Playwriting

Master of Fine Arts in Theatre: Playwriting

Creating Connections

The ultimate artisans of theatre, playwrights remind us where society has been and—more importantly—where it's headed. Our goal at the U of A is to provide M.F.A. playwriting candidates the opportunity to grow and amplify their artistic voice by equipping them with the skills and space to become confident theatrical storytellers and bold dealers in personal truth. Our three-year M.F.A. Program in Playwriting gives time for playwrights to build their portfolio of works for stage and screen, while allowing them space to discover and explore their larger artistic process.

While the priority deadline was February 1st, applications are now being accepted on a rolling basis until all positions are filled.  After March 1st the window to apply for Graduate School Fellowships closes. Our Theatre Department Graduate Assistantships will be available until all positions are filled. If you have any questions, please contact the area head in your specific program of study (Head of Playwriting: John Walch - jswalch@uark.edu).

Please review application process below and submit your application via our application portal.

About the Program

M.F.A. playwrights learn by doing—immersed in a series of rigorous, exploratory workshops that stretch the boundaries of form and imagination. Each workshop invites them to take creative risks, to question, to build, and to reimagine, all while building foundational knowledge in dramatic form and structure.

We strive to create a space where playwrights can listen closely to their own creative pulse—where the process itself becomes a site of discovery. We encourage playwrights to write with courage and conviction, to shape work that is both deeply personal and fiercely engaged with the world around them. Through ongoing workshops. we reach toward a fearless form of expression—one that speaks truth, explores form and conventions, and joins the larger cultural dialogue their work challenges and confronts.

While the priority deadline was February 1st, applications are now being accepted on a rolling basis until all positions are filled.  After March 1st the window to apply for Graduate School Fellowships closes. Our Theatre Department Graduate Assistantships will be available until all positions are filled. If you have any questions, please contact the area head in your specific program of study (Head of Playwriting: John Walch - jswalch@uark.edu).

Applicants are asked to provide the following information and materials:
  • Applicant Information
  • Unofficial Transcript, and college GPA
  • A one- to two-page personal statement addressing the applicant’s reasons for wanting to pursue a M.F.A. in Playwriting at this moment in their development as a writer. The statement should also discuss the applicant’s goals and expectations coming into the program. Applicants are welcome to share other relevant information that might give the selection committee perspective on their application.
  • Three letters of recommendation from theatre professionals, professors, or other people who are familiar with the applicant and/or their work. At least one of the recommendations must speak directly to the applicant’s work.
  • A résumé detailing academic experience, professional work in the theatre, and other relevant work experience.
  • A portfolio of their work that includes two writing samples.
  1. The first work sample should be a full-length play that the applicant feels best reflects their theatrical sensibility and dramatic writing.
  2. The second can be a full-length, a one-act, a work-in-progress, or something in a different genre/medium. Applicants should provide a 15-20 minute excerpt from this piece, plus a one to two paragraph description of the work and their reasons for selecting including it in this application.
The GRE Test is not required for admission to the M.F.A. Program in Playwriting.
>>Submit your application via our application portal.
 
Please Note:
Final admission into the M.F.A. Program in Theatre requires a formal application to the University of Arkansas Graduate School. This step is not necessary until and applicant has been granted admission into the M.F.A. Program. To apply to the Graduate School, applicants will need to provide:
  • Current official transcript (official transcripts must come from a College or University Registrar or similar office)
  • If one’s undergraduate career is incomplete at the time of application, a final official transcript must be sent to the Graduate School before registration begins for one’s second semester.
  • There is a $60.00 application fee for this step of our application process.
  • You should not proceed to Step Two or apply for admission to the UA Graduate School until you receive notification from the M.F.A. Theatre program.

We offer Graduate Assistantships, fellowships, and teaching opportunities.

  • Graduate assistantships are half time (20 hours weekly) and may include teaching opportunities and other departmental duties will be assigned as needed.

Our graduate assistantships pay for all tuition (excluding fees) and give a minimum 9-month $17,325 stipend each academic year.

