2023 Playmaking Performances at Circle in the Square

We’re back!

I’ll get to who “we” are in just a moment.

The past three years have offered all of us new twists and turns that we may never have expected. I’ll share a bit about my journey at Circle in the Square through the pandemic.

My work at Circle shifted during COVID from mostly teaching arts, arts outreach, and directing to mostly grants along with my regular administrative jobs while schools were closed to visiting artists. Broadway, too, was shut down, as we know. Our Executive Director of 40+ years at Circle retired, and I took on all of the city and state grants that he used to manage. For those of you not familiar with the grant process, each one includes an application and report. You apply for the upcoming year in detail predicting what you expect will happen, and then you document in the report what actually took place, and update the budget numbers previously projected. If I make it sound simple and quick, I’m sparing you some 100+ pages of excruciatingly boring details. Doing grants feels like a non-CPA doing a multi-estate owner’s taxes…year round. But I’m extremely grateful for these city and state funds and support! Each year during COVID, I hoped that we would be coming back to all of our Arts Outreach teaching and performances, and each year I elaborated on what didn’t happen, explaining how everything was mostly still on hold due to mandates. …until this past year.

At the beginning of last summer PS 11’s principal reached out saying they were ready and eager for us to come back in the fall to teach their students Playmaking—a form of Playwriting created by Daniel Judah Sklar. This was incredibly exciting because we at Circle also had mandates dropping and were ready, too!

Outside of COVID each year our work with PS 11 starts with Arts Education for Actors—an annual alumni program that I direct at Circle in the Square, which teaches a new group of our Theatre School graduates how to be teaching artists. You can learn more about our program here: https://circlesquare.org/outreach/

I then have a planning meeting with the PS 11 teachers to organize the residency with all the 3rd-grade classes at their school in Chelsea, Manhattan. I rewrite the Playmaking curricula to cater to the current season, students, and classes…then our playwriting residency begins!

My Arts Ed team and I go to PS 11 every Tuesday and Thursday winter morning.

Daniel Judah Sklar—my friend and colleague who created Playmaking and used to teach half the classes—retired during COVID; so now I teach all the classes, and my alumni team mentors a group of their own kids in each class as the students write their scripts. This gives the kids more 1-on-1 guidance, and offers the alumni hands-on experience in a NYC public school arts residency. I meet with my team every day after classes to discuss and reflect on the work, kids, scripts, and how they feel.

The Playmaking writing process starts on the first day with what’s called a Scribble Scrabble. It’s a blank page, and the budding playwrights scribble without thought for 20 seconds—then pencils down. Similar to a Rorschach test but without analyzing any of the kids’ answers, I ask them to see what they can find in their own scribbles. They choose two of their favorite things that they see, then create character profiles on those two things. The students learn play structure, script format, and how to bring feelings into character dialogue. One of the artistic challenges each playwright faces is incorporating aspects of their character profiles into their script subtly, while creating a story that speaks from their own heart.

After about three months of working with all the 3rd-grade classes, every student finishes their script, and my team and I start rehearsing all the plays at Circle in the Square.

Each class at PS 11 has their own performance at Circle in the Square’s Broadway Theatre. My team of professional actors perform every student’s play. This year, those shows started last Monday, and will continue for two more weeks. Adults acting in plays written from kids’ perspectives invokes its own very special type of joy, depth of feeling, and boundless laughter.

A new challenge I faced this year with the help of PS 11 teachers was accommodating and communicating with multiple ENL Spanish speaking students in three of our classes. 17 of these kids spoke no English, and we spoke no Spanish. We strive to make sure every student creates a play, whether it’s written or drawn in pictures, with character profiles translated. The latter is what happened with these new ENL students. Two talented Spanish speaking actors (also Circle in the Square Theatre School alumni) rehearsed with me. I was so touched by their beautiful translations, knowing that every student will be able to understand their play when it’s performed, that tears came to my eyes when the actors finished the first play in Spanish. It was an emotional moment for me after trying to figure out how it could all work.

I will have an assessment meeting with PS 11 after their performances to celebrate what worked, work on what can improve next school year, and decompress after a season of working together. It always takes a village to serve students in healthy ways and make sure every child is respected, heard, and reached.

I will also have 1-on-1 meetings with my Arts Ed team members to discuss our work together; and celebrate and support them and their future careers.

Teaching arts focuses a lot on community, and how individuals and the whole can gain more tools to thrive together with acceptance, encouragement, healthy artistic expression, honest communication, and support. For those called to this work, it can be a rewarding career that compliments our professional acting gigs.

You would be amazed how talented these actors are! I wish you all could see the performances. Watching each young playwright watch them perform their play on Broadway is priceless, and I can feel my face glued in a surely ridiculous-looking but beyond-grateful ear-to-ear smile.

Circle in the Square and PS 11 have been in collaboration doing this Arts Education for Actors alumni program and Playmaking residency for over 20 years now. I still feel so honored and thrilled to be doing this work. After a few years of COVID hiatus, being back in the classrooms and on Broadway with the kids and my Arts Ed team is deeply fulfilling.

And thankfully, now, I can report in all city and state grants that Playmaking, Arts Education for Actors, Arts Outreach, and Circle in the Square’s live student Broadway performances are back!

Thank you to PS 11 and their PTA, Principal Bender, all the 3rd-grade teachers and students, paras, and translators; Circle in the Square; our Arts Ed team and actors; the DCLA; City Council; and NYSCA!

My next arts outreach performance on Circle’s Broadway stage will be Talent Unlimited High School’s Shakespeare on Broadway—a program I’m in the middle of directing now. That performance will be in May. More to come!

In the meantime, I want to introduce you to our talented Circle in the Square Arts Education for Actors alumni team this year! I’ll post some photos.

