Blank Theatre's Young Playwrights Festival Submission Deadline Set for March 15

The Blank Theatre's Young Playwrights Festival is seeking submissions nationwide from playwrights 19 years of age and younger. The submission deadline is March 15, 2012. Winning plays will be presented by professional actors and directors from May 31 - June 24, 2012 at the Stella Adler Theatre in Hollywood, CA.

Celebrating its 20th anniversary year, The Blank Theatre's Young Playwrights Festival is a nationwide competition that produces the work of twelve teenaged playwrights each year. Since 1993, the festival has produced 220 plays by playwrights 19 and younger from 27 states.

Each winning play will have four performances in a weekend run. The productions are made possible in part by grants from Ralph M. Parsons Foundation, The Plum Foundation, The Rosenthal Family Foundation, Los Angeles County Arts Commission and City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs.

"Every year I am amazed at the depths to which these teenagers go in their writing. They are brave, bold and uninhibited," said Noah Wyle, Artistic Producer at The Blank. "The winners are thrilled to see their plays presented by professionals, but these professionals are often given a great gift in return: a renewed sense of artistic purpose. We learn from the playwrights as they learn from us."

The rules for the festival competition are as follows: playwrights must be 19 years of age or younger on March 15, 2012; original plays and musicals can be any length, on any subject. Scripts must be legible; pages must be numbered and unbound; submissions must be postmarked or emailed by March 15, 2012. There is a limit of three (3) plays per playwright. All plays must include a cover sheet with the play's title, playwright's name, date of birth, school (if any), mailing address, contact phone number, e-mail address and the play's production history (if any).

Each playwright whose work is accepted will be assigned a mentor: professional writers who will help the youngsters hone their work for performance. Past mentors have included Tony Award-winning playwright Terrence McNally, Tony Award-nominated composer Michael John LaChiusa, writer Jeff Greenstein (Will & Grace), Tony Award-winning director Michael Mayer (Spring Awakening), television and film director Garry Marshall, among many others. The playwrights then experience the thrill of seeing their plays performed by industry professionals in fully staged productions.

Past festivals have featured well known actors such as Jeremy Sisto (Law & Order), Chris Pine (Star Trek), Noah Wyle, Molly Shannon, Tiffani Thiessen (White Collar), Michael Welch (The Twilight Saga), Tom Lenk, Nicholas Brendon, and Sarah Michelle Gellar (Buffy The Vampire Slayer), Josh Radnor and Alyson Hannigan (How I Met Your Mother), Sherri Shepherd (The View), Kelly Lynch, Debra Messing, Mark Valley, Constance Zimmer (Boston Legal), Kathryn Joosten (Desperate Housewives), Jerry O'Connell, Tony Award-winning actress Daisy Eagan, Emmy Award-winning actor Edward Asner, and many others.

In past years, some winning plays have gone on to have a life on The Blank's mainstage for full-scale production. Should this happen, the playwright is treated as a full professional, from signing an option agreement to being paid royalties for his/her play. The Why, a play by 19-year-old Victor Kaufold, received a Los Angeles Stage Alliance Ovation Award nomination for 'Best Writing – World Premiere' as a result of The Blank's production. Kaufold is the youngest nominee in his category in 22 years of Ovation Award history.