Victory Gardens, the Tony Award-winning Chicago theater company famous for its close relationship with playwrights, has announced a new group of affiliated writers: Marisa Carr, Keelay Gipson, Isaac Gómez and Stacey Rose.
The scribes will be considered ensemble members for a three-year term.
“All four are wildly talented playwrights and brilliant minds whose work reflects Victory Gardens’ mission to be a theater for all and a leader in inspiring civic change,” said the theater’s new artistic director Ken-Matt Martin.
Martin also said that each playwright is guaranteed one production of a world-premiere play in a Victory Gardens season, and one reading in the Ignition new play development program, as well as support for any new projects. After three years, the four playwrights will be expected to choose their successors.
For most of its history under artistic director Dennis Zacek, Victory Gardens maintained a much larger and more permanent ensemble of writers, slowly adding names much as Steppenwolf Theatre Company added actors to its acting ensemble. That changed when Chay Yew became artistic director in 2011 and removed most of the longtime writers from active status, adding his own smaller list of names and saying he wished to limit terms. Those scribes left the company in 2020 after Yew’s exit as artistic director; some criticized the trajectory of the theater.
Martin said his new arrangement is designed to ensure the ensemble playwrights “are true partners in charting the artistic course of Victory Gardens Theater.”
The theater’s plans for the fall season and beyond have yet to be announced.
Chris Jones is a Tribune critic.