Writing

PLAYS:

Anne and Fran Take the Night Bus (short – 20 mins): Two women embark on an adventure to the Suffolk coast, in the process disrupting the course of a stranger’s life and calling into question their fundamental beliefs about the natural world.

Tongue-Tied (full-length – 120 mins): In 1927, a veteran film actor navigates the transition to talkies by losing his Bronx accent, while a female studio head pushes her industry to embrace its changing audience. In 1972, a young actor in London studies to mimic his uncle’s Trinidadian accent to land a film role that will honor his heritage. His grandmother, left speechless by a stroke, finds escape in fantasies of silent film, stepping into the past as she finds the strength to recover. All of them must question how the world values their humanity and reach beyond it to embrace their authentic voice.

Gnome Land’s Book of the Dead (short – 30 mins): When Bess lures her mother to a timeworn amusement park with weighty questions about their future, the answers are more bizarre and complex than either of them could have foreseen.

The Mud Room (full-length): Two cousins purchase their deceased great-aunts’ home at auction, in the process awakening the vengeful spirit of Baba Yaga, who has a special interest in evening the score on long-buried harms and family secrets.

Botanica (full-length): A magical realist dramedy about the last known specimen of a nearly-extinct lily in the American West. Botanica tangles with ideas of ownership and authenticity as locals and institutions vie for control over a beloved landscape.

Photo Play (full-length):
In a shared subconscious – the crossroads of memory, belief, and speculation – family members and chosen family grapple with shared truth in the pages of a dusty photo album. Photo play is a rumination on the power of personal snapshots: why we take them, how they map the present to the past, and what happens to the ones we alter, delete, or burn. An early 20-minute draft was performed at I.R.T. Theater in 2015. It was developed into an evening-length script through Field Work (a program of The Field) and a residency at the Holes in the Wall Collective. A workshop performance of Photo Play was staged in March 2018 at Dixon Place in NYC.

LIVE SHOWS CO-WRITTEN WITH SIX CHARACTERS:

  • Best Show Ever! (Production 2005, Tour 2007) – Theatre for the New City, Orlando Fringe
  • Six Characters Cometh! (Productions 2002 & 2003) – Connelly Theater, Chernuchin Theater
  • Six Characters in Search of a Working Title (Productions 1998 & 2000) – Collective Unconscious, Kraine Theater
  • Global Warmth/ Arctic Margarita (Video Shorts 2007) – NRDC
  • Brilliant! (Video Short 2006)
  • Too Cancelled for TV (Video Pilot 2003)

CO-WRITTEN WITH BOOBY HATCH:

  • Suck it! (Music Video 2009) – Best Music Video, Coney Island FF 2011
  • Cone of Silence (Sketch show 2009) – UCB Theater NY

OTHER WRITING:

  • Parts of a Motorcycle (Poem), Thó Wiŋ literary magazine, 2023.
  • Monograph Series (Essay), No, You Tell It! storytelling workshop, included in their 10-Year Anthology, available through Amazon (Palm Circle Press, 2022). Hear an audio recording of the story here.
  • Peace and Noise (Essay) published in the first Girl Crush Zine (2011, editors Thessaly La Force and Jenna Wortham):
    “Several times on the street, we locked eyes as she passed, and I was able to breathe out a little. In reality I knew I was dumbly gravitating to places where I knew she might be, but never had I wished harder that I could conjure someone into existence.”

FOR THEGLOC.NET:

  • Film review of Ruby Sparks, starring Zoe Kazan and Paul Dano.
  • Film review of Celeste and Jesse Forever, a film co-written by and starring Rashida Jones:
    “They share an intimate verbal shorthand that mimics the easy rapport of a great first date…which is a problem because Celeste and Jesse are in the throes of a divorce. They’ve been separated for six months but are determined to escape all the messy, painful bits and skip straight to the part where they’re best friends who happen to be dating other people.”
  • Weekly recap posts of NBC’s Best Friends Forever and HBO’s Girls, which also appeared on The Huffington Post.
  • Feature on Jennifer Childs, Artistic Director of 1812 Productions, an all-comedy theater company in Philadelphia, for theGLOC.net:
    “If making other people pee their pants was a sport, Jen would be an Olympic champion (though I’m not sure I’d want to judge that event). Her company includes women as creative collaborators at every level – which, sadly, is still pretty radical. But here’s the key: by including them without undue fanfare, she presents it as the norm – no big deal.”
  • Interview with comedy duo Mel & El:
    “Friends and partners in crime since they were twelve years old, Mel and El are a hilarious musical duo who have graced stages throughout New York City and on the high seas with their pitch-perfect banter-y goodness.”

Writing samples and excerpts available upon request.