Francisco, 2018 followed by a second UK tour; Kennedy Centre, Washington DC, 2019), The Prophet (Gate theatre, 2012) and Baghdad Wedding (Soho Theatre, London 2007; BBC Radio 3, 2008; Belvoir St Theatre, Sydney 2009; Akvarious productions, Delhi & Mumbai 2010). Hassan has translated numerous Arabic plays. He is the recipient of George Devine, Meyer-Whitworth, Pearson theatre awards as well as the Arab British Centre Award for Culture. The script of his short film ‘A Night of Gharam’ won the Unsolicited Scripts Short Film Grant 2022.

 

October

Regan Moro – Oct 13

Regan Moro is a playwright and an incoming fellow in the Lila Acheson Wallace American Playwrights Program at The Juilliard School. Her play burn for You has been developed with Tony Award winner Danya Taymor, was a Finalist for the 2024 Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, and received readings at the 2025 Ojai Playwrights Conference and 2024 Great Plains Theatre Conference. Her play Tremolo was a 2025 Irons in the Fire project for Fault Line Theatre, received a reading through Pride Plays at MCC in association with Woolly Mammoth and Rattlestick, and was a Finalist for the 2025 O’Neill National Playwrights Conference.

 

Iraisa Ann Reilly – Oct 20

Iraisa Ann Reilly (She/Ella) is a writer, performer, and educator who is half-Cuban, half-Irish, and whole New Jersey. Select full-length plays include Good Cuban Girls (Teatro del Sol, at The Arden Theatre), The Jersey Devil is a Papi Chulo (Sol Fest 2022, Yale Drama Series Shortlist 2022, Finalist Leah Ryan Prize, KCACTF) Saturday Mourning Cartoons ( Arkansas New Play Festival 2023, Winner, Bay Area Playwright’s Festival 2022, Finalist Goldberg Playwriting Prize 2022, Semifinalist Blue Ink Award 2023, Semifinalist Premiere Stages). Her work has been developed with Theatre Exile, The New Harmony Project, The Chain Theatre, The Workshop Theatre, ARTHouse INKubator, NYU Production Lab’s Development Studio and the Latinx Playwright’s Circle. Her play “House Bill 3979: Amendment #10: The Life and Works of Dr. Hector P. Garcia” was commissioned and produced by Texas A&M-University-Corpus Christi in 2022. Iraisa Ann is currently under commission with the Arden Theatre Company in Philadelphia and Michigan State University. She is a recipient of the 2023 Latinx Playwright’s Circle Mentorship, working with mentor Migdalia Cruz. As a screenwriter, her screenplay La Reina del Bronx won best screenplay at Fusion Film Festival and was a semifinalist for the Vail Screenwriting Competition. Iraisa Ann recently performed off-Broadway in Arlene Hutton’s According to the Chorus. She’s taught students of all ages and is an adjunct professor of Dramatic Writing at NYU. MFA in Dramatic Writing from NYU, B.A. in Theatre and English from the University of Notre Dame.

 

Zarina Shea – Oct 27

Zarina Shea’s plays have been seen at/supported by Lincoln Center Theater, SPACE on Ryder Farm, Playwrights Horizons, Berkeley Rep, BRIC Arts, Clubbed Thumb, New Georges, New York Theatre Workshop, JACK, Actors Theatre of Louisville, the Ucross Foundation, among others. She was a Fondazione Giorgio Cini Fellow at the Vittore Branca Center in Venice and a Working Farm Resident at SPACE on Ryder Farm. As an actor, Zarina has performed at the Williamstown Theatre Festival, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Trinity Rep, and Ars Nova, among others. BA: University of Chicago, MFA in Acting: Brown University, MFA in Playwriting: Brooklyn College.

