Washington, DC

Recent productions by Children's Theatre Company---one of the NEA Distinguished New Play Development Project recipients---include Esperanza Rising, by Lynn Alvarez, adapted from the novel by Pam Munoz Ryan and directed by Rebecca Lynn Brown. Photo by Dan Norman.

Five theaters and five playwrights across the country are celebrating today as the NEA announces its 2010 Distinguished New Play Development Project grants, part of the NEA's New Play Development Program. Through these grants, five theaters will collaborate with a playwright on the development of a new American play. Although they are all recognized as "Distinguished New Plays" that's where the similarities end among this diverse group of projects. The Cornerstone Theater Company in Los Angeles will work with Tom Jacobson on a new musical about the "scene and unseen" in the City of West Hollywood, while Washington, DC?s Woolly Mammoth Theater Company is collaborating with playwright Danai Gurira on a play about the current sociopolitical state of Zimbabwe. Another recipient of a Distinguished New Play Development Project grant is Minneapolis's Children's Theatre Company. They are working with Lakota writer Larissa FastHorse to develop an autobiographical piece about FastHorse's journey to a career as a ballerina. Visit the NEA Facebook page to hear what Charisse Gendron of Children's Theatre Company had to say about what inspired the theater to collaborate with FastHorse on this project.