The Graduate School offers competitive merit-based fellowships to provide additional financial support to outstanding incoming students. These competitive, merit-based fellowships award an additional $4000 each year to select students.  There are other  scholarships for which you might be eligible, as well. Summer assistantships are also sometimes available.

All new graduate assistants must have background checks before they can be appointed.  All offers are contingent on a successful background check, but no work can begin until the check is complete. 

Playwriting M.F.A. candidates may teach introduction courses in Theatre Appreciation, serve as teaching assistants, and serve as readers for the annual Kernodle New Play Award as part of their assistantship duties. Other duties will be assigned as needed.

We offer a comprehensive three-year degree covering all aspects of dramatic writing—from short- and long-form structures, and special topics in adaptation,  television/screenwriting, and writing for the solo-performer. Additional courses in dramatic form and structure unlock  strategies other writers have used in creating work, and develop the dramaturgical skills to articulate how a variety of plays function and create theatrical meaning.  The program is intentionally intimate, only two or three playwrights are accepted, allowing for intensive individualized mentorship, as well as the flexibility to let writers shape their course of study to meet their own creative goals and ambitions.

Black Book
"Black Book" by M.F.A.
Austin Dean Ashford

The theatre faculty shares a philosophy that is deeply collaborative, with cross-disciplinary classes that regularly generate new work – both individual and group-centered. If you pursue an M.F.A. in playwriting at the University of Arkansas, you will join an intimate community of theatre artists who are at once mutually supportive and passionately devoted to craft. Playwrights are also encouraged to take acting, directing and design classes and to diversify their artistic palettes by taking poetry, fiction, and translation workshops offered by the U of A's renowned Creative Writing Program, along with a rich array of related courses in the arts.

Students are given multiple opportunities to practice the process of building a new play from conception to completion, working peer-to-peer with fellow collaborators including: directors, actors, and designers.  This process is repeated throughout the writer’s three-year course of study at varying levels, from concert- and staged-readings through to a full production in their thesis year as a part of the ArkType New Works Festival, presented in our newly renovated theatre @ Global Campus.

As a part of their assistantships, playwrights serve as administrators on the Kernodle New Play Award and are given additional opportunities to serve as dramaturgs on departmental productions. These experiences develop the playwright’s skill-set in Literary Management and—more critically—provide opportunities for deeper investigation into how other writers create theatrical meaning.

While our core focus is on preparing playwrights for a professional career in the field, opportunities can and have been created for playwriting candidates who express an interest in developing the tools and skills to teach. Because of our small size, we are nimble enough to create TA opportunities, in-classroom opportunities, and full classes for those candidates who want to gain teaching experience.

Writing workshops thrive on the creative tension between rigorous attention to dramatic structure and an equally rigorous focus on each writer's unique voice. Our playwriting faculty is led by active playwright, John Walch.  Additionally, the area  is committed to bringing in guest playwrights and "virtual mentors" to give multiple perspectives on student work and further models for creating work.

Guests have included playwrights Leigh Fondakowski and Moises Kauffman from Tectonic Theater Project, Lisa D’Amour, Dael Orlandersmith, Carson Krietzer, Sharon Bridgforth, Mia Chung, Idris Goodwin and Kevin Coval (Hip Hop Theatre), Emily Schwend/Theatre for One, Amy Evans, Sherry Kramer, Sheila Callaghan, and J.T. Rodgers. Guest directors have included Leigh Fondakowski, NJ Aguwana, Dexter Singleton, and Estefani Fadul.

Our students also take ala carte workshops with TheatreSquared visiting playwrights, who have included Tony Meneses, Stephen Karam, Mona Monsour, and Robert Schenkkan.

Our faculty and guest seek to prepare our students for the unknowns of the professional world, by making them confident in the power of their voice, while being capable to articulate their vision, triage critical feedback, and effectively improvise with collaborators.

