Tanya Barfield’s plays include: Of Equal Measure (Center Theatre Group), Blue Door (Playwrights Horizons, South Coast Repertory; Seattle Repertory, Berkeley Repertory and additional theaters), Dent, The Quick, The Houdini Act and 121º West. She wrote the book for the Theatreworks/USA children’s musical: Civil War: The First Black Regiment. Blue Door was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and is published by Dramatists Play Service. Tanya was a recipient of the 2003 Helen Merrill Award for Emerging Playwrights, 2005 Honorable Mention for the Kesselring Prize for Drama, a 2006 Lark Play Development/NYSCA grant, a 2007 Finalist for the Hull-Warner Award and she has been twice been a Finalist for the Princess Grace Award. She has been commissioned by Playwrights Horizons, Center Theatre Group, South Coast Repertory, Primary Stages and Geva Theatre Center. She is a member of New Dramatists and serves on the Dramatist Guild Council. Her play, The Call, will premiere as a co-production between Playwrights Horizons and Primary Stages in April 2013.
ND Activity
Creativity Fund
The Creativity Fund blends the flexibility of a one-day play reading with the intensive focus of a two-week workshop, providing ten to fifteen playwrights per year the opportunity to program three to five day workshops on an ad hoc basis. Creativity Fund workshops are structured according to each writer's needs at any stage of development and are funded through a lead grant from the Andew W. Mellon Foundation.
Nocturnal Commissions
Nocturnal Commissions is a marathon evening of instant theatre, New Dramatists style. First, the opportunity to commission new plays by New Dramatists resident and alumni playwrights is auctioned to the highest bidder; second, the writer and their winning bidder meet for a lightning-fast commission; third, each writer has about 20 minutes to create a new short theatre piece, monologue, or song; fourth, the plays are rehearsed upstairs while the audience has dinner downstairs; and last, all the evening's commissioned pieces are presented by a first-rate company of actors and directors.
Pen & Swill
Pen & Swill is a catch-all phrase for events designed to stimulate discussion among the resident playwright company on artistic and professional issues. Some are private-just for resident writers-most are open to the public, and they almost always include drinks and snacks.
Writers' Executive Committee
The Writers' Executive Committee is a voluntary grouping of resident playwrights who meet throughout the year to discuss and make decisions concerning the work of New Dramatists and to help guide the organization.