New Group/No Limits

The New Group/No Limits Reading Series, curated by, Thomas Bradshaw, is a development series that features new and unexpected works by playwrights of color. This series is a part of the New Group/New Works play and musical development program.

The No Limits series aims to bring support and artistic opportunity to playwrights of color who have works that are deemed “too controversial or unproducible” for the American Theater. Pushing beyond the ideas of theatrical conventions, No Limits encourages its playwrights to explore difficult subject matter, controversial themes, as well as shocking and unexpected storytelling in a safe and creative environment.

Committed to the values of equity, diversity, and inclusion, this series helps to create opportunities for under-represented playwrights, by exposing them to potential co-creators, theater-makers, and creative advocates.

As a part of the No Limits Reading Series, these playwrights are given the opportunity to work with emerging or established directors on a staged reading presentation to industry people and audiences in the New York Area.

Click here to learn more about submitting a play for the New Group/No Limits Reading Series.

Good Fortune

Eighteen years ago, Julie adopted an Asian baby so there would always be someone around to take care of her. After all, Asian culture is about honoring your ancestors. Unbeknownst to Julie, her daughter, Mei-Ling has a different plan and Julie realizes the only way to solve the problem is to evoke Mei-Ling’s ethnic roots.

Tuesday, June 11 at 4pm
The Rehearsal Studio at The Pershing Square Signature Center
480 West 42nd Street
RSVP HERE

Megan Chan Meinero is a playwright and standup comedian. Her plays have been produced/developed with The New Group, Ensemble Studio Theatre, The Flea Theatre, UglyRhino and Garner Arts. She’s a proud member of EST/Youngblood. As a standup comedian, Megan performs regularly throughout New York and she was a finalist in the Hudson Valley Comedy Competition. MFA: Northwestern University. More at meganchanmeinero.com

May Adrales is a director, artistic leader and teacher and has directed over 25 world premieres, including Qui Nguyen’s Lortel Award and Obie Award winning, Vietgone and Poor Yella Rednecks. Her work has been seen at theatres across the country including Manhattan Theater Club, Lincoln Center, Second Stage, Signature Theater, South Coast Rep, Milwaukee Rep, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Actors Theater of Louisville, The Goodman and Seattle Rep. She recently was awarded the TCG Alan Schneider directing award and the League of Professional Theater Women’s Josephine Abady Award, which recognizes the cultural diversity of her work. She is a former fellow at Drama League, Women’s Project, SoHo Rep and New York Theater Workshop, and a recipient of the TCG New Generations Grant, Denham Fellowship and Paul Green Directing Award. She proudly serves as an Associate Artistic Director at Milwaukee Rep. She is a former Director of Artistic Programs at the Lark Play Development Center and Artistic Associate at The Public Theater. May has taught at Yale, Brown, Juilliard, Harvard/ART, ACT, Fordham, NYU and Bard. MFA, Yale School of Drama. mayadrales.net

“The New Group has served as an artistic home for me and has fearlessly mounted top-notch productions of my work. I believe in the mission of The New Group, and there are very few Off Broadway theaters that program work that’s not completely driven by commercial aspirations. The New Group developed and premiered my plays Burning and Intimacy with Artistic Director Scott Elliott directing. Those have been two of the most artistically fulfilling experiences of my theatrical life. But my relationship with The New Group goes deeper. During a visit, Scott and I began a discussion about the lack of diversity in the American Theater. By the end of that conversation, we were collaborating on a plan to challenge this reality, and our brainstorm ultimately led to a grant from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. We are still working on this together because The New Group has committed to making changes within their company that can influence the rest of the theater community.” –Thomas Bradshaw

PAST READINGS

The Wicked One

The Wicked One (Formerly named The 626 Project)
By Lisa Sanaye Dring
Directed by Shariffa Chelimo Ali

Thursday, March 14 at 12pm

The Wicked One is the story of a mother faced with a brutal decision. Based on a true story out of Rosemead, California, a terminal cancer diagnosis forces a first-generation Laotian immigrant to confront her son’s schizophrenia. The Wicked One explores the piercing isolation experienced by single mothers, the shame around mental illness that often plagues Asian families, and the heft of having to carry your culture with you in a foreign land.