Guest Workshop with Lisa D'Amour

Guest Playwright Lisa D'Amour works with MFA Playwriting students
As part of their training, playwrights are encouraged to pursue internships with literary departments and/or new play festivals at theatres around the country, including in the Arkansas New Play Festival at TheatreSquared, which the American Theatre Wing recognized as one of the ten most promising emerging theatres in the country. Graduate playwrights also participate in the administration of the nationally listed Kernodle New Play Award.

NEWS

>Read all playwright activity on the UARK Newswire

STUDENT SUCCESS

2025
  • Connor Johnson (’26) publication of The Quite Rule in “Theatre Masters Take 10: vol. 10”. Concord Theatricals. >Read The Play
  • Connor Johnson (’26) Finalist for National Partners of the American Theatre Julie Jensen Playwriting Award: The Last Forest in Brooklyn, Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival.
  • Sarah Loucks (‘23) selected Post MFA Scholar in Playwriting and New Work Creation at Ohio State University.
  • Austin Dean Ashford (‘19) PhD in Performance Studies from Texas Tech and inaugural Artistic Director of Flanner House Arts Stage Academy in Indianapolis. >Read Full Story
  • Aowyn Anderson (undergrad) Region VI Semi Finalist, Gary Garrison Ten Minute Play Award: Eye of the Beholder, Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival.
  • Robin Bruce (MFA in Creative Writing ’25) awarded Susan Kamil Emerging Writers Prize, the BINC Foundation. (2025) >Read Press Release
2024
  • Basil Parnell (’26) Artists 360 Award, Mid-America Arts Alliance. >Read Press Release
  • Connor Johnson (’26) selected for the Take Ten National Ten Minute Play Festival in New York sponsored by Theatre Masters.
  • Sarah Loucks (‘23) MAPFund grant forLandscape Mechanicle.
  • Lauren Ferebee (‘21) invited finalist Austin Film Festival Comedy Teleplay Pilot for
2023
  • Brendan Beseth (‘21) appointed Instructor in Screenwriting at Oberlin College.
  • Jackson Cook (undergrad) finalist Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival in two categories: National One Act Play Finalist:
  • Artists 360 Award, Mid-America Arts Alliance, Sarah Loucks and Adrienne Dawes, (2023)
  • 2023 Individual Artist Fellowships, Arkansas Arts Council for Literary Arts--Theatre, Sarah Loucks and Adrienne Dawes, (2023) >Read Press Release 
  • Award. One & Only,  Fusion Theater 17th annual national playwriting contest: “The Seven”, Emma K. Cleary (undergrad, taught by graduate M.F.A. students) >Read Press Release
2022
  • Award. for Distinguished Achievement, The Kennedy Center Latinx Playwriting Award, Adrienne Dawes
  • Artists 360 Award, Mid-America Arts Alliance, Na’Tosha Devon, Khloud Sawaf, John Walch (2022) >Read Press Release
  • Sewanee Writers’ Conference, Walter E. Dakin Fellowship, Adrienne Dawes.
  • Arizona Actors Academy and Theatre Upstairs Present "Richter" by Megan McEnery, (2022) >Read Press Release
  • Ragdale Foundation, Alice Judson Hayes Fellow, Adrienne Dawes.
  • 2022 Sin Muros: A Borderless Teatro Festival, Stages Rep, Houston, Adrienne Dawes. >Read Interview
  • New Harmony Project residency, Adrienne Dawes,
2021
  • Yale Drama Series Award, Rachel Lynett (2021) >Read Press Release
  • New Harmony Project residency, Lauren Ferebee
  • Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival Planet Earth Arts Playwriting Award for plays addressing environmental and social justice issues, Lauren Ferebee (2021) >Read Press Release
  • Publication: Teen Dad, TRW Plays (UK), Adrienne Dawes (2021) >Read Press Release
  • 2021 Artist 360 Award, Mid-America Arts Alliance, Sarah Loucks (2021) >Read Press Release
  • Television Academy Foundation Internship program, just one of 50 students chosen from across the country, Adrienne Dawes (2021) >Read Press Release
2020
  • Commission/production: Artemisia Theatre, Chicago, IL, Lauren Ferebee,  >Read Press Release
  • Publication: Run. Hide. Fight, "Best New Ten-Minute Plays 2020", Applause Theatre & Cinema Books, Adrienne Dawes, 
  • Los Angeles Times Feature: 40 Black Playwrights On the Theatre Industry’s Insidious Racism, Adrienne Dawes  >Read Article
  • International Centre for Women Playwrights development grant, Adrienne Dawes 
2019
  • New York Times Feature: Summer Residency Playwrights, Adrienne Dawes >Read Article
  • One Beat Columbia Fellow, International, Austin Dean Ashford
  • The Rosa Parks Playwriting Award, Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, Austin Dean Ashford  >Read Press Release
  • Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival (Region VI): Outstanding Production of a New Work, Austin Dean Ashford  >Read Press Release
  • The Kennedy Center Citizen Artist Award, awarded to work that insists that theatrical production is central to urgent community, national and international conversations on campuses of higher education. Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, Austin Dean Ashford  >Read Press Release
  • New Zealand International Fringe Festival: Outstanding Performer, Austin Dean Ashford
2018
  • Certificate for Distinguished Achievement by the Lorraine Hansberry Playwriting Award, Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, Austin Dean Ashford >Read Press Release
  • The Harold and Mimi Steinberg National Student Playwriting Award, second place honors, Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, Austin Dean Ashford >Read Press Release
  • The Hip Hop Theatre Creator Award, second place honors, Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, Austin Dean Ashford  >Read Press Release
  • San Diego International Fringe Festival Best of Fest: Austin Dean Ashford 
  • Best One-Person Show, United Solo Festival, NYC, Austin Dean Ashford >Read Press Release
  • “Best Women’s Stage Monologues", Smith & Kraus, Lauren Ferebee
  • “Best Men’s Stage Monologues”, Smith & Kraus, Lauren Ferebee 
  • The William Inge Theatre Festival and Conference invited writer, Brendan Beseth 

