Pride Plays co-producers Doug Nevin and Michael Urie and festival director Nick Mayo will return to Rattlestick Playwrights Theater next year for Pride Plays 2020. The program will run June 25–29, 2020, with programming to be announced at a later date.
The festival launched earlier this year in honor of World Pride being celebrated in N.Y.C. on the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. A diverse array of productions were presented from world premieres to readings of earlier works by Tony-winning playwrights.
“We’re coming back with another festival of play readings that tell the story of the LGBTQ+ experience past, present, and future, and honor those who showed up then and are still showing up,” said Urie in a statement.
READ: Pride Plays Brings the Theatrical to World Pride
The inaugural Pride Plays featured Tony winner André De Shields (Hadestown) and Jordan E. Cooper (Ain't No Mo') in a closing-night reading of Some Men by Tony winning playwright Terrence McNally (Master Class). Others works presented included Thornton Wilder's Our Town, The Baltimore Waltz by Pulitzer Prize winner Paula Vogel (How I Learned to Drive), and Blueprints to Freedom: An Ode to Bayard Rustin by current Fires in the Mirror star Michael Benjamin Washington.
Festival performers included Urie, Maybe Burke, Mario Cantone, Robin De Jesús, John Glover, Penny Fuller, Judy Gold, Lou Liberatore, Beth Malone, Michael Hsu Rosen, Dale Soules, Nilaja Sun, Jason Tam, and Taylor Trensch.
New plays and world or New York premieres included works by Daaimah Mubashshir, Ryan Spahn, Eri Nox, Caroline Prugh, Eduardo Machado, MJ Kaufman, and a presentation of new pieces from Trans Lab artists Ashley Lauren Rogers, Naomi Charlotte Thieves, Mariam Bazeed, Corinne Donly, and Eamon Boylan.
Joining the Pride Plays team is Literary Manager and Associate Producer George Strus. Playwrights looking to submit their plays for consideration in Pride Plays 2020 should email [email protected]. Submissions will close January 20, 2020.
