In this episode of Playwright's Spotlight, I speak to playwright Jonathan Cook about festivals, submission fees, and dealing with rejection. We also discuss the pathway to playwriting with no formal training and learning from reading bad material. Jonathan shares his experience with getting published and his extensive knowledge in creating and producing audio versions of plays as a podcast. Jonathan supplies a lot of great resources in this episode, all which can be found in the show notes. Be sure to take advantage of it all.
Jonathan Cook is a playwright, actor, and filmmaker based in Georgia. Many of his short plays have been produced in theaters around the world, and most notably, he was a semi-finalist in the 37th annual Samual French Off-Broadway Festival in New York with his post-apocalyptic play LOBSTER MAN. His play INSURGENTS was also a semi-finalist in the 2020 ScreenCraft Stage Play Contest. He is a five-time recipient of the Porter Fleming Literary Award in the playwriting category and some of his works have been published in anthologies by Smith & Kraus. He is also the host and producer of GATHER BY THE GHOSTLIGHT, a collection of plays adapted to an audio only format.
To view the video format of this episode, visit the link below -
https://youtu.be/0MUIOE8QvVI
Links to sites and resources mentioned in this episode -
Short + Sweet Festival -
https://shortandsweet.org
New Play Exchange -
https://newplayexchange.org
Le Chat Noir -
http://www.lcnaugusta.com
Playwright's Binge Blog -
https://groups.io/g/playwrightbinge
NYC Playwrights -
https://www.nycplaywrights.org/
Playwrights Center -
https://www.nycplaywrights.org/
ScreenCraft -
https://screencraft.org/
Pittsburgh New Works Festival -
https://pittsburghnewworks.org/
Smith & Kraus -
https://www.smithandkraus.com/annuals
Gather by the Ghostlight -
https://gatherbytheghostlight.podbean.com
Porter Fleming Literary Competition -
https://www.themorris.org/porter-fleming-literary-competition/
Contact information for Jonathan Cook and Gather by the Ghostlight -
www.jonathanrcook.com
gatherbytheghostlight@gmail.com
Websites and socials for James Elden, Punk Monkey Productions and Playwright's Spotlight
Punk Monkey Productions -
www.punkmonkeyproductions.com
PLAY Noir -
www.playnoir.com
PLAY Noir Anthology –
www.punkmonkeyproductions.com/contact.html
James Elden -
Twitter - @jameseldensauer
IG - @alakardrake
FB - fb.com/jameseldensauer
Punk Monkey Productions and PLAY Noir -
Twitter - @punkmonkeyprods
- @playnoirla
IG - @punkmonkeyprods
- @playnoir_la
FB - fb.com/playnoir
- fb.com/punkmonkeyproductions
Playwright's Spotlight -
Twitter - @wrightlightpod
IG - @playwrights_spotlight
Playwriting services through Los Angeles Collegiate Playwrights Festival
www.losangelescollegiateplaywrightsfestival.com/services.html