Beckett’s Babies

How do we teach playwriting? How do we teach writing in general? In this episode, we discuss what we think are best practices, writing exercises, approaches to workshopping students' new plays, and how do we grade creative work.

If teaching playwriting is something you're passionate about or interested in discussing, we'd love to hear from you!

Send us your questions or thoughts on playwriting and we might discuss it on our next episode. Email: [email protected] For more info, visit our website: www.beckettsbabies.com

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Please support Beckett's Babies by reviewing, sharing an episode to your friends, or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter: @beckettsbabies

Playwright, Dramaturg, Ceramic Artist and former Acupuncturist Tanuja Jagernauth join us on this episode to share her truth on theater and supporting communities through the arts. She also explores the ideas from her current research on fascism to write anti-fascist plays. What an important conversation we all had in this episode. She's incredibly thoughtful, generous, and open to sharing her life with us. We enjoyed having her on the show! We know you'll enjoy this episode too!

Tanuja Jagernauth is an Indo-Caribbean playwright, dramaturg, and ceramic artist who believes in the necessity of creation during times of destruction. A former acupuncturist, Tanuja aspires to practice four specific frameworks for collective liberation and wellness through theatre: self/community care, harm reduction, trauma-informed practice, and body positivity.

To learn more about Tanuja and her work, follow on Instagram @tanuja_devi

Please support Beckett's Babies by reviewing, sharing an episode to your friends, or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter: @beckettsbabies

And as always, we would love to hear from you!

Send us your questions or thoughts on playwriting and we might discuss it in our next episode.

As playwrights and writers, we must be able to talk about ourselves and our work. In this episode, we get into the idea of self-promotion... the good, the bad, and the ugly.

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Please support Beckett's Babies by reviewing, sharing an episode to your friends, or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter: @beckettsbabies

And as always, we would love to hear from you!

Send us your questions or thoughts on playwriting and we might discuss it on our next episode.

Email: [email protected]

For more info, visit our website: www.beckettsbabies.com

Playwright, improviser and mental health counselor John Mabey joins us on this episode to discuss all things playwriting, theater, improv, and more. John is a listener of the show who reached out to us and we wanted to reach back to bring him on show! 

John began writing plays as a child before he knew that’s what he was doing. He’s spent the past 10 years living in New York, London and Amsterdam and now lives in the American South. He studied human behavior, emotion and relationships by earning a master’s degree in Counseling and Psychology, and infuses into his playwriting everything he’s learned about what it means to be human. In addition to plays, he also publishes in academic books and journals on the topics of sexual identity and spirituality. In playwriting, John enjoys experimenting with structure and uses improvisation as a way to generate creative ideas as well as its own art form. He now teaches and performs improvisation around the world with ensembles and as a solo act, and is a regular performer in true storytelling events. Last year, John co-authored a play that was produced in Amsterdam titled, The B Word, which had a successful 2-week run and multiple sold-out performances. Next month his short play, The Most Brave Girl In The Whole Wide World, is included in the Los Angeles play festival ‘A Light In Dark Places’ at the Stella Adler Theatre.

Follow John on Instagram @jmabey to learn more!

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Please support Beckett's Babies by reviewing, sharing an episode to your friends, or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter: @beckettsbabies

And as always, we would love to hear from you!

Send us your questions or thoughts on playwriting and we might discuss it on our next episode.

Email: [email protected]

For more info, visit our website: www.beckettsbabies.com

Sam interviews Sarah Cho.... and you won't believe what she says! Or maybe you do but... listen anyways!

Thanks so much for listening to our show!

And as always, we would love to hear from you!

Send us your questions or thoughts on playwriting and we might discuss it on our next episode.

Sarah interviews Sam Collier.... and you won't believe what she says!

We are a two-woman operation in creating this podcast show. Please help to support Beckett's Babies by reviewing, sharing an episode to your friends, or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter: @beckettsbabies

And as always, we would love to hear from you!

Send us your questions or thoughts on playwriting and we might discuss it on our next episode.

What are the plays that have haunted you? In this episode we discuss plays that we have seen or read that’s stucked with us long after they’ve been seen or read. The plays can also be the ones you haven’t written yet and are stewing in your mind or the ghost-twins of the plays you have written or even bad plays you’ve seen. We attempt to unpack these ideas to think about why some plays stick with us. 

Related Links & Glistens

Please support Beckett's Babies by reviewing, sharing an episode to your friends, or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter: @beckettsbabies

And as always, we would love to hear from you!

Playwright Reina Hardy joins us on this episode to discuss all things playwriting, theater, teaching, and more. Reina is a delightful and incredible human being. We also share our pet peeves on rejections so don't miss out on this episode!

Reina Hardy's plays, which usually contain magic and sometimes contain science, have been produced in Chicago, NYC and London. They include “Glassheart” (Rorsharch Theater and the Shrewds), “Changelings”, (The Vortex), and “A Map to Somewhere Else” (Everyday Inferno, NYC). Honors include: Michener Fellowship, National New Play Network New Play Showcase, Source Festival, Kennedy Center MFA Playwrights Workshop, Interact 20/20 Commission, Kennedy Center ACTF TYA PRIZE. Publications include: “Best American Short Plays, 2012-2013,” and “Best Scenes for Two Actors,” Applause, “Best Stage Monologs for Men,” “60 Seconds to Shine,” and “105 5-Minute Plays for Study and Performance,” from Smith and Kraus. In the 2018-19 and 2019-20 season: the world premiere of "Fanatical" in London, new productions of "Stargazers" in Michigan and Australia, the second production of "Susan Swayne and the Bewildered Bride" in Cincinnati, and the rolling world premiere of "Annie Jump and the Library of Heaven" in Milwaukee, WI; Washington, DC; Austin, TX and Ridgefield, CT. MFA: Michener Center at UT Austin.

To learn more about Reina and her work, visit the website: www.reinahardy.com

Please support Beckett's Babies by reviewing, sharing an episode to your friends, or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter: @beckettsbabies

And as always, we would love to hear from you!

Send us your questions or thoughts on playwriting and we might discuss it on our next episode.

In this episode, we share our thoughts on talkbacks and post-show discussions. What are the different approaches or structures to talkbacks? What are talkbacks for? In an ideal world, what would a talkback provide to artists, audience members, and the theater institution? What are the pitfalls of talkbacks? What makes them go wrong? How can we make them better? Well, we attempted to answer these questions the only way we know how-- The BB Way.

As always, we would love to hear from you!

Send us your questions or thoughts on playwriting or any topics discussed on this show and we might discuss it on our next episode.

LINKS

GLISTENS

Please support Beckett's Babies by reviewing, sharing an episode to your friends, or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter: @beckettsbabies

Listeners, sometimes you gotta learn the format to break it. In this episode, we discuss the standard format for playwriting, different writing programs to use for playwriting, and what we love (or sometimes we don't love) about the format.

Please support Beckett's Babies by reviewing, sharing an episode to your friends, or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter: @beckettsbabies

As always, we would love to hear from you!

Send us your questions or thoughts on playwriting and we might discuss it on our next episode.