Goodman Theatre's four new resident playwrights.
All four of Goodman Theatre’s new resident playwrights are women, but it wasn’t necessarily intended that way.
“Every year, we try to have gender parity and diversity of voices,” said Tanya Palmer, Goodman Theatre’s director of new play development. “But we didn’t set out to have an all-female unit. Those were the writers we were most excited about. It was a happy accident really.”
This is the theater’s sixth playwriting residency – past alum include American Theater Company interim artistic director Bonnie Metzgar, “Song of Himself” playwright Mickle Maher, and actress and playwright Nambi E. Kelley, whose adaptation of “Native Son” last year was highly praised.
Outrage over the lack of work published by female playwrights spiked this past year, after the New York Times reported that not a single play in Broadway’s 2013-14 season was written by a woman. That knowledge led L.A. group the Kilroys to create a juried list spotlighting 46 nationally unproduced or little-produced plays from trans and female playwrights. Over the summer, a report called “The Count” took a gendered look at nationwide plays performed at major nonprofits over the past three seasons.
That report put the number of works by female playwrights at just 22 percent.
“I think it’s exciting and it makes a strong statement that there are really talented women writing all over the country. And here in Chicago as well,” Palmer said. “Those women deserve to be supported, they deserve to have their voices heard.”
During the yearlong process, the four resident playwrights will attend bimonthly meetings to discuss the plays they’re working on, with the residency culminating in public staged readings of each playwright’s work at Goodman.
See a breakdown of Goodman’s four female playwriting residents below:
Kristiana Rae Colón is a poet, playwright, actor, educator, Cave Canem Fellow and executive director of the #LetUsBreathe Collective. Her play "Octagon," winner of Arizona Theater Company's 2014 National Latino Playwriting Award and Polarity Ensemble Theater's Dionysos Festival of New Work, had its world premiere at the Arcola Theater in London in September 2015. Her work was featured in Victory Gardens Theater’s 2014 Ignition Festival. In 2013, she toured the UK with her collection of poems "promised instruments" published by Northwestern University Press. In autumn 2012, she opened her one-woman show "Cry Wolf" at Teatro Luna in Chicago while her play "but i cd only whisper" had its world premiere at the Arcola Theater in London. Colón is a resident playwright at Chicago Dramatists and one half of the brother/sister hip-hop duo April Fools. She appeared on the fifth season of HBO's “Def Poetry Jam.”
Sandra Delgado is a Colombian American actor, singer, writer and producer born and raised in Chicago. She first appeared on the Goodman stage in Zoot Suit in 2000 and has since appeared in many other Goodman productions including "The Upstairs Concierge," "Pedro Páramo," "El Nogalar," "Chicago Boys," "Electricidad," "Massacre," "Mariela in the Desert" and "A Christmas Carol." Other Chicago stage highlights include "The Motherf**ker with the Hat," "Sonia Flew" (Steppenwolf Theatre Company), "El Grito del Bronx" (Teatro Vista, Collaboraction, Goodman Theatre), "Mojada," "Anna in the Tropics" (Victory Gardens Company) and "Summertime" (Lookingglass Theatre Company). Her original work "para Carmen" premiered at Collaboraction's Sketchbook Festival and was later seen in the Goodman's Latino Theatre Festival in 2010. She is an ensemble member of Teatro Vista, where she served as associate artistic director from 2006-2008, and a founding ensemble member of Collaboraction, where she produced the YO SOLO Festival of Latino Solo Shows and the popular Sketchbook Festival from 2005-2008. Delgado is on the National Steering Committee for the Latina/o Theatre Commons. She was a Theatre Communications Group Fox Foundation Resident Actor Fellow in residence at the Goodman Theater where she developed her solo show, "para Graciela." She is the recipient of the Joyce Award.
Jenni Lamb is a Chicago-based playwright and former improviser and actor. Her plays include "12th and Clairmount," "Candy Store," "Memento Polonia," "Period Piece" (with Lisa Linke), "Suicide Kills," "Quiver" and "Thou Proud Dream" (with Damon Krometis). Her plays have had readings or productions with The Gift Theatre, American Theatre Company, Stage Left Theatre, Wordsmyth Theatre (Houston), Northwestern University, Route 66 and Chicago Dramatists. Her play "Quiver" received an honorable mention from The Kilroys List and will be produced as part of the Route 66 season in spring 2016. Lamb is a two-time semi-finalist for the O’Neill Playwrights Conference and has received grants for her writing from the Illinois Arts Council. As an improviser, she has performed on many Chicago stages as well as national comedy festivals in New York, Washington DC and Los Angeles. She is a producing playwright and proud member of Living Room Playmakers, a playwright collective focused on creating theater in unusual spaces and an Artistic Associate at Route 66. Lamb holds an MFA in Writing for the Screen and Stage from Northwestern University.
Calamity West is a Chicago-based award-winning playwright. Her most recent productions include "The Peacock" (Jackalope Theatre), "The Gacy Play" (Sideshow Theatre), "Common Hatred" (The Ruckus), and "Ibsen Is Dead!" Her play "Give It All Back" was commissioned by Sideshow Theatre in 2015 and was cited on The Kilroys List the same year. In February 2016 her newest play, "Rolling," will receive its world premiere at Jackalope Theatre. West’s short plays have been seen in Chicago at/with: Victory Gardens, The Inconvenience, Chicago Dramatists, Rhinofest, Living Newspaper Festival, Abbie Fest, Chicago Home Theatre Festival, LiveWire, One-Minute Play Festival, The Anatomy Collective, Broken Nose Theatre, Fight Night, First Floor Theater and The Good Night Ladies. She earned her BA in playwriting at Webster University and her MFA in playwriting from California College of the Arts in San Francisco. She was born and raised in Missouri.
