WP Theater


WP Theater is a not-for-profit Off-Broadway theater based in New York City. It is the nation's oldest and largest theater company dedicated to developing, producing and promoting the work of Women+ theater artists of all kinds at every stage in their careers. Lisa McNulty serves as the Producing Artistic Director and Michael Sag serves as the Managing Director.

Background

WP Theater was founded in 1978 by Julia Miles to address the conspicuous under representation of women artists working in the American theater. Miles was producing at The American Place Theatre, an Off-Broadway theater dedicated to produce new work by American writers. Miles began as a Producer and Assistant Director at The American Place Theater in 1964 and advanced in the ranks to Associate Director. During this time, she noted the lack of plays written by women being produced by The American Place Theater in comparison to those written by men- at the time, only 6% of all work onstage was written by a woman. Under a grant from the Ford Foundation, Miles created The Women's Project under the umbrella of The American Place Theater to encourage the development of female playwrights and directors and to provide a forum for their work. For its first nine years, WP Theater staged its productions in the basement of The American Place Theater. In 1987, the project left The American Place Theater and became an independent organization, known today as WP Theater. In 1998, the project bought a church at 424 West 55th Street, also the site of Theater Four, which was named the Julia Miles Theater in 2004.
WP Theater aims to empower artists who have historically been marginalized for their gender or gender expression to reach their full potential. The fundamental components of WP Theater are the Main stage Season, the WP Lab and Pipeline Festival, The Space Program, the Pages to Stages Collaboration with viBe Theater Experience, and the annual Women of Achievement Awards gala.
WP Theater artist alumni include Billie Allen, Anne Bogart, Pearl Cleage, Eve Ensler, María Irene Fornés, Pam MacKinnon, Martyna Majok, Alexis Scheer, Danya Taymor Dominique Morisseau, Lynn Nottage, Joyce Carol Oates, Diane Paulus, Sarah Ruhl, Anna Deavere Smith, and Rebecca Taichman.
Actors who have performed in WP Theater productions include Tony Award winners and nominees Michael Cerveris, Kathleen Chalfant, Colleen Dewhurst, Tammy Grimes, Cherry Jones, Tonya Pinkins, Daphne Rubin-Vega, Thomas Sadoski, and Frances Sternhagen, Academy Award winners and nominees Linda Hunt, Kim Hunter, and Mary McDonnell, and Emmy Award winners and nominees Ruby Dee, America Ferrera, Sarah Jessica Parker, Jimmy Smits, and John Spencer. Other actors who have performed in WP Theater productions include Adrienne C. Moore, Pedro Pascal, Ato Essandoh, Richard Masur, Cristin Milioti, Constance Shulman, and Tracie Thoms.
Alumni of the WP Lab include JoAnne Akalaitis, Tea Alagić, Rachel Chavkin, Quíara Alegria Hudes, and Anne Kauffman. Many Lab alumni have served as artistic directors at other theater companies, including Akalaitis, Emily Mann, Maria Goyanes, Pam MacKinnon and Carey Perloff.
WP Theater founder Julia Miles died on March 18, 2020.

Productions

Since 1978, WP Theater has produced more than 700 Off-Broadway plays and developmental projects and has partnered with a number of other New York theater companies for co-productions, including Playwrights Horizons, the Vineyard Theater, INTAR, and New York Theatre Workshop. Often, WP Theater produces plays that are New York premieres or world premieres. These include Dirty Laundry by Mathilde Dratwa, minor.ity by francisca da silveira, Our Dear Dead Drug Lord by Alexis Scheer, Hurricane Diane by Madeleine George, Bright Half Life written by Tanya Barfield and directed by Leigh Silverman, Stuffed by Lisa Lampanelli, Or, by Liz Duffy Adams, and Virginia Woolf's only play, Freshwater, directed by Anne Bogart.
WP Theater's first production was Choices, a one-woman show that was adapted from the works of Colette, Virginia Woolf, Dorothy Parker, Gertrude Stein, Sylvia Plath, Adrienne Rich, and Joan Didion, among others. It was conceived by writer Patricia Bosworth and adapted by Bosworth, director Caymichael Patten, and actress Lily Lodge. Choices ran from November 30 to December 17, 1978, in the American Place Theater basement. Julia Miles said the production "explores the choices that women have. Hopefully, there are now more of those choices and women are more definite about what they are." After the production opened, Mel Gussow of The New York Times wrote, " Choices serves as a brief introduction to the artistic energy of literary women. Given the variety of versatile people who are engaged in the 'Women's Project', we look forward to the plays, playwrights, and directors that should emerge from the American Place."
In 1981, WP Theater produced Still Life, a documentary-style play about the aftermath of the Vietnam War written and directed by Emily Mann. The production featured Mary McDonnell, Timothy Near, and John Spencer and earned four Obie Awards, including the award for Best Production.
One of WP Theater's most heralded productions is A...My Name is Alice, a revue of songs and sketches conceived and directed by Julianne Boyd and Joan Micklin Silver. The production earned the Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Revue in the 1983/84 season and featured songs and scenes penned by Cassandra Medley, Winnie Holzman, Marta Kauffman, Anne Meara, and others.
WP Theater has worked closely with Cuban-American playwright, María Irene Fornés, since its inception. Fornés, a Pulitzer Prize nominee and nine-time Obie Award winner, is known for her avant-garde and experimental plays. WP Theater has produced three Fornés plays, including Abingdon Square, which earned the 1988 Obie for Best New American Play, and Julia Miles produced eight of Fornes' work in their legendary lifelong collaboration.

