Tamasha Playwrights: Year 4
Tamasha Playwrights: Year 4
TDA Writers' Group
Deadline: Monday 25 September, 12 noon
Tamasha Developing Artists (TDA) is soliciting applications for the third year of its Tamasha Playwrights group.
Tamasha Playwrights is a writer-led collective founded in October 2014 by Tamasha’s Artistic Director Fin Kennedy and formed of eight playwrights from a diverse range of backgrounds.The group is refreshed with a new cohort every autumn.
The aim of the group is to:
* Be open and responsive to the participants’ interests / needs.
*Invest in the professional skills of a core of writers.
*Equip writers with the skills to sustain a professional freelance career, including initiating, fundraising and managing their own projects.
*Generate seeds of inspiration for developing new ideas as well as group discussion and peer learning.
*Build relationships with writers who can collaborate with the company on TDA projects, including regionally, and responding to inspiration from young people and community groups.
*Provide some showcase opportunities e.g. response work to Tamasha’s core productions, or a dedicated Scratch night.
*Offer some careers advice and 1 to 1 time.
Session content is by request from the participants. Visiting speakers so far have included representatives from the National Theatre, Soho Theatre, Tricycle Theatre and the Royal Court, as well as freelance producers, directors and award-winning playwrights.
Projects previous years’ have initiated include:
Scratch night at Soho Theatre: in which a series of new two-hander short plays were showcased and digitally published.
Tamasha Radio: development of a new online audio drama series for podcast and pitching ideas for BBC Radio commissioning.
The Agency: training as workshop leaders and the founding of an agency of diverse ‘playwrights-for-hire’ to schools and youth groups.
An 8-week Introduction to Playwriting course for a local school.
Projects Year 1 Tamasha Playwrights initiated include:
Intensive workshop and writing week at the Tricycle Theatre including visits from Complicite, Roy Williams, Tanika Gupta, Dawn King and Dennis Kelly.
Diverse audition pieces, working with the National Youth Theatre to develop bespoke monologues for their diverse members to better show their range in auditions.
R and D towards a new writing festival showcase of diverse new plays.
Tamasha Playwrights remains an unfunded pilot, but the first two years have been a successful model of responsive playwright training and a third year group is now being recruited.
The group will meet regularly from early November 2017 and will run for at 9 months. It will be led by Tamasha’s Artistic Director playwright Fin Kennedy, who has taught playwriting at postgraduate level for over ten years.
Additional info:
* This group isn’t aimed at absolute beginners. Applicants will need to have written at least one full length play for the stage, 70 mins+ (though it need not have been produced). Writers with more experience are welcome to apply – though those with established professional careers will not be given priority.
* This group is not about generating new plays for Tamasha to commission and produce in the immediate future. In the interests of managing applicants’ expectations, we would like to stress that Tamasha is a small company which produces 1-2 plays per year. Following the 2014 Arts Council funding round, the company has committed to its professional productions up to 2018.
* Group members will be expected to work towards developing wholly new ideas for the stage, not further developing pre-existing plays. Plays submitted during the application process are writing samples only. Taking part in Tamasha Playwrights does not guarantee your work being showcased.
*Writers who applied unsuccessfully for Years 1 or 2 are welcome to reapply, but we would request that they submit a different (ideally new) full-length writing sample.
* All play submissions are read by at least two readers, at least one of which will be a diverse writer from a previous Tamasha Playwrights cohort. We usually get about 80 submissions, from which we shortlist around 20. From the shortlist 10-12 will be invited to interview with up to 8 writers recruited for the final group.
* Interviews will take place w/c 16th October 2017
Timeline
Tamasha Playwrights remains a pilot project so the precise structure and content will be worked out in collaboration with the group.
Sessions will take place on Tuesday evenings 6.30-8.30pm at Tamasha’s offices at Rich Mix in Shoreditch, East London. The sessions are fully subsidised and offered free of charge. We regret that we cannot pay travel expenses.
We are looking for writers who:
*Have written at least one full length play for the stage, 70 mins+ (though it need not have been produced).
*Are interested in and inspired by the diversity of a globalised world and the multiple narratives of contemporary Britain and beyond.
*Have a genuine desire to further develop their skills and experience in a collaborative environment and to offer constructive peer support to one another.
* Have an interest in learning to self-produce and also learning to run playwriting workshops for young people on Tamasha’s behalf.
How to apply
Deadline: Monday 25 September, 12 noon
Please submit:
*One full length play for the stage (please note that screenplays cannot be considered, though stage plays for young people, stage musicals and radio plays can be).
*A full CV (including writing and work experience + full contact details).
*A covering letter, no more than 1 side of A4, outlining your relevant experience, your reasons for applying and what you hope to gain from taking part.
*Equal Opportunities monitoring form.
Please email Anuja Batra on th your application with subject line 'Tamasha Playwrights’ or call the office on 0207 749 0090 if you have any questions.
All applicants will be contacted after the deadline and those shortlisted will be invited for an informal meeting during week commencing 16 October.