12
I n c i t e /I ns i ght
Network Spotlight
W i n te r 20 1 9
How Students are
Learning Playwriting
Through AATE
The Playwrights In Our
Schools Project
WR ITTEN BY JOHN NEWMAN
A
ATE’s Playwrights In
Our School Project
allows secondary
students to see
how plays are
written and, more importantly,
rewritten. Aspiring young writers
see professional dramatists make
changes to their texts, and this
inspires them to improve their
own scripts. It helps students
and teachers to contribute to a
canon of new works for young
actors and audiences in addition
to remounting familiar plays from
the established repertory.
Playwrights In Our Schools (PIOS),
began with five 2003 school
residencies that were made
possible by a grant from the
Children’s Theatre Foundation
of America. During its first year,
PIOS connected five award-
winning playwrights from
Nebraska, Missouri, Michigan,
Kansas, and Hawaii with school
residencies in California, Idaho,
Colorado, Texas, and New York.
PIOS took a different approach
in 2005, sending three high
school theatre teachers to
observe script development at
the Provincetown Playhouse, the
Bonderman Symposium, and
Pollyanna Theatre Company, who
then initiated play development
projects in their schools. In
2007, PIOS connected eight
professional writers with eight
adolescent writers who developed
three drafts of their own short
scripts through correspondence
with their mentors.
Since 2009, Broadway Across
America Utah’s Education
Foundation has supported one or
two PIOS residencies by award-
winning playwrights in Utah
secondary schools. Writers who
have participated in the Utah
residencies include Ric Averill,
Gloria Bond Clunie, Max Bush,
Brian Geuhring, D.W. Gregory,
Claudia Haas, Barry Kornhasuer,
and Carol Korty. These writers
have worked in private, charter,
and public schools throughout
the state of Utah.
The centerpiece of the three-day
residencies is the development
of the adult writer’s latest script.
Students perform a staged
reading of the resident writer’s
latest work that typically
undergoes extensive rewrites
before and during the rehearsal
process. While the teachers and
students approach the residency
as if it’s all about the development
of the play, the dramatist
approaches the residency as if
it’s all about the learning of the
students. Half of the dozen plays
developed through the Utah PIOS
residencies have been published
and all of them have received
full productions. The published
scripts credit the school for
furthering the play’s development
and often acknowledge the
student casts by name.
PIOS residencies also include
opportunities for young
playwrights to receive feedback
on their own works from the
professional adult writer. The
guest dramatists visit drama,
creative writing, and other
academic courses, holding
question-and-answer sessions
and teaching playwriting
workshops. The teachers
and students get to know the
playwrights as real people
rather than as names on script
covers. They come to see how
a dramatist can be an active
participant in a play’s production.
Claudia Haas’ Antigone in Munich