Los Angeles, CA – Moving Arts, based in Atwater Village, is proud to announce that it will develop the 50th full-length play through its innovative MADLab New Play Development program by the fall of 2025. Plays developed through MADLab have gone on to have acclaimed productions at Steppenwolf Theatre Company (Chicago), Milagro Theatre (Portland), Inkwell Theater (Los Angeles), and many other leading regional theatres and college campuses throughout the nation. MADLab playwrights have also gone on to write for television shows such as Watchmen, Man in the High Castle, Vida, and Lawman Bass Reeves, among others. Since its inception in 2011, more than half of MADLab participants have identified as female or non-binary, and more than half identified as persons of color.
“The original idea for MADLab was to provide space and support for playwrights to follow any idea that they found fascinating, and to write a play that they really wanted to write,” said Darin Anthony, Artistic Director and MADLab founder. “We gave no parameters on content or theme, only that it had some connection, however loose or tight, to the city of Los Angeles. Beyond that, the playwrights had 100% control on where the play, and the MADLab process, would take them.”
The mission of Moving Arts’s MADLab is to foster new and producible scripts by creating a unique environment of support and collaboration with professional Los Angeles playwrights, dramaturges, directors, and actors. MADLab is a nine-month, script-focused program that supports the development of new plays from the idea up.
“Beyond providing actors, directors, and other artistic support for these new plays,” said Dana Schwartz, MADLab Program Director, “it’s been vital to our program to also gift writers with access to other resources that they may need; incorporating cold readings, workshops, feedback sessions and evenings with theatre experts which support writers on both the micro and macro level of play creation.
Said former MADLab participant Marlow Wyatt, whose Robbin from the Hood was developed in MADLab in 2019 and will open at The Road Theatre Company this fall, “MADLab was the jumpstart of my professional career as a playwright. The Lab gave me everything I needed as a storyteller including dramaturgy, directors, and professional actors. The environment was nurturing, safe and professional and it was the first time I had been compensated for my work. It set the standard for me as a writing artist. The focus was always about the playwright and still is. To have a work written, conceived, and workshopped within a span of nine months and end with a public reading is an extraordinary feat for any theatre company small or large.”
In addition to the many plays that have been produced and developed by the larger theatre community, Moving Arts has produced many of the plays that came through MADLab, including Terence Anthony’s Burners (developed in 2014, produced in 2018), Cory Hinkle’s Apocalypse Play (developed as This Quintessence Of Dust in 2016, produced in 2018), Howard Ho’s Reset (developed in 2020, produced in 2023), and Leviticus Jelks’s My White Husband (developed in 2023, planned production Spring 2024).
Said Jelks, “MADLab changed the way I thought new play development could happen. It made me excited to write again. Working with the other writers in my cohort to build a play, literally from the ground up, was an experience that not only strengthened my skills in drafting and revising but also collaboration and creative input. The permission to play and open-hearted guidance from Dana Schwartz and Darin Anthony helped me create a script and an experience that I will never forget.”
The 2024 MADLab cohort includes Chris Banda, Tom Jacobson, Vincent X. Kirsch, Kate Mickere, and Nabra Nelson. The 2025 cohort will be selected early next year.
THE MADLAB TEAM
DANA SCHWARTZ is the Program Director of the MADLab New Play Development program at Moving Arts. She is a Los Angeles writer, director, producer and performer. She was a member of the 2023 cohort at Director’s Lab West. Her short play “The Crush” was produced at the Echo Theatre. Her audio play “Hot Mic” was produced by Eclectic Theatre in Chicago. “Presto!” was completed while working with The Workshop Theatre New York and was a 2023 Eugene O’Neill Semi-Finalist. "@Playaz" was a 2019 O'Neill Finalist and had its World Premiere in 2021. "Early Birds" premiered in 2019, and was also presented at the Curtis Theatre. She has written for several productions of the internationally renowned Car Plays, notably at REDcat LA, Disney Hall, Segerstrom Arts and La Jolla Playhouse. She has directed plays across the country, most recently at Theatre of NOTE, The Road Theatre, Topanga Arts Center, and Moving Arts. She has performed around the world. She is a member of Dramatists Guild, The Dramaturgical Society LA, LAFPI, The Kilroys, and Honor Roll.
DARIN ANTHONY is the Artistic Director of Moving Arts in Los Angeles, a company dedicated to the development, production, and promotion of adventurous new works by Los Angeles artists. For Moving Arts he directed: the world premieres of RESET by Howard Ho, @PLAYAZ by Dana Schwartz, Isolation Inn – A Zoom Series, Apple Season by E.M. Lewis, BLISS (or Emily Post is Dead!) by Jami Brandli, Apocalypse Play by Cory Hinkle, the west coast premieres of The Kill-or-Dies by Meghan Brown, Viral by Mac Rogers, The Gun Show by EM Lewis, and numerous Car Plays. Other recent productions: Daniel’s Husband at Dezart Performs (DTL Best Director Award) and Dinner with Friends (DTL Best Director Nomination) at CV Rep, the world premiere of the rhythm and blues musical The Devil You Know for Devilish Productions, and Nureyev’s Eyes at American Stages (FL) and The Bluebarn Theatre (NE).
The award winning theatre company MOVING ARTS is dedicated to the creation, promotion, and production of original works by Los Angeles artists. Founded by Lee Wochner and Julie Briggs in 1992, Moving Arts has produced many world, national, West Coast, and Los Angeles premieres. Moving Arts began as a 22-seat venue in the Silver Lake area and quickly grew to become a resident artist company that includes actors, directors, producers, designers, and playwrights. Since 1992, Moving Arts has continuously produced adventurous new plays in a variety of venues across Los Angeles, ranging from traditional theatres such as [Inside] the Ford in Hollywood and the Los Angeles Theatre Center, downtown to nontraditional spaces such as the Natural History Museum and the parking lot across from Disney Hall, showing remarkable versatility and commitment to the craft of theatre. Many of the new play we have created have gone on to be produced across the country. Once called “The tiny Silver Lake theatre with an enviable reputation,” Moving Arts has now taken up residence in its new home the larger Moving Arts Theatre.