First Look @ New Plays is a program designed specifically for alumni playwrights who graduated from the Goldberg Department of Dramatic Writing, Tisch School of the Arts in New York University. Each year, three emerging alums are chosen to develop a new full-length piece of dramatic writing, and provided with all the necessary resources for a professionally staged reading that will best serve the development of their work.
First Look @ New Plays provides a vital and economical step in the creative process, allowing NYU to support its graduates as they venture into the professional world so their voices can be heard. Through a unique collaboration between Tisch graduates and the larger world of theatre professionals, we give talented authors opportunities of the highest quality to showcase and develop their new works.
No school in the metropolitan area besides NYU is producing playwrights of such accomplishment. To name a few: Neil LaBute, Kenneth Lonergan, Heather Macdonald, George C. Wolf, Tony Kushner and Doug Wright. Kushner and Wright are also Tony Awards and Pulitzer Prize winners! We want all of our graduates to return to NYU to develop new works, to share them with the NYU community and with the city. We also must nurture the emerging playwrights to increase their number and secure their ability to continue writing plays.
First Look @ New Plays seeks to generate a vibrant alumni network of talented dramatists by creating alliances and collaborating with graduates from other Tisch departments. Leveraging on the School’s facilities and its professional theatre First Look Theatre Company, it establishes a real meeting place and clearing house for our theatre arts alumni, and in turn provides public access to new works. Above all, it aspires be home to successful theatre artists for many generations to come.
First Look @ New Plays is founded by Gary Garrison and Elizabeth Hemmerdinger.
