Jack-Jack

Playwright
he/him/his

Jonathon Benjamin is a native of Fort Lewis, Washington. He served 5 years, 12 days and 4.5 hours in the US Air Force as an Avionics Technician. He was medically retired from the military in March of 2015 after debilitating injuries from a motor vehicle accident overseas. Not one to shy away from challenge, he applied to The George Washington University while still in out-patient care on Fort Belvoir, Virginia. He graduated, Magna cum Laude, in May 2018 with a major in Theatre and a minor in Creative writing, concentrating on Playwriting. His first play, then, a one-act play, American Airman, was honored in the Kennedy Center’s American College Theatre Festival in January 2018. The play endeavors to help create a forum that broadens the perspective of both the civilian and military communities by presenting the journey of a veteran from injury back into civilian life. This same play was honored at George Washington University with the Clayssens Award for Best Work in Playwriting by an Undergraduate student. Currently, Jonathon has developed American Airman into a full-length play. In May 2019, his play, “One Giant Leap” was produced by the Rainbow Theatre project for the 50th Anniversary of the Stonewall Riots in New York City in 1969. He works at the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts in as an Usher. Working in the Kennedy Center, Jonathon is constantly reminded of the power of the theatre and his responsibility, as a playwright, to tell his truth, providing a glimpse into an imagination borne out of a life of experiences-both thrillingly triumphant and terribly tragic. With undergraduate studies in the past, he is looking forward to writing more plays and honing the craft of playwriting in an MFA program in the near future.