MAGIC IN ROUGH SPACES 2022

NATHAN YUNGERBURG is a Brooklyn-based storyteller and Afrosurrealist who writes for TV, scripted podcasts, and theatre. Nathan is a freelance writer for Sesame Street and head writer for Live from Mount Olympus, a podcast co-directed by Tony award-winner Rachel Chavkin. He also worked as script editor for Cultureverse, a podcast on TRAX by PRX, narrated by Yara Shahidi and Kelly Marie Tran. Nathan’s plays have been developed or featured by The Cherry Lane Theatre, JAG Productions, LAByrinth Theater, The National Black Theatre, Alliance Theatre, The Fire This Time Festival, 48 Hours in Harlem, The Lark, Roundabout Theatre Company, The Playwrights’ Center, American Blues Theater, Crowded Fire Theater, Climate Change Theatre Action, Northern Stage and The Bushwick Starr. He was commissioned by The New Black Fest for HANDS UP: 7 Playwrights, 7 Testaments published by Concord Theatricals, and adapted by BBC radio afternoon drama. Nathan’s play Esai’s Table was featured in The Cherry Lane Theatre’s Mentor Project (Mentored by Stephen Adly Guirgis and directed by Danya Taymor). Highlights: 2021-2024 Playwrights’ Center Core Writer, 2021-2022 Jerome Hill Artist Fellowship, 2021 National Black Theatre of Harlem I AM SOUL residency, Blue Ink Playwriting Award (Finalist), and a 2019 Djerassi Resident Artist. https://www.nathanyungerberg.com/ 

JENNIFER BARCLAY is a Chicago actor-turned-playwright, now living in DC. Her play Ripe Frenzy won the 2016 Smith Prize for Political Theatre from the National New Play Network (NNPN) and a 2018 Dramatists Guild Fund Writers Alliance Grant. Ripe Frenzy was developed at Woolly Mammoth, the 2017 Ojai Playwrights Conference, NNPN/PlayPenn, and had a 2018 NNPN Rolling World Premiere at New Rep in Boston, Synchronicity Theatre in Atlanta and Greenway Court in LA. Her other plays include Hot Little Slice, Housebound, Obscura, Freedom, NY, The Human Capacity, Danny, Red Helen, The Attic Dwellers, Eat It Too, and she is in the midst of developing a trilogy set in the national parks which includes Yellowstone, This Profound Abyss (set in Yosemite) and an untitled play set in Glacier National Park. She is also currently developing a digital interactive, immersive, promenade party-play called Bacchanal. Jennifer’s plays have been produced and developed by Steppenwolf, La Jolla Playhouse, The Old Globe, RedCat, The Kennedy Center, Center Stage, Boulder Ensemble Theatre Co, Andy’s Summer Playhouse, American Blues Theatre, The International Theatre of Vienna and The Edinburgh Fringe, among others. Awards include: Samuel Goldwyn Writing Award, Kennedy Center National Science Playwriting Award, Pinter Review Gold Medal, BETC New Generations Award. Jennifer has been a Fellow at the MacDowell Colony, New Harmony Project, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Hawthornden International Writers Retreat in Scotland. She has been a playwright in residence at South Coast Rep (2009-10 Shank Playwright in Residence), Center Stage (2016 Playwrights Collective) and Arena Stage (2018-19 Playwrights Arena). Jennifer has a degree in Theatre from Northwestern University and an MFA in Playwriting from UC San Diego, where she studied with Naomi Iizuka. She is proud to be an NNPN Affiliated Artist, a member of the Dramatists Guild, and an Associate Professor of Playwriting and Performance at the University of Maryland.

JULIA IZUMI work has been developed and presented at MTC, Clubbed Thumb, New Georges, Bushwick Starr, WP Theater, The COOP, Berkeley Rep’s Ground Floor, SPACE on Ryder Farm, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Ojai Playwrights Conference, Seattle Rep, ArtsWest, Great Plains Theatre Conference, Williamstown Theatre Festival, NPN/Kennedy Center MFA Playwrights’ Workshop, CAATA’s National Asian-American Theatre ConFest, Rorschach Theatre and Pork Filled Productions. Honors for her work include the OPC Dr. Kerry English Award, O’Neill Finalist, Kilroys List Honorable Mention, and KCACTF’s Darrell Ayers Playwriting Award. Current New Dramatists Resident. Current commissions: True Love Productions, MTC/Sloan, Playwrights Horizons. MFA: Brown University www.juliaizumi.com

STEVE YOCKEY is a Los Angeles-based writer with work produced throughout the US, Europe, and Asia. His plays Bellwether, Pluto, Afterlife, Octopus, Large Animal Games, CARTOON, Subculture, Very Still & Hard to See, Blackberry Winter, The Thrush & The Woodpecker, The Fisherman’s Wife, Wolves, Disassembly, and Niagara Falls & Other Plays are published and licensed by Samuel French/Concord Theatricals. Steve holds an MFA from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. He was a Co-Executive Producer on the television series Supernatural and is the Emmy-nominated creator and showrunner of HBO Max’s breakout darkly comedic thriller The Flight Attendant.