Young Playwrights' Theater teaches students
to express themselves clearly and creatively
through the art of playwriting.



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The Express Tour

The Express Tour is a traveling production of vibrant new plays. 

Student plays are brought to life by professional actors in an energetic, fully staged performance. The tour inspires creativity and introduces diverse audiences to the voice of a new generation.  

Our company travels to a wide variety of community venues including schools, theaters and hospitals.

Book the tour for your site! Or catch the Express Tour at one of our public showcase performances!

Objective:

The Express Tour shares the work of our young playwrights throughout the community in order to inspire new artists and audiences.

 


2011 Express Tour Showcase

Heroes and Bullies
Which do you choose to be?

FREE 
Monday
November 14, 2011
7:30pm

GALA Hispanic Theatre
3333 14th Street NW
Washington, DC 20010

For more information, call 202-387-9173

 

 

The 2011 Express Tour Plays

 The following plays will be performed in the Fall 2011 Tour.

A Jewel of a Date
     by Dakota Wenberg
     directed by Cecilia Cackley

In A Jewel of a Date by Dakota Wenberg, Supergirl – AKA Liz – must learn to balance her life as a super hero with her life as a regular teenage girl. When YPT came into Dakota’s 8th grade classroom at Swanson Middle School, she had never written a play before, but as she started working on it, she discovered how much she loved writing. She says, “If you’re meandering around your house and you have an idea, write it down somewhere, even if you think it may be stupid. Who knows? It might be a really good idea – so good you might get it performed, like mine.” 

 

 

 

 

Flatworm’s Courageous Act
     by Lauren White
     directed by Ryan Maxwell

Flatworm’s Courageous Act by Lauren White is the tale of an unusual super hero: Flatworm. Flatworm’s one and only weakness is his fear of peanut butter. Lauren wrote this play when YPT came to her 4th grade class at Lafayette Elementary School last year. Lauren hopes you will enjoy Flatworm’s Courageous Act, and that you will learn that you can do anything if you put your mind to it. 

 

 

Kelly’s Big Performance
     by Nneamaka Iwobi
     directed by David Snider

In Kelly’s Big Performance by Nneamaka Iwobi, Kelly must out-sing (the much more popular) Cairo in order to prove herself. Nneamaka wrote this play when she was in the 4th grade at Watkins Elementary School. She hopes that the audiences who see her play will have a good time, learn from the characters, and be inspired. In the future, she dreams her plays will be made into major movies.  

 

These three plays are woven together with short scenes on bullying by students at Kelly Miller Middle School, and original spoken word poetry written by Reyna Rios.

Book the Tour!

 

Our company travels to a wide variety of community venues including schools, theaters and hospitals.

 

 

Single or back-to-back performances are available, with workshops on playwriting, acting or directing available upon request.

 

Call 202-387-9173 or write to lharbison@yptdc.org to book the tour to visit your site this fall!

The Good Neighbor
YPT Collaborates with Fannie Mae to Premiere Community Play on Homelessness

Update: On June 24, 2011, YPT was excited to launch the new playwriting curriculum we created with Fannie Mae in the Fall of 2010. Beginning this summer, this innovative, interactive writing curriculum is being used in classrooms throughout the nation in conjunction with Fannie Mae’s annual Help the Homeless campaign, raising awareness and involving the community in solving the issue of homelessness.
 
Young Playwrights’ Theater (YPT) is excited to announce a new partnership with Fannie Mae’s Help the Homeless Program.  With the help of Fannie Mae, YPT has created a community play in hopes of raising public awareness to support organizations working to prevent and end homelessness in the Washington DC metropolitan area.  

Continue...
Express Tour Plays Deepen Experience of Current Events

Perhaps you joined the multitudes on the National Mall for the Easter concert marking the anniversary of Marian Anderson’s historic performance on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. 

Or you may have read about it in the Washington Post.
 
Maybe you’re following Kojo Nnamdi’s series on WAMU 88.5 about DC’s Juvenile Justice system or you read the recent article in the Washington Post Magazine about reforms at Oak Hill Juvenile Detention Center.
 
 
 
Here at YPT we are following the news too, and working with students throughout the Washington area to deepen their understanding of current and historical events by dramatizing them in new ways, and giving voice to youth perspectives.
 
If these are stories that have resonated with you, we invite you to join us for next week’s Express Tour Showcase, where we will perform My Dream, Marian’s Dream and Choosing Change.
 
Photos from Washington Post.
Past Express Tours

Looking for information about the Express Tour from 2007 to 2010?  Click here.

Looking for Tours from 2006 and before? Click here.