The Lanford Wilson New American Play Festival honors new American plays that provide dynamic performance opportunities for college-aged actors.

The festival endeavors both to recognize playwrights for their outstanding work and to provide a resource for universities across the country to identify dynamic plays with robust roles for college-aged actors for production at their institutions. The festival features both a full-length and short play division.

The 2025 Lanford Wilson New American Play Festival will be held in person at the Dobbins Conservatory of Theatre and Dance on the River Campus of Southeast Missouri State University from May 25 to May 31, 2025.

The festival will feature staged readings of five Official Selection full-length plays and ten Official Selection short plays, as well as workshops and seminars on playwriting and new play development.

After the festival, one full-length play will be selected for the festival’s top prize and will receive its world premiere in the 2025-2026 Dobbins Conservatory Mainstage Season and will be considered for publication by Concord Theatricals, the world’s most significant theatrical company, comprising the catalogs of R&H Theatricals, Samuel French, Tams-Witmark, and The Andrew Lloyd Webber Collection.

FULL-LENGTH SUBMISSIONS

Seeking non-musical plays that have:

• A cast with all or nearly all characters between the ages of 15-25 (with no more than two characters outside of that age range).
• A mid to large-sized cast (i.e., at least five actors, preferably at least ten).
• A running time of at least 80 minutes.
• Significant representation (in both number and quality) of roles for female-identifying actors.
• Dynamic, fully-drawn roles to challenge student actors.
• Thematic values that will speak to college-aged artists and audience members.

The festival also places a value on plays that have the potential to provide performance opportunities to actors from under-represented groups.

Please note: The Lanford Wilson New American Play Festival is specifically seeking plays in which the characters are in their teens and early twenties, not simply characters that could be played by actors in their teens and early twenties. The festival is not seeking plays with characters that are “ageless” or “any age.” Plays should be about characters who are experiencing late adolescence and early adulthood.

Full-length plays should not have had a previous full production. Workshops and readings are fine.

Finalists for the festival’s top prize will receive airfare and housing to participate in the Lanford Wilson New American Play Festival on the campus of the Jeanine Larson Dobbins Conservatory of Theatre and Dance at Southeast Missouri State University in May of 2025. Staged readings of the finalists’ plays will be presented as part of the festival, and the winner of the prize will be announced at the end of the week-long event.

The winning full-length play will receive:

• A world premiere production in the 2025-2026 Dobbins Conservatory of Theatre and Dance theatre season.
• Consideration of the play for publication by Concord Theatricals, the world’s most significant theatrical company, comprising the catalogs of RandH Theatricals, Samuel French, Tams-Witmark, and The Andrew Lloyd Webber Collection.
• A meeting for the playwright with new play acquisition staff at Concord Theatricals.

Submissions are due October 1, 2024.

SUBMIT FULL-LENGTH PLAYS HERE

SHORT PLAY SUBMISSIONS