News And Blogs

The Center Theatre Group Writers’ Workshop, a program designed to foster the next generation of great American playwrights, has generated approximately 70 new plays in the past decade. Many of these shows have gone on to acclaimed world premieres, but only two have made their way back to Center Theatre Group’s stages. The second is Sheila Calla...

Having 'Salad' - and Eating It, Too

Bathsheba Doran’s The Mystery of Love & Sex, which plays the Mark Taper Forum from January 27 through March 6, 2016, begins with a dinner party thrown by two college students, Charlotte and Jonny, for Charlotte’s parents—a party teetering on disaster as Charlotte invites her parents to dine on undressed salad and unbuttered bread while se...

On Sex, Detective Fiction, Dinner Parties, and Edward Albee

Marsha Norman’s credits span the spectrum of performance from tragic plays to HBO series and have earned her top awards and prizes including a Tony and a Pulitzer. But what drew her to the tale of housewife and World War II war bride Francesca Johnson and inspired her to write the book for the musical adaptation of The Bridges of Madison Count...

A Conversation with Pulitzer Prize-Winning Writer Marsha Norman

How does the woman The New York Times has anointed “the most adventurous downtown playwright of her generation” follow up a silent play featuring an all-nude feminist cast? If you’re Young Jean Lee, you ask yourself the same question you ask yourself when you start any play—what don’t I want to write—then tackle a genre you’ve never w...

Playwright Young Jean Lee on Why We Hate Losers

Sean Cawelti makes winning the 2015 Sherwood Award sound glamorous: After getting onstage and giving a thank you speech at LA Stage Alliance’s Ovation Awards, he got press coverage, recognition from his peers, and new professional connections. But a more interior transformation has come alongside the pomp and circumstance. Winning the Sherwood, s...

The Sherwood Award Allows Sean Cawelti to Follow His Passion

When The Christians comes to the Mark Taper Forum from December 2, 2015 to January 10, 2016, it will mark Obie Award-winning Director Les Waters’ third Center Theatre Group play in 15 months. In September 2014, he directed the world premiere of Marjorie Prime at the Taper, and in July and August of this year, he directed Girlfriend at the Kirk Do...

L.A. Feels Like an Artistic Home to Director Les Waters