A.E. Hotchner Playwriting Festival 2023

For nearly 30 years, the Performing Arts Department has produced the A.E. Hotchner Playwriting Festival as a vehicle to support and develop new plays written by WashU students. The annual Festival begins with a university-wide solicitation of new, unproduced plays. Several plays are selected, through an anonymized screening process, to be developed in a two-week event in September.  During those two weeks, each play will be workshopped with a professional dramaturg, a faculty director and student cast.  The Festival culminates in a public staged reading of each play.  

Guest dramaturg, Mead Hunter, will mentor the writers during the Hotchner Festival workshop in September 2023.

This year’s 2023 Festival is supported by the Office of the Dean of Arts & Sciences as well as a grant from Tim Hotchner.

All Readings will take place in-person in the A.E. Hotchner Studio Theatre.  Admission is free and open to the public.

Friday, September 22 at 7 p.m.

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Lost Cat (a 10-minute Play)
by Bela Marcus
Directed by Sarah Whitney

Saturday, September 23 at 7 p.m.

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Minds at Work
by Maddy Klass
With Direction by William Whitaker

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Now Boarding (a 10-minute Play)
by Charlie Meyers
With Direction by William Whitaker