For the privacy of the kids, we don’t open PS 11 performances to the general public, or post photos or videos of the students. If you’re a friend or colleague and would like to attend a performance, feel free to drop me a line and I’ll be happy to give you the details and welcome you to a show!

Wishing you all peaceful and adventurous travels on your own paths this spring!

Left to right: Gretchen Schneider, Monica Mendez, Abby Zeets, me, Quinn McKenzie, Carl Bindman

Our Arts Ed actors prepping for a PS 11 performance at Circle in the Square last week. This includes our talented ENL Spanish speaking actors, Christopher Browne Valenzuela and Alex Acosts too! Left to right top row: Gretchen, Quinn, Monica; middle row: Carl, Abby; bottom right row: Chris, Alex

Every morning before anyone arrives, I come to the Theatre to clean, prep the stage, and set the lights. Each morning so far, Quinn—one of our team members and actors—is kind enough to show up extra early to help me. I caught Quinn in the act of so kindly vacuuming the stage here. Thank you, Quinn! It takes a village!

2018/2019 Playmaking Final Performances

It’s this time of year again! We’re in the midst of our final Playmaking PS 11 performances, and all is going well.

Daniel Judah Sklar, who created this form of playwriting (called Playmaking), collaborated with Circle in the Square and Manhattan’s PS 11 (elementary school) 18 years ago, which started this program. I joined this team five years ago.

Each year, 10 Circle in the Square Theatre School alumni are accepted into the Arts Education for Actors program (at Circle in the Square), which includes, among other phases of training to be teaching artists, a five-month paid residency at PS 11. The 10 actors become Residency Assistants (RAs), and mentor students as they write their scripts.

Daniel teaches the first three classes of third-graders in the morning with five of the RAs assisting him, while I teach the last three classes, with five other RAs assisting me. There are six classes altogether. Each class gets its own performance on Broadway, and each child in each class has their own original play performed by the RAs/professional actors. After five months of working and bonding together while the kids write and edit their plays, it’s a deeply fulfilling experience for us all.

Daniel’s and my group had our first performances last week. Both of our 2nd performances were today, and both of our third performances will be on Monday. If you’d like to come to a show, let me know and I can give you details.

Watching the kids react to the actors bringing such meaningful life to their words is thrilling and heartwarming. Playmaking focuses on feelings: the kids’ and their characters’. We consider it a great responsibility to respect these young playwrights, their feelings, and the messages they intend to convey in their plays; so to finally see their joy after a lot of work put into this process means the world to us, and me. We will miss these kids!

I’m filled with gratitude for many things: my (and Daniel’s) responsible, caring, enthusiastic, and talented group of RAs; being on the team at Circle in the Square; my friend Daniel Judah Sklar; the teachers and administration at PS 11; and the students, who brought true feelings and honesty to our work every day.

Here’s a photo of my fabulous team and me taken today at Circle in the Square Theatre.

Left to right, upper row: Sara Lily, me, Bryan Songy, Robin Murray. Lower row: Alex Acosta, Molly Williams

Playmaking 2017-2018

It's that time of year again! This season of Playmaking at PS 11 is coming to a close. I taught my last classes there (until next season), the kids all finished writing their plays, we rehearsed them during the past two weeks, and have started the final performances on the Broadway stage at Circle in the Square. 

Playmaking is a form of playwriting created many years ago by playwright and master teaching artist Daniel Judah Sklar. Daniel, Circle in the Square, and PS 11 have been in collaboration for the past 17 years. I joined the team in 2014, and have been teaching classes at PS 11 as a master teaching artist for the past few years. 

We have a team of 10 Residency Assistants (RAs) who are also professional actors and fellow alumni from Circle in the Square Theatre School. They mentor 3-8 students of their own in each class. This residency is part of a year-long Arts Education training program, which I co-direct at Circle with Executive Director Colin O'Leary.

This year's 3rd graders at PS 11 were delightful. Some were passionate about writing from the beginning, while others struggled at first; but each and every one of them found and expressed their unique creative voice through writing and completing their own play.

Their first day started with a scribble scrabble, which sounds just like what it is: scribbling on a blank page. They do this for 20 seconds, then put pencils down. Similar to a Rorschach test--but without analyzing any of their answers--the kids then choose two of their favorite things that they see in their own scribbles, and create character profiles on them. They also learn about play structure and script format; how to build conflict into climax, then create action and resolution. They write their first imaginative plays, and witness them read by the actors. 

During the next step, we give the kids an artistic challenge, which is to transform their imaginary characters into realistic humans, while still keeping the essence of their original scribble scrabble characters. Their final realistic plays are the ones that are being performed at Circle in the Square this week. 

Not many kids can say that they get their original plays performed by professional actors on Broadway; but every single 3rd grader at PS 11 can. 

I consistently feel rewarded and lucky when I do this work. The kids brighten my days; I'm honored to call Daniel Judah Sklar my friend and colleague, and grateful that he taught me Playmaking years ago, and entrusted me to teach it; I so appreciate the whole talented team of 10 RAs; and I love still being a part of Circle in the Square after so many years (I graduated from the theatre school as a 20-year-old back in 1993).  

If you want to come see the rest of the children's plays at Circle in the Square this week, please drop me a line, and I'll give you the details. It's a rare and enriching experience to see the kids as they witness their own words come to life so beautifully on stage; and it's a delight to see the talented actors do what they do best. It's been an incredible pleasure working with them these past few months. 

Me and my team after the performance today. From left to right: Danielle Amendola, Matthew Boyd, me, Cristina Sebastian, Gretchen Schneider, and Shana Casey. (Photo credit: Colin O'Leary)