Results tagged “play review process” from Inkblog!
Guess what?!
The Inkwell just launched its SECOND CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS, and we couldn't be more excited. We can't wait to hear from playwrights from across the country... we can't wait to find out what is brewing in their heads and what they are throwing down on the page.
So PLAYWRIGHTS — We are ready for you! SEND US YOUR PLAYS BETWEEN MARCH 1st and MARCH 21st.
We'll be selecting plays to develop through a sustained collaboration with dramaturgs, directors, actors, and designers. There's lots more information at The Inkwell's website.
This whole submissions process wouldn't be possible without the quick wits and superhuman organizing skills of The Inkwell's Lindsay Haynes. You're the best, Lindsay!
And she wants to tell you more about how we manage this whole big thing. So I am yielding the blog floor to her to describe our review process. Take it Lindsay!
-------------------------------------------------
We’re like a crew of little kids looking over a pile of presents at a birthday party.
Over a few short weeks, we’ll get to unwrap all sorts of wild, thrilling, thoughtful, engaging and wonderful plays. It just doesn’t get any better than this.
“But come on,” a playwright might say, “you don’t really read all those plays, do you?”
Oh, my goodness, do we ever!!
Our famous blog maven Anne McCaw and I were thinking it might be a good idea to explain our play reading process, so you don’t feel like you are throwing your play into a void when you send it to us… and why it takes so long for us to come out of play-reading hibernation and tell you what we’ve figured out.
First off, we get your plays over a three-week period. And this year we have a fancy new submissions site that our fantastic web designer Jessie Glass has put together for us. (Check out Jessie Glass's website if you’re in the market for a web guru. Man, is she great... but I digress.)
So here’s what happens on our end of things.
Starting from day one, our band of around 30 awesome readers (and counting) hit the ground running. Each has been trained how to read a play for The Inkwell and will be assigned between one and three plays per week to review and respond to via an all-important evaluation form. We’ll start sending out plays to our readers as soon as we get them, and we’ll keep sending them out to our readers until each and every play is read.
We then ask our readers to evaluate how well these plays fit into The Inkwell’s aesthetic based on a number of criteria — story/plot, structure, character, theatricality, and language, among them. (You can read a bit more about these criteria — how we define them and how we examine them — at the play submissions page on our website.)
We also ask our readers to advocate for plays, telling us why they find them fascinating and how they think the playwright would benefit from a collaboration with The Inkwell. Here’s a sampling of the questions we ask our readers:
Last year, we received 428 plays over two weeks, and it took about eight weeks for our readers to get through their first review. That’s the end of step one.
We then read through all of our readers’ responses and narrow the field down for a second round of evaluation of about 100 plays. Those will be read and responded to by at least two more readers, and then from those responses, we’ll narrow the field down further to one last group.
In all, the final pool of plays will be read by five people at least.
Finally, we’ll work with the finalists in different capacities depending on the need of the plays or the playwrights. The first step is likely to be a showcase reading of a 20-minute excerpt. We’ll be producing a series of these readings in the fall.
All-in-all, it’s an exhausting, exhilarating process. It takes us about six months to select our final plays, and we think it’s important to take that time because it’s a process we feel strongly about. We know you’ve poured yourself into what you’ve sent us, and we respect that, and do our best to honor it by reading every play we’re sent. We get a lot of them, so – though we wish we could -- we can’t respond to all of you, but your plays are well-cared for in our hands.
So thank you for your time and effort in creating your scripts and sending them in to us. We’re doing our best to be good stewards for the industry, and to further the development of new plays and playwrights. We’re glad to get to know you and your plays, and we promise to do our best to take good care of them.
The Inkwell just launched its SECOND CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS, and we couldn't be more excited. We can't wait to hear from playwrights from across the country... we can't wait to find out what is brewing in their heads and what they are throwing down on the page.
So PLAYWRIGHTS — We are ready for you! SEND US YOUR PLAYS BETWEEN MARCH 1st and MARCH 21st.
We'll be selecting plays to develop through a sustained collaboration with dramaturgs, directors, actors, and designers. There's lots more information at The Inkwell's website.
This whole submissions process wouldn't be possible without the quick wits and superhuman organizing skills of The Inkwell's Lindsay Haynes. You're the best, Lindsay!
And she wants to tell you more about how we manage this whole big thing. So I am yielding the blog floor to her to describe our review process. Take it Lindsay!
-------------------------------------------------
We’re like a crew of little kids looking over a pile of presents at a birthday party.
Over a few short weeks, we’ll get to unwrap all sorts of wild, thrilling, thoughtful, engaging and wonderful plays. It just doesn’t get any better than this.
“But come on,” a playwright might say, “you don’t really read all those plays, do you?”
Oh, my goodness, do we ever!!
Our famous blog maven Anne McCaw and I were thinking it might be a good idea to explain our play reading process, so you don’t feel like you are throwing your play into a void when you send it to us… and why it takes so long for us to come out of play-reading hibernation and tell you what we’ve figured out.
First off, we get your plays over a three-week period. And this year we have a fancy new submissions site that our fantastic web designer Jessie Glass has put together for us. (Check out Jessie Glass's website if you’re in the market for a web guru. Man, is she great... but I digress.)
So here’s what happens on our end of things.
Starting from day one, our band of around 30 awesome readers (and counting) hit the ground running. Each has been trained how to read a play for The Inkwell and will be assigned between one and three plays per week to review and respond to via an all-important evaluation form. We’ll start sending out plays to our readers as soon as we get them, and we’ll keep sending them out to our readers until each and every play is read.
We then ask our readers to evaluate how well these plays fit into The Inkwell’s aesthetic based on a number of criteria — story/plot, structure, character, theatricality, and language, among them. (You can read a bit more about these criteria — how we define them and how we examine them — at the play submissions page on our website.)
We also ask our readers to advocate for plays, telling us why they find them fascinating and how they think the playwright would benefit from a collaboration with The Inkwell. Here’s a sampling of the questions we ask our readers:
(Yup, we really ask that. And it’s important to us – more than you might think. Since The Inkwell’s relationship with playwrights is so process-intensive we really care about the human behind the play — as much as, maybe more — than the play they submitted.)
- What about this piece excites or engages you?
- What is the most memorable thing about this play?
- How and why do you think that the playwright could benefit through The Inkwell’s development process?
- Did the playwright fill out the form correctly?
Last year, we received 428 plays over two weeks, and it took about eight weeks for our readers to get through their first review. That’s the end of step one.
We then read through all of our readers’ responses and narrow the field down for a second round of evaluation of about 100 plays. Those will be read and responded to by at least two more readers, and then from those responses, we’ll narrow the field down further to one last group.
In all, the final pool of plays will be read by five people at least.
Finally, we’ll work with the finalists in different capacities depending on the need of the plays or the playwrights. The first step is likely to be a showcase reading of a 20-minute excerpt. We’ll be producing a series of these readings in the fall.
All-in-all, it’s an exhausting, exhilarating process. It takes us about six months to select our final plays, and we think it’s important to take that time because it’s a process we feel strongly about. We know you’ve poured yourself into what you’ve sent us, and we respect that, and do our best to honor it by reading every play we’re sent. We get a lot of them, so – though we wish we could -- we can’t respond to all of you, but your plays are well-cared for in our hands.
So thank you for your time and effort in creating your scripts and sending them in to us. We’re doing our best to be good stewards for the industry, and to further the development of new plays and playwrights. We’re glad to get to know you and your plays, and we promise to do our best to take good care of them.
