r/playwriting

Excluding works by Shakespeare, what do you think are the 5 best plays ever written? I am looking for good plays to study but I am not interested in the Bard.

Am I the only one who uses music to help figure out scenes? I am mainly talking about scriptwriting for stage or screen but even for chapters for books (which I also write fortunately and unfortunatel) it helps me stay with what the emotional part of the scene needs to look like. Even if it’s just one song that I know that captures what I need for the scene/chapter

I have spent the past year writing a novel which I am currently querying with agents with zero success. I felt I wanted a break from my novel and its follow ups and the endless round of query letters and rejections and write something else. This idea of a one act play came to me which quickly developed into a two act play. It turned out pretty good I think. I have no links to actors or theatres or amateur groups so I went on the internet and found that it is even more impossible to get a play published than a novel. Agents wont take plays.

Lucky me, I can have the thrill of being rejected by theatres as well as literary agents.

I found one place that took unsolicited scripts and I sent it to The Royal Court. After 7 weeks they came back to me with a form rejection. No feedback, of course. I am sure my play needs work, it needs workshopping, it needs someone other than me to read it. They said they were open to do that with plays with potential. Clearly they thought mine didn't have any - or they have so many I was lost in the shuffle. It is probably too short. It is probably too old fashioned. I may be delusional, and the play is not worth staging, but I enjoyed writing it and now I just do not know what to do with it.

I was not sure what the policy is on this reddit about sharing my work so I haven't posted it. I am based in the UK and opportunities do not appear to be there unless you are a student or fit into some minority category, because they want to hear fresh voices. I haven't been a fresh voice for decades. I cannot find anywhere else to send it. I am not looking for money or fame, I would just like to see actors read my words and hear an audience laugh at my script.

What do I do?

Hi guys,

Apologies if this has been asked before, but I am having issues with Final Draft 13.

1. How do you change the font of the page numbers? Even though I'm using the Dramatists Guild Modern Stageplay template in Times New Roman, the page numbers are still in Courier.
2. Is there any way to adjust the pagination to read as (Act #) - (Scene #) - (Page #) i.e. like 1-3-22 ?

Any help would be appreciated! Thank you!

UPDATE: Silly me. I was in the wrong template, so that's why the page number font was Courier. Now, I just need help with question 2. Is there any way to customize the pagination in this way?

So, writing a stageplay for my high school this year. I have the plot and everything fully mapped in my mind, so there's no issue with writing itself.

The thing with this play is it's never about who did it, but about how the innocents are going to get out. It's very obvious who the killer is from the beginning to the audience, but the characters don't know, and the play is about them finding that out.

For context, it's a 1920s noir taking place in a Chicago mansion, heavily inspired by the social game Mafia, even named after it, and draws from Agatha Christie's "And Then There Were None".

Please let me know if I should somehow make it a whodunit instead? I'm not sure if it's going to be engaging enough as is and would like an expert opinion, or at least an opinion more expert than mine. I'm more experienced with writing poems and novels.

Thanks.

So, I wrote a 10-minute play a while back for one of those themed festivals. It was accepted. Yay! But, so what? What do I do with this play now? It's only 10 minutes long. Do any publishers accept 10-minute plays? Would I have to write enough plays and package it as an anthology of short works for something like this to get published?

I suppose I haven't ever truly finished a play I'm absolutely proud of, but I've committed myself to a one-act of vignettes. My only question is, what do I do with it when it's done? I know there's theater festivals where pieces like mine can be performed, but do I have to physically be at the festival? or are there festivals I can simply submit my script and see someone else direct it? I've been writing for a long time now, and I'm working on a side project monolog book (which should be much easier to publish), but I'm to the point I want my work to be more than an "exercise" or a file in my computer. What's the next step?

Hey folks! I love doing my research when writing a piece and am looking for (as the title says) plays that are both real time (one continuous scene) and have a literal ticking clock (i.e. "It is 7:00pm now, xyz is going to happen at 8:00pm" energy).