Lisa Sanaye Dring is a playwright, director and actor. She was recently selected as one of two finalists for the 2018 Relentless Award for The 626 Project. Kaidan: Walls Grow Thin, a play Lisa co-wrote with Chelsea Sutton, was recently nominated for 8 Ovation Awards including Best Production, and won 5. Lisa has worked with Asolo Repertory Theatre, Actors Theatre of Louisville, East West Players, Circle X Theatre Co., Playpenn, SCF @ Son of Semele, One Year Lease, Bread & Puppet Theater, Bootleg Theater, Boston Court, Sacred Fools and Theatre of NOTE. She co-founded Rogue Lab, a new play incubator with Rogue Artists Ensemble, and is a proud ensemble member of Rogue Artists as well as Hero Theatre. lisasanayedring.com

Shariffa Chelimo Ali is a creative leader committed to working with an open-heart at the intersection of the performing arts and humanitarianism. Shariffa has worked at the Public Theater in New York since 2013 where she has served in numerous capacities often piloting new roles that serve her interest in curating radical spaces of hospitality, equity, inclusion, diversity and promoting anti-racism throughout the institution.

As a director, Shariffa moves her audiences to engage with timely issues touching upon Black, Afropolitan, and African-American identities. Select directing credits include Mies Julie (Classic Stage Company), The Year of the Bicycle (The Cell Theatre), Love’s Labor’s Lost (NYU Tisch), Detroit 67 (Brooklyn College), Eclipsed (Princeton University) & We are Proud to Present…(Yale University). Shariffa’s award winning Virtual Reality (VR) prototype Atomu (formerly titled ROUND ROUND) has received incubation at various international development labs including La Nurserie (Paris, France), The Sundance Institute (Park City, USA), The National Theater (London, UK) POV Spark (New York, USA). Atomu will go into production in the summer of 2019.

Shariffa has served as Assistant Director to mentor Cynthia Nixon for Rasheeda Speaking, Steve (The New Group, NY) and Motherstruck! (Culture Project, NY). Shariffa is a member of Black History Museum, a collective of interdisciplinary artists presenting an immersive theatrical installation produced by HERE Arts and Smoke & Mirrors Collective. Black History Museum will receive a full production in the fall of 2019.

Shariffa is a graduate of the University of Cape Town’s select Theater and Performance division and holds a Bachelor of Arts (Honors) degree. And perhaps the thing that she is most proud of, is that she was featured in the New York Times Gentleman’s Style section for her great taste in fashion. shariffa.com

The Feast

The Feast
By Celine Song
Directed by Whitney White
Featuring Teagle F Bougere, Toni Ann DeNoble, Edward O’Blenis, Adam Petchel, Sarah Tolan-Mee

Monday, October 15 at 4pm

Are you hungry? You are invited to The Feast, where no meat is served. In a new post-meat reality, hungry dinner guests wait for a latecomer to arrive before they can eat. As their stomachs growl, they cling to traces of civilization before eventually reverting to their true selves: Animals, driven mad by the violent needs of the body and spirit.

Hang Man

Hang Man
By Stacy Osei-Kuffour
Directed by Morgan Green

Wednesday, June 13, 2018 at 3pm
The Lark, BareBones Studios

A rural town in present-day Mississippi is shaken when the body of Darnell, a Black man, is found hanging from a tree. While the circumstances remain a mystery, the white woman who discovered his body quickly develops a perverse fixation – one that threatens those around her. Darnell’s broken family begins to uncover the haunted, buried past behind his own obsessions.