 

Nestled in the beautiful foothills of the Ozark Mountains, Fayetteville and its Northwest Arkansas environs are fast becoming a cultural destination. The Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and The Momentary--a multi-disciplinary space for visual and performing arts, culinary experiences, festivals, and artist residencies--only add to the areas already rich cultural legacy.

  A maturing arts scene and abundant live music, together with the areas natural beauty and congenial urban environment, make for an atmosphere that is the highly conducive to writing.

Sample Plan of Study (subject to change)

Fall Semester

  • Playwriting Workshop: Playwriting Form and Structure
  • Collaboration Strategies
  • Script Analysis
  • Alexander Technique
  • Literary Internship (at TheatreSquared)*
  • Presentation: One-Act or 10 Minute Play


Spring Semester

  • Playwriting Workshop: Adaptation
  • Writing for Television
  • Core Elective
  • Literary Internship (at TheatreSquared)*
  • Presentation: Readings of Full-Length Play

Summer

  • Optional: Internship/Independent Study

*As negotiated and needed

Fall Semester

  • Playwriting Workshop: Playwriting Lineages
  • Interdisciplinary Elective (ie. Experiments in Moving Image)
  • Literary Internship (at TheatreSquared)*
  • Presentation: Workshop/Readings


Spring Semester

  • Playwriting Workshop: Writing Through Resistance
  • Interdisciplinary Elective
  • Literary Internship (at TheatreSquared)*
  • Acting/Directing/Design Elective
  • Devising
  • Presentation: Workshop Productions of Full-Length Play

Summer

  • Apply for Pre-thesis Fellowship

*As negotiated and needed

Fall Semester

  • Playwriting Workshop:  Writing for Solo Performer
  • Writing for Television (can be repeated)
  • Interdisciplinary Elective
  • Thesis
  • Presentation: Production of Thesis Play


Spring Semester

  • Playwriting Workshop: Rewriting Strategies/Portfolio Development
  • Interdisciplinary Elective
  • Thesis
  • Presentation: Production of Thesis Play