2026 New Play Development Conference
PlayPenn, a Philadelphia-based artist-driven organization dedicated to the long-term development of new plays and playwrights, will transform new play development into a laboratory for civic imagination through their 2026 New Play Development Conference: "Democracy in Action” running July 17-August 2 at various venues in Philadelphia and New York City.
PlayPenn’s nationally recognized New Play Development Conference brings together readings of new plays alongside a citywide series of civic gatherings, workshops, artist exchanges, and public conversations focusing on art, democracy, historical memory, belonging, and collective imagination. This community-focused approach to new play development reflects a broader vision of theatre in a shared civic life that illuminates what theatre can do, who participates in it, how it unfolds, and why it matters.
Serving as the centerpiece for the Conference are new plays that ask audiences to reconsider the architecture of freedom, featuring new works by 2026 Creative Capital Awardee Roger Q. Mason (Lavender Men with Skylight Theatre), PlayPenn Foundry alum and Susan Smith Blackburn Prize winner Sarah Mantell (In the Amazon Warehouse Parking Lot with Playwrights Horizons), and newcomer Zoe Palmer.
The 19-event Conference brings together 22 playwrights participating across workshops, conversations, and five new work presentations while expanding its scope to include an interview with Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Eboni Booth (Primary Trust), free playwriting workshops for adults and teens, and a writing workshop for women over 50, and a public conversation examining constitutional history and civic identity. Additional programming includes a community workshop for queer theatre makers; a convening on innovation in theatre-making with leaders from Philadelphia Fringe Festival, Cannonball Festival, Pig Iron Theatre Company, Lemonade Stand, and Tiny Dynamite; and an acting lab focused on approaches to new play development and cross-community exchanges among theatre artists.