Stacy Osei-Kuffour born and raised in Chicago, Illinois, is a BFA graduate from NYU (major: Drama) and an MFA graduate from Hunter College (major: Playwriting). Previous plays include: The Painter, *Samuel French Festival finalist. Breathless, workshop productions at the Dream Up Festival & Downtown Urban Theater Festival (both at Theater for the New City). Dirty Blood, reading at Rattlestick Theater. Animals, *Irv Zarkower Award winner through Hunter College, readings: Lark Development Center, NYTW, Blank Theatre, and IAMA Theatre. The Pearl and The Black Sea, *Honorable Mention in The Kilroy’s 2015 The List. Cut, upcoming reading at The Robey Theatre. Hang Man, *World Premiere at The Gift Theatre in Chicago, Bay Area Playwrights Festival finalist, Boston Court New Play finalist, MultiStages New Works Contest finalist, and The Kilroy’s 2017 The List. Besides this, Stacy is also a member of Youngblood, New Georges the Jam, Humantias PLAY LA Workshop, MADLAB, and has created plays with MacDowell Colony and the Nashville Repertory Theatre’s Ingram Play Lab alongside Christopher Durang. Stacy is also a TV writer. Just last year she wrote for the TV show Happy! on the SYFY network and PEN15 which will air on HULU in the fall. Currently, she writes for the TV show WATCHMEN based on the acclaimed comic book by Alan Moore, which will air on HBO in 2019. Stacy’s goal as an artist is to bring untold stories to the stage and screen, stories that challenge our political, societal, and stereotypical views of the Black experience.

Morgan Green is a Bay Area born theater director and co-founder of the Brooklyn-based company, New Saloon (newsaloon.org). Most recently she directed the west coast premiere of The Wolves by Sarah DeLappe (Marin Theatre Company), and Cute Activist by Milo Cramer (The Bushwick Starr). Last summer, Morgan led the first ever director-driven season at The Sharon Playhouse which included New Saloon’s MINOR CHARACTER, Caryl Churchill’s Far Away, and a controversial rendition of Meredith Wilson’s The Music Man. Her work has also been seen at The Public Theater, Ars Nova, The Invisible Dog, and Clubbed Thumb. She is a New Georges Affiliated Artist, an alumni of the Lincoln Center Director’s Lab and Williamstown Theater Festival Directing Core, and a 2014-2015 Bob Moss Directing Resident at Playwrights Horizons. MorganClaireGreen.com

As Is

As Is
By Stacey Rose
Directed by Logan Vaughn

Wednesday, March 21, 2018 at 3pm
cancelled due to inclement weather

As Is is the story of four Big Beautiful Black Women living the everyday struggle of trying to lose a few pounds and navigating their Big Black Womeness in the confined spaces of their lives. D. Everette has found her stride as a college professor. Antonia seems to have stumbled upon the perfect manifestation of Black love. Beverly has her children and her grief. It is young Camille who threatens to unravel the four way friendship with her inability to find, and relegate herself to, a confined space of her own.

Blackjack

Blackjack
By Roger Q. Mason
Directed by LA Williams
Featuring Carolyn Baeumler, Reynaldo Piniella and Dale Soules

Thursday, December 7, 2017 at 3pm

Ethel, an elderly white Texan transplant, is dying. Her grandson, Arthur, struggles for mental stability after a hapless stint at college. Neither of them wants help, but now all they have is each other. As they face new precipices in their lives, Ethel and Arthur brave the fears and challenges of the unknown together.

Blackjack explores an unlikely bond between two souls searching for hope and self-determination when their lives have fallen out of their own hands.

Scratching the Surface

Scratching the Surface
By Charly Evon Simpson
Directed by Benjamin H. Kamine
Featuring Zoe Chao, Joe Curnutte, Mandi Masden and Tara Pacheco

Wednesday, June 14, 2017 at 3:30pm

Mark and Winn are perfect. They are that couple at the diner, in a back booth, who make you think about the love, youth, and perfection you don’t have. When they finally move into their dream home, however, their fantasy of a happily ever after is threatened by one overeager neighbor and a mysterious scratching noise that just won’t let up.

"Daddy"

“Daddy”
By Jeremy O. Harris
Directed by Danya Taymor
Featuring Mamoudou Athie, Zachary Booth, Jim Fletcher, Crystal Lucas-Perry, Ana Nogueira, Madeline Wise and Charlayne Woodard

Friday, March 3, 2017 at 4pm

Art Therapy

Art Therapy
By Megan Chan Meinero
Directed by Marissa Wolf
Featuring Midori Francis, Samuel H. Levine, Marilee Talkington and Gary Wilmes

Thursday, December 8, 2016 at 3pm