The Fornés Playwriting Method Workshop with Amber Bradshaw

About the Workshop:

The María Irene Fornés playwriting method is an experiential, anti-Aristotelian pedagogy designed to help writers tap into their subconscious to generate unique theatrical work through physical, visual, and communal exercises. Key elements include, but are not limited to, centering movement (yoga/stretching), guided visualization, basic drawing, found materials, and communal, timed writing prompts. The goal is to create together and without limits. Whatever is inside you will emerge.

About Amber Bradshaw:

Amber Bradshaw (she/they) is an Atlanta native, a Southern queer and a fierce believer in the power of live storytelling. She is the Managing Artistic Director of Atlanta’s new play incubator, Working Title Playwrights (WTP). She is a new play dramaturg, director, moderator and dancer/mover with a sole focus in new works and script development. Amber also loves to work as a dance dramaturg. Since 2006, they have worked locally with Actor’s Express, Theater Emory, Kennesaw State University, Synchronicity Theatre, the Center for Puppetry Arts, Out of Hand Theatre, Out Front Theatre, Gathering Wild Dance, Staibdance and Theatrical Outfit. For WTP, Amber dramaturgs for the Ethel Woolson Lab and Ghost Light, moderates regularly for all WTP programs, teaches both a New Play Dramaturgy & Directing Intensive and hosts a podcast about process called TABLEWORK: HOW NEW PLAYS GET MADE. In addition to her playwriting (Embodied, Searching for Jane) they have co-produced and written several original works (A virtual dance piece called Chords Bare, co-choreographed with Nadya Zeitlin; Circa 50 with Gathering Wild; Learning to Fly with the Center for Puppetry Arts and Identified: A Queer Variety Show! with Corian Ellisor). Amber is also becoming a Fornes Playwriting Method teacher and is enjoying sharing Fornes’ innovative and inspiring Method with artists interested in exploring creating through embodiment and community. Amber is a co-founding member of I.D.E.A. ATL (Inclusion, Diversity and Equity in the Arts Atlanta), the collective of artists that brought the Atlanta Theatre Town Hall to the community in 2020. She is a member of the Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas, the 2020 Class of the Arts Leaders of Metro Atlanta (ALMA) and an Affiliate Artist with Theater Emory (2023). She also works as a freelance dramaturg for writers and artists of all kinds. For more about Amber check out www.workingtitleplaywrights.com.

About the María Irene Fornés:

Fornés was born on May 14, 1930, in Havana, Cuba, to Carlos Luis and Carmen Hismenia Fornés. After her father died in 1945, she moved with her mother and sister to the United States, becoming a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1951. From 1954 to 1957, Fornés lived in Paris, studying to become a painter. However, after attending a French production of Samuel Beckett's WAITING FOR GODOT, Fornés decided to devote her creative energies toward playwriting. Upon returning to the United States, she worked for three years as a textile designer in New York City. THE WIDOW, Fornés's first professionally produced play, was staged in 1961. Fornés acted as the director for many of her subsequent works, including THERE! YOU DIED (1963; later retitled TANGO PALACE, 1964), THE SUCCESSFUL LIFE OF 3: A SKIT IN VAUDEVILLE (1965), and MOLLY'S DREAM (1968), among others. In 1973 she founded the New York Theatre Strategy, which was devoted to the production of stylistically innovative theatrical works. Fornés has held teaching and advisory positions at several universities and theatrical festivals, such as the Theatre for the New City, the Padua Hills Festival, and the INTAR (International Arts Relations) program in New York City. She received eight Obie awards — in such categories as distinguished playwriting and direction and best new play — for PROMENADE (1965), THE SUCCESSFUL LIFE OF 3, FEFU AND HER FRIENDS, THE DANUBE (1982), MUD, SARITA (1984), THE CONDUCT OF LIFE, and ABINGDON SQUARE (1987). Fornés received numerous other awards and grants for her oeuvre, including Rockefeller Foundation Grants in 1971 and 1984, a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1972, National Endowments for the Arts grants in 1974, 1984, and 1985, an American Academy and Institute of Letters and Arts Award in Literature in 1986, and a Playwrights U.S.A. Award in 1986. She also produced several original translations and adaptations of such plays as Federico Garcia Lorca's BLOOD WEDDING (1980), Pedro Calderón de la Barca's LIFE IS A DREAM (1981), Virgilio Piñera's COLD AIR (1985), and Anton Chekhov's UNCLE VANYA (1987). She died in New York City on October 30, 2018.

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