PlayPenn, Philadelphia’s professional new play development organization, will hold its third annual New Play Development Conference from July 9-July 22 at the Adrienne Theater (2030 Sansom Street) in Philadelphia. The Conference will feature two weeks of intensive work on six works-in-progress by Andrew Case (The Rant), Russell Davis (The Day of the Picnic), Christina Ham (After Adam), Sean Christopher Lewis (Militant Language), Jennifer Maisel (There or Here) and Aaron Posner (My Name is Asher Lev).

The chosen playwrights will bring their works-in-progress to Philadelphia for two weeks of intensive work with a professional director of their choice, dramaturgical assistance and professional actors from the Philadelphia theatre community. Playwrights will rehearse for 29 hours with a team of artists devoted to the progress of their work, culminating in public staged readings between July 19 and July 22.

Russell Davis has been a resident playwright at People’s Light & Theatre, which has produced several of his works, as has Long Wharf Theatre, Yale Repertory, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Mark Taper's New Work Festival, Sundance Playwrights Lab., National Playwrights Conference, and New Harmony Project. He has received fellowships and grants from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, National Endowment for the Arts, New York Founda­tion for the Arts, McKnight Foundation, New York State Council on the Arts, and the Tennessee Arts Commission. His stage adaptation of Avi's Crispin: The Cross of Lead, the Newbery Medal winner for children's literature in 2003, is scheduled for production at People's Light in 2007-08.

Christina Ham’s plays have been produced and developed with Mark Taper Forum, The Guthrie Theater,The Goodman Theater, Arielle Tepper’s Summer Play Festival, Tokyo International Arts Festival, SteppingStone Theatre, and A.S.K. Theater Projects. Christina is the recipient of a 2005-06 Jerome Fellowship and 2007-08 McKnight Advancement Grant from The Playwrights’ Center in Minneapolis, a 2005 Marianne Murphy Women & Philanthropy Award in Playwriting from UCLA’s School of Theatre, Film, and Television, and a 2006 MacDowell Colony residency. She has been commissioned by The Guthrie Theater, Ensemble Studio Theatre/Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and The Stepping Stone Theater.

Andrew Case’s plays include Pacific, Bullhead City, Historic Times, The Electric Century, Universal Grammar, In Loco Parentis, and others. His writing has been produced at Steppenwolf , the 78th Street Theatre Lab, the Salon for the Lincoln Center Directors Lab, Theatre AUM, the Fifth Night Series at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, and elsewhere. His work has been developed at the Manhattan Theatre Club, the Atlantic Theatre, Primary Stages, and the Eugene O’Neill Theatre Center. He is a member of the New American Writers Group at Primary Stages and a former Manhattan Theatre Club playwriting fellow, and was awarded the Samuel Goldwyn Award for screenwriting while he was an MFA student at UC San Diego.

Sean Christopher Lewis is the Artistic Director of Working Group, a touring company based in New York and will serve as the 2007-2008 Emerging Playwright-in-Residence at InterAct Theatre Company. His plays have been performed at Orlando Shakespeare Festival’s PlayFest, Berkshire Theatre Festival, Saratoga Shakespeare Company, Riverside Theater, National New Play Network's University Workshop, Iowa New Play Festival, and NYU HotInk Festival.

Jennifer Maisel received both the Charlotte Woolard award for Extraordinary New Voice in American Theatre and the Fund for New American Plays award from the Kennedy Center for The Last Seder, which was produced by Chicago's Organic Theater and Theatre J in Washington, DC. Her Goody Fucking Two Shoes, a Heideman Award finalist, was produced in the 29th Humana Festival at Actors Theatre of Louisville. Her work has also South Coast Repertory’s California Playwrights competition, the Center Theatre International Playwrights Competition, the Roger L. Stevens Award from the Fund for New American Plays and finalist status for the PEN West Literary Award and the Abingdon Theatre’s Christopher Brian Wolk Award. Her most recent play, Birds, won the 2006 Women Working With Women Collaboration Award from the NY Coalition of Women in the Arts and Media and will be produced by Rorschach Theatre in Washington, D.C. in July.

Aaron Posner is currently the Artistic Director of Two River Theater Company in Red Bank, New Jersey, as well as the Co-Founder and former Artistic Director of Philadelphia’s Arden Theatre. His recent adaptation, Mark Twain’s A Murder, A Mystery & A Marriage was nominated for 10 Barrymore Awards and the Charles MacArthur Award for Best New Play. His adaptation of Chaim Potok’s The Chosen has been performed across the country, and won a Barrymore Award for Outstanding New Play.

Conference writers were chosen from a field of over 150 playwright submissions. The six conference playwrights were culled from a group of twelve semi-finalists, also including Carson Kreitzer (Enchantment), Sean Cunningham (The People’s Pimple), Lisa D’Amour (In The Thick), Gino Dilorio (Sandbox), and Philadelphia playwrights, Seth Rozin (Black Gold), and Nicholas Wardigo (Chessboard Heroes).

PlayPenn’s mission is to support the development of the written word and those who use it to create new plays for the American theatre. PlayPenn service to the American theatre is made possible through the generous support of the Phoebe W. Haas Charitable Trusts A and B.