PETERBOROUGH, N.H.: MacDowell, the nation’s first artist residency program, has awarded 149 fellowships to artists across seven disciplines for its fall 2025/winter 2026 season, representing 25 states, Washington D.C., and 16 countries. Theatre fellows are playwright Kimberly Belflower, composer Paul Castles, playwright Lisa Sanaye Dring, playwright Sean Dunnington, playwright Dave Harris, playwright and actor Tife Kusoro, actor and director Paul Lazar, director and playwright Namoo Chae Lee, playwright and actor Forest Malley, playwright and actor Karin McCracken, author, performer, and professor Helen Paris, playwright and writer Novid Parsi, playwright Christopher Shinn, and playwright, director, and actor Marissa Joyce Stamps. Residencies started in September, and the artists will stay for an average of four weeks at MacDowell’s campus through February 2026. They were selected from a competitive pool of 1,697 applicants, with an acceptance rate of 9 percent.
CHICAGO: The MacArthur Foundation has named its 2025 Fellows. Among the 22 Fellows, who span a wide range of artistic and scientific disciplines, is Heather Christian, the composer-lyricist-playwright of Animal Wisdom, Oratorio for Living Things (currently in an Off-Broadway revival), and Terce: A Practical Breviary. The MacArthur citation praised her for “creating space to contemplate the sacred and spiritual in structurally complex works of music theatre.” The MacArthur prize, popularly known as the “genius” grant, awards scholars and artists with a “no-strings attached” award of $800,000, paid out in quarterly installments for five years, to further their practice.
CHICAGO: On Sept. 29, the 57th annual Equity Jeff Awards celebrated Chicago theatre’s 2024-25 season at the Harris Theatre. At the ceremony, hosted by Sean Fortunato and Alexis J. Roston and announced by Janet Ulrich Brooks, 44 award recipients were recognized from 214 nominees across 32 categories and shows from 40 producing entities. Receiving the top awards were Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812 at Writers Theatre for Outstanding Production of a Large Musical, Berlin at Court Theatre and Lobby Hero at Shattered Globe Theatre for Outstanding Production of a Play (Large and Mid-Sized, respectively), and Always…Patsy Cline at Drury Lane Productions for Outstanding Production of a Revue. Both Writers Theatre and Court Theatre’s ensembles won for their categories (Ensemble of a Musical and Play, respectively), as did their directors (Charles Newell for Court Theatre’s Berlin and Katie Spelman for Writers Theatre’s Great Comet).
These four theatres were also the ones with the most wins that night. Writers Theatre garnered five wins for Great Comet, making it the most-awarded production of a single show, which also included lighting design (Yael Lubetzky) and costume design (Raquel Adorno). Court Theatre took home seven wins across three productions, including performer nods for Stephen Schellhardt and Sarah Bockel from its co-production of Falsettos with TimeLine Theatre Company. Shattered Globe had seven wins across two productions, including Lobby Hero director Nate Santana and principal performer Elliot Esquivel, and A Tale of Two Cities director Mikael Burke, original music composer Christopher Kriz, costume designer Kotryna Hilko, and lighting designer Eric Watkins. Drury Lane had six wins, including nods for Always…Patsy Cline director Scott Weinstein and principal performer Bri Sudia, The Little Mermaid supporting performer Sawyer Smith, and an Artistic Specialization award for The Little Mermaid’s puppet design. The Libby Adler Mages Award for New Work was given to Atra Asdouf for Iraq, But Funny at Lookingglass Theatre Company and Mickle Maher for Berlin at Court Theatre.
The ceremony featured performances from seven nominated productions and dozens of local theatre artists as presenters. Johanna McKenzie Miller directed the awards program, with music direction by Dr. Michael McBride. Five theatres with anniversaries this season were recognized with Special Equity Awards: The Goodman Theatre, the city’s largest nonprofit theatre, for its 100th anniversary, and four institutions all celebrating their 50th anniversaries, including Marriott Theatre, Northlight Theatre, Oak Park Festival Theatre, and Steppenwolf Theatre Company. All winners are listed on the Equity Jeff Awards website.