I'm usually quite well versed in my plays, but I'm struggling to find something of this sort. The closest I've found in my google searches/my own mind grapes has been "Mercury Fur" (not literal ticking clock, but a ticking clock nontheless for when the Party Guest arrives).

Film wise, I'm currently watching "Saturday Night" which fits the bill, but would love to read a play that does the same thing!

Thanks all! :)

Heyoooo

So I’ve been using readmyplay for feedback, and overall I think it’s a great resource.

But my last feedback tore me APART for my formatting.

I know the most popular format looks like:

(Centered) CHARACTER NAME
(Centered) THEIR LINE

but I prefer:

(Left) Character name: Their line

Are both formats valid? Or is there some kind of unspoken rule about it?

I've been reading Playwriting by Stephen Jeffreys, which contained (among lots of other excellent information) the following:

>Caryl Churchill introduced the standard typography for interrupted dialogue in plays. She uses a ‘/’ – the ‘Churchill slash’ – to indicate when a line of dialogue should be interrupted by the next line.

On the one hand, it sound very useful as a tool for writing dialogue. On the other, I've never seen a Churchill slash in any of the plays I've read (which, yes, is a smaller number than I'd like it to be). I'm not self-taught per se but there's still a lot I need to learn about standard conventions in the playwriting world. Can I expect people to understand what it means, or would they sooner assume that the "/" is a typo?

(i hope this is the right place to ask my questions, and if not I would gladly take guidance to places that can better answer my questions.)

So I am writing a play for my senior year graduation, but I am stuck in a few places. First, I'm not entirely sure what genre or setting the story will be set in. That is my main problem. And it would seem easy but our budget for this play is essentially little to none. I meant to say My budget, since I wanted to write and direct all aspects of this play, so most if not all money comes from me.

I have big ideas but they all require a lot of visuals and props to contribute to conveying such story, so with this lack of a budget I am stuck and at a loss of what I want this story to be and where I want it to go. And I don't really think I could change many of these ideas to fit my budget lol...

Lastly, I have never wrote a full play before, let alone doing all the props, costumes, etc. I know this will probably be a big task for me and anything but easy for me (especially since I don't know much, except really how to write an actual story), but I was hoping to learn along the way.

(And here's a few relevant questions I have revolving around storywriting as a whole and my specific and current problems/roadblocks:)

Essentially my main question here is this: Does anyone know of any settings, plots, and/or genres that is possible with a small budget?

Also, is there any sources or things you would recommend to help make any part of this process (from writing to creating props) a little easier?

What would you recommend to help me make my own ideas so I don't have to continually and constantly rely on others for ideas?

Lastly, I am of course still very open to what this story could be. However, what I do have written so far are themes I want to implement and a couple other very broad and open ideas that could fit in any story.

Thanks for reading, and I greatly appreciate any help or guidance.

I don't really know what I want from anyone by saying this, but I'm really on a roll lately! I wrote two-act Arthurian drama in verse, and a farce, and they're both still a little rough around the edges but I'm really quite proud of both!

So I recently bought a laptop so I could get back into playwriting, but I’m having trouble motivating myself to write any plays. I’m unsure why as I really wanted to get back into it and I would talk about a laptop nonstop. I just can’t seem to motivate myself to write any plays!!

I have tried to put on a tv show in the background to help but I got distracted, I thought it would help as I don’t like complete silence.

I also struggle with motivating myself as I can be negative my thoughts of not being good enough to be a playwright or that my plays suck or that I don’t write the way a playwright should.

I’m not sure if I’m making sense, but I thought I’d come here to see if anyone could offer some advice

Anyone heard back about interviews for Cherry Lane Playwrights Collective yet?

Gonna post this to r/musicalwriting as well for double feedback.

So, I’m currently writing this play that I’m hoping that when I get the first few drafts of completed I could find some people who could collab with me on composing and turning this into a musical. (As I’d mostly be working on the book and lyrics haha, I’m not too good with scorewriting…)

Basically it’s a retelling of Hänsel and Gretel wherein they’re two sixteen year old fraternal twins living in fairytale Germany (The era of aesthetics is vaguely 18th century albeit with some hints of 19th century romanticism, specifically with Hänsel.) Living in the aftermath of a great earthquake that caused a famine. And, we open on their parents’ SECOND attempt to abandon them.