Current Staff at WP

Ria Mae Binoaro - Development Manager
Alisha Espinosa - Marketing Director
Kristin Leahey - Bold Associate Artistic Director
Gary Levinson - Production Manager
Lisa McNulty - Producing Artistic Director
Julianna Azevedo Mitchell - Audience and Community Engagement Manager
Ayana Parker Morrison - Co - Facilitator Producer's Lab
Michael Sag - Managing Director
Hannah Sgambellone - Associate Production Manager
Sofia Ubilla - Bold New Play Development Consultant
Michael Valladares - Business and Company Manager
Katherine Wilkinson- Co - Facilitator: Directors Lab

The Lab

The Lab is a two-year residency for Women + playwrights, directors, and producers. Members of the Lab are selected through a highly competitive application and interview process. The Lab provides its members with a vital professional network, entrepreneurial and leadership training, rehearsal space, and opportunities for the development and production of bold new work for the stage.
The Lab began as the Directors Forum, created in 1983. In 1992, WP added the Playwrights Lab. The Producers Lab was added in 2006 to enhance the collaborative nature of the residency.
The Lab has two main goals: to cultivate the work of the participating artists and to give them the tools they need to succeed in the industry. In addition to developing their own unique work, Lab artists collaboratively create a culminating residency production. Since 2016, Lab members' work has been showcased at the biennial Pipeline Festival. For the month-long Pipeline Festival, groups of three—one writer, one director, and one producer—come together to collaborate on a piece.
Prior to 2016, Lab members would devise new work, showcased in a production at the end of the residency term. These productions include The Architecture of Becoming, We Play for the Gods, Global Cooling: The Women Chill, Corporate Carnival, and Girls Just Wanna Have Fund$.
Prior to 2004, the Lab did not function on a two-year rotation.
Under the auspices of WP Theater, the 2008/2010 Lab Playwrights published Out of Time and Place, a two-volume anthology of plays, including contributions from 11 Lab playwrights and an introduction by Theresa Rebeck.
Many Lab artists continue to work together long after their official residency ends, and WP Theater continues to advocate for its Lab alumnae by connecting them with agents, providing references, and submitting their work to theaters around the country. WP Theater also hires many Lab artists for main stage productions, and artistic roles on the staff.

WP Lab alumnae

Lab yearsPlaywrightsDirectorsProducers
2024-2026Jordan Ramirez PuckettKayla AmaniPenzi Hill
2024-2026Deneen Reynolds-KnotBritt BerkeRoshni Lavelle
2024-2026Amy StaatsAlex KeeganSkye Pagon
2024-2026Mukta PhatakMikhaela MahonyLianna Rada-Hung
2024-2026Danielle StaggerSusanna JaramilloMaia Safani
2022-2024Amara Janae BradyJordana De La CruzAlverneq Lindsay
2022-2024Christin Eve CatoOnyekachi IwuEmma Orme
2022-2024Queen EstherJulia Sirna-FrestSami Pyne
2022-2024Amina HenryDina VovsiBarbara Samuels
2022-2024Else WentRan XiaPraycious Wilson-Gay
2020-2022Gethsemane Herron-CowardMiranda HaymonIyvon Edebiri
2020-2022Nambi E. KelleyChika IkeBJ Evans
2020-2022Haruna LeeSophiyaa NayarKristin Leahey
2020-2022Zizi MajidMachel RossAyana Parker Morrison
2020-2022Daaimah MubashshirKatherine WilkinsonCynthia J. Tong
2018-2020Vanessa GarciaVictoria ColladoIlana Becker
2018-2020CQ QuintanaSarah HughesMarie Cisco
2018-2020Bryna TurnerCandis C. JonesLucy Jackson
2018-2020Charly Evon SimpsonRebecca MartinezStephanie Rolland
2018-2020Eboni BoothArpita MukherjeeAlyssa Simmons