November

Rajiv Joseph – Nov 3

Rajiv Joseph’splays include Guards at the Taj, Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, (2010 Pulitzer Prize finalist for Drama), The North Pool, Gruesome Playground Injuries and Animals Out of Paper. He is the librettist for the upcoming opera, Shalimar the Clown, adapted from the novel of the same name by Salman Rushdie, which will have its premiere at the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis in 2016.He has been awarded artistic grants from the Whiting Foundation, United States Artists and the Harold & Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust.He served for three years in the Peace Corps in Senegal

 

Zac Kline – Nov 10

Zac Kline is a playwright and poet based in New York City and Philadelphia. His work has been seen in spaces ranging from traditional theaters including Finborough Theatre (London), Philadelphia Theatre Company, and Hyde Park Theatre/FronteraFest/Out of Ink (Austin), a 100-year-old squash court and a field on Governors Island. He was the lead producer and contributing writer for After Orlando: an international theatre action in response to the shooting at Pulse Nightclub which received readings across the United States and in the UK. He wrote the libretto for james (book of ruth) music by Steven Sérpa, which has been recorded by Inversion Ensemble. He is the co-author of Bob Dylan: Music, Lyrics and Justice with Tom Kline. His poems appear in various publications. BFA/MFA, Tisch, NYU. JD Drexel University Thomas R. Kline School of Law.

 

Zizi Majid – Nov 17

Zizi Majid is a playwright whose plays advocate for a shared humanity. She recently presented a staged reading of her new play at the Julie Lutz New Play Festival at Syracuse Stage, a play she first wrote during the Julia Miles Playwriting Residency (WP Theatre). She was a 2022-23 Playwriting Fellow with the Dramatists Guild Foundation and is a proud alumni of the WP Lab. She won the Pacific Rim Prize for Playwriting (Kumu Kahua Theatre/University of Hawaii Manoa Playwriting Contest). Zizi has been a finalist for the Princeton Arts Fellowship, a finalist for the Blue Ink Playwriting Award; a thrice semi-finalist for the O’Neil National Playwrights Conference and a finalist for the Columbia@ Roundabout New Play Reading Series. Plays include They Came in the Night, Return to Fall, The Rejects, and How to Gild an Eagle. For five years, Zizi was the Artistic Director of Teater Ekamatra (Singapore) garnering multiple awards during her tenure. She teaches playwriting and drama in context at Syracuse University. MFA: Columbia University.

 

Brian James Polak – Nov 24

Brian James Polak is an award-winning playwright born and raised in New Hampshire. His plays have been presented at venues and schools around the country, and have been published by Smith & Kraus, Talon Review, Commonplace Books, NoPassport Press, Next Stage Press, and Canyon Voices. He has been awarded the Jean Kennedy Smith and John Cauble Awards from The Kennedy Center and an Elliot Norton Award (co-recipient for P.S. Page Me Later). For ten years he has hosted and produced American Theatre magazine’s “The Subtext,” a playwright-centered podcast. He received his MFA from the University of Southern California.

 

December

Elaine Ávila – Dec 8

Elaine is a Fulbright Scholar and co-founder of the Climate Change Theatre Action now involving 75,000 participants worldwide. She is described as “a wonderful writer, tremendously gifted, and innovative” (Suzan-Lori Parks), “fully engaged with the immense political, cultural, and aesthetic complexity of fado’s history” (Jeff Parker); her writing as “gorgeous…a piercing cry to the soul” (Katherine Vaz). Her award-winning plays have been produced in over forty cities/countries, from Panamá City to London, Lisbon to Los Angeles. Her books are available from NoPassport Press and Talonbooks.

 

Allyson Dwyer – Dec 15

A theater-artist from New Jersey, Allyson creates work about the Internet, communication, alienation, systems and time. Work supported or seen at: The Brick, The Exponential Festival, Clubbed Thumb, Workshop Theater, Road Theatre, Theater Accident, Wild Project. Finalist: SohoRep Lab, Alpine Fellowship, Sam French OOB Festival. Semi-finalist: Ars Nova PlayGroup, Pipeline Theatre PlayLab, Princess Grace Award. Proud alumna of The Road’s UC4, Clubbed Thumb ECWG, Brick SoundLab. Commissions include EST/Sloan and the Constitution Commission. Her digital audio-film-play Arrow of Time was an official selection of the NYC Indie Theater Film Festival & named Best Audio Production by Young-Howze Theatre Journal Awards.