Basically the general rigamarole of the original story, they get abandoned, they get to the candy house…

And due to all this pent-up stress over the last few months, they argue. Outside the house.

And before they know it, the resident of the home, the Witch sees them both outside quarreling, and breaks up the fight. By kidnapping Hänsel and saving him to eat for later and placing a displacement spell on Gretel that sends her far far away from their forest.

So basically, we have two versions of the second act.

Version A. Which is Gretel’s Route, and from her POV it showcases her journey back to the Witch’s house to save Hänsel.

and

Version B. Hänsel’s Route, which showcases all the bullshit that he has persevering through in this damn house, and also him finding out that, he sure isn’t her first victim.

So yeah, that’s basically the main elevator pitch I have for this show, anymore and I’ll start getting into detail about the characters and finer details which I will save for my Tumblr blog when I get a bit more progress in on the draft.

I will add on as one more final addendum that for the musical style of this show, I was hoping for it to be a mix of Into the Woods (Which, I feel like is a given at this point lol) and 2008’s Frankenstein: A New Musical, because, this does take after the 18th century after all.

Oh, and I should add, that the act structure works like this.

ACT ONE: SHARED

ACT TWO VER A: Happens on alternating performance nights.

ACT TWO VER B: Happens on alternating performance nights.

ACT THREE: SHARED

Anyway, that’s all, I’d love to hear your guys’ feedback!

Hi everyone,

I've been learning Playwright with TypeScript over the past few months, and instead of just following tutorials, I built my own UI automation framework from scratch.

So far my framework includes:

Page Object Model

Fixtures

Data-driven testing

Environment configuration (.env)

Screenshots, videos and traces

Reporting

Parallel execution

The framework is working well, but I feel like I've reached the point where tutorials and courses aren't teaching me anything new.

What I really want now is practical, industry-level experience.

I'm not looking for another course. Instead, I want to build something that exposes me to real-world automation challenges such as:

Complex user workflows

Multi-page business processes

Dynamic UI handling

Network mocking

Authentication/session management

File uploads/downloads

API + UI integration

Advanced Playwright features used in production

Can anyone recommend:

A website or open-source application that's complex enough to automate?

A project idea that resembles what SDETs automate in real companies?

How you personally moved from "knowing Playwright" to writing automation that's production-ready?

I'm willing to spend the next 2–3 months building a serious portfolio project, so I'd really appreciate suggestions from people working as SDETs or QA Automation Engineers.

i wrote a short play for a short play festival. the draft came up to about four pages but there are considerable moments where there is silence or just someone doing something, that being said do you think the 1 page = 1 minute thing still works here for determining how long it'd be or should i use something else to get a more accurate estimate (key word: estimate) of how long it'd be? our max time is 20 minutes. I def don't plan on having a 20 minute show but I thought'd be more than 4 or 5 minutes long

Have strong opinions about the greatest R&B records ever made? Do you believe there are artists whose stories deserve a whole new generation of fans? Then we should probably talk.

I'm seeking a playwright/librettist to help develop a new musical inspired by the life, music, and legacy of Teena Marie—the soulful, genre-defying powerhouse known as "The Vanilla Child." This project aims to celebrate an artist whose impact on R&B, soul, funk, and popular music deserves a spotlight bright enough for the folks in the back who somehow still don't know**.**

Someone who:

• Loves musical theatre and great storytelling
• Has a deep appreciation for R&B, soul, funk, and music history
• Can build compelling characters and emotional journeys
• Knows how to blend fact, feeling, and theatrical magic
• Wants to collaborate and create something meaningful from the ground up
• Gets excited by the idea of introducing Teena's brilliance to a new audience

This is an early-stage musical development process. We're exploring the triumphs, challenges, artistry, and legacy of a woman who carved her own lane and left an undeniable mark on music.

Vibe: Think less "history lesson" and more "let me tell you about the icon you've been sleeping on."

Interested? Reply and I'll message you contact info to talk more! :D