NEW YORK CITY: The Dramatists Guild Foundation (DGF) has announced that New York City-based musical theatre composer and lyricist Madeline Myers is the 2025 recipient of the Stephen Schwartz Award. The award, described as “a pledge to the future of musical theatre,” annually grants $10,000 to a musical theatre writer whose voice is seen as critical to the continued success of the craft. Myers’s musicals include Double Helix, Flatbush Avenue, and The Devil’s Apprentice. Myers is a 2025 recipient of the Kleban Prize for libretto writing and a three-time finalist for lyric writing, a 2022 Broadway Women’s Fund “Woman to Watch on Broadway,” a 2021 Billie Burke Ziegfeld Award winner, a four-time finalist for the Jonathan Larson Grant, a 2019 York Theatre Company NEO Writer, a 2016-17 Dramatists Guild Foundation Fellow, and an original member of Hamilton’s Broadway music department. Myers’s work will be spotlighted as part of the DGF Fellows 25th anniversary celebration gala on Oct. 20 at the Ziegfeld Ballroom, which also honors Chisa Hutchinson, Michael Korie, and Jolie Schaffzin for their commitment to mentorship and support of the future of storytelling for the stage.
CHICAGO: Chicago Dramatists, a center for playwright development and new-work creation for over four decades, has named six new Resident Playwrights: Michael Bassett; India Nicole Burton; Toccara Castleman; Cheryl Coons, a former Chicago Dramatists board member; Jenny Magnus, a legendary figure in Chicago’s experimental theatre scene; and Keegon Schuett, winner of the 2024 Yale Drama Prize for this dry spell. The residency provides play development opportunities, such as table reads, workshops, and staged readings, in the Russ Tutterow Theatre.
NEW YORK CITY: The Entertainment Community Fund and Playwrights Horizons announced that Grammy-nominated artist Rona Siddiqui is the 2025 recipient of the Mark O’Donnell Prize. A composer and lyricist based in New York City, Siqqiqui has also received the Kleban Prize for lyric writing, the Jonathan Larson Grant, and the Billie Burke Ziegfeld Award. Her show The Brown Musical: A New Brown Musical, an autobiographical comedy about growing up bi-ethnic in America, was developed at Playwrights Horizons and premiered at 54 Below in 2022. The Mark O’Donnell Prize, named for the Tony-winning book writer of Hairspray, is given to “America’s most anomalous, singular, and curious emerging writers, composers, directors, and designers.” It includes a cash prize, use of the Mark O’Donnell Theater at the Entertainment Community Fund Arts Center for one week to develop a reading of a new work, and counseling from the Entertainment Community Fund on how to apply for affordable housing and obtaining health insurance, challenges that emerging artists often face.
NEW YORK CITY: On Nov. 5, the New York Landmarks Conservancy will host its annual Living Landmarks Celebration at the Plaza Hotel. Theatre figures to be honored include producers Bonnie Comley and Stewart F. Lane, playwright and screenwriter Kenneth Lonergan, actor Mark Ruffalo, and producers Cynthia Wainwright and Stephen Berger.
WALTHAM, MASS.: Brandeis University has awarded its 2025 Creative Arts Award to playwright and choreographer Larissa FastHorse. She will receive the award in a ceremony on the Brandeis campus in November. The university’s theatre department will present The Thanksgiving Play on the weekend of Nov. 21, in conjunction with FastHorse receiving the award. FastHorse, a member of the Sicangu Lakota Nation, is a 2025 Guggenheim Fellow, a 2020 MacArthur Fellow, and the co-founder of Indigenous Direction, the nation’s leading consulting company for Indigenous arts and audiences. Her satirical comedy, The Thanksgiving Play, debuted on Broadway in the 2022-23, making her the first known female Native American playwright to be produced on Broadway. The Thanksgiving Play was one of the most-produced plays in America in the 2023-24 season. Seattle Rep and Seattle Children’s Theatre are currently premiering her autobiographical coming-of-age solo play Fancy Dancer.
