2024

An Oxford Man — Pacific Playwrights Festival

Else Went’s play An Oxford Man (directed by Emma) will be presented as part of the Pacific Playwrights Festival at South Coast Rep, May 5th 2024

Featuring: Bill Brochtrup, Shelley Fort, Theo Germaine, Alexia Jasmene, Ram Kanneganti, Ames O’Connor, Puppett, Else Went, and Zoe Yale

Twelfth Night

Project week at Mercury Store; March 25-29

Workshop exploration of Twelfth Night, featuring: Zoë Geltman, Che Kabia, Frankie Placidi, Austin Purnell, and Amy Webb

I Am The Most Beautiful Bird

by Else Went
Directed by Emma Rosa Went

Workshop exploration with Breaking the Binary Theatre, at Playwrights Horizons
Feb 5-7, presented on Feb 7th

Featuring: Esco Jouléy, Felix Teich, Juan Arturo, Layla Koshnoudi, Liat Graf, & T Mitsock — dramaturgy by Harrison Densmore

2023

Two Noble Kinsmen

Public Shakespeare Initiative Workshop
July 24-28

Emma’s work on Two Noble Kinsmen is supported by a Tent Pole Commission from Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival

Featuring: Amara James Aja, Barzin Akhavan, Raquel Chavez, Zoë Goslin, Tyrone Mitchell Henderson, Danny Holme, & Merritt Janson

Music by Ray Duncan
Dramaturgy by Isabel Smith-Bernstein & Julie Crawford

Coach Coach

by Bailey Williams
Directed by Emma Rosa Went

A reading in the “Do More” series at BEDLAM

May 25th, 4 PM

Featuring: Jackie Abbott, Merritt Janson, Layla Khoshnoudi, Denise Manning, Constance Schulman, & Esther Williamson

Initiative

by Else Went
Directed by Emma Rosa Went

A reading of ‘Initiative’ in the Spotlight Series; the culmination of Else’s time in the Public Theater’s Emerging Writers Group

May 8th at 6 PM, & May 9th at 2 PM

Featuring: Olivia Rose Barresi, Gregory Cuellar, Harrison Densmore, Carson Scott Higgins, Andrea Lopez, Jamie Sanders, Christopher Dylan White, & Tallie Medel

Between first loves and first betrayals, the SAT and D&D, house parties and homecomings, it's a wonder any of us survive high school. Initiative is an epic microcosm, charting the fatefully intertwined lives of seven teens as they struggle to grow up in and get out of Coastal Podunk, California, at the dawn of the new millennium.

Degenerates

by Else Went
Directed by Emma Rosa Went

An ‘Out Loud’ reading at Ars Nova
Friday April 21st, at 3 PM

Featuring: Zachary Desmond, Christopher Dylan White, Tyler Nowell Felix, Juan Arturo, & Olivia Rose Barresi

The boys are not doing so hot. In an obscure corner of the internet, they form a community on the bedrock of their shared and infinite miseries, offering each other proofs that the game is rigged against men, it was over before it began, there is no love in the world for them, better just to lay down and rot. When an unexpected relationship shakes the foundations of their miserable fraternity, the consequences of their fatalism are revealed.

Kit Marlowe

by David Grimm
Directed by Emma Rosa Went

A Red Bull 'Revelation Reading,’ at TFANA
April 3rd; 7:30 PM

Featuring: b, Tina Benko, Helen Cespedes, Mo Gooding-Silverwood, Amy Jo Jackson, Merritt Janson, Rami Margron, Yasmin Pascall, Sushma Saha, Han Van Sciver, & Ching Valdes-Aran

Set in the seedy underworld of Elizabethan England, the story of the meteoric rise and fall of Christopher Marlowe – playwright, poet, spy, and sexual outlaw – charts the ambitions of youth in a cold and unforgiving world. Performed by an all women and non-binary company, director Emma Rosa Went seeks to reinvigorate the play's radical and provocative landscape, by giving a new generation of queer artists access to its explosive and urgent questions about art, love, depravity, redemption, and the cost of genius.

An Oxford Man

MTC’s Ted Snowden Reading Series — 4 PM, Monday March 27th

By Else Went, directed by Emma Rosa Went

Featuring: Han Van Sciver, Hari Nef, Zoë Goslin, Amy Jo Jackson, Rami Margron, Erin Noll, Sam Gonzales, Tyrone Mitchell Henderson, & Olivia Rose Barresi

Join us, dear audience, for a buoyant and raucous mythologization of the life and times of the first "modern" transgender man, Laurence Michael Dillon. Commissioned by MTC through the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, An Oxford Man is a witty, surprising, and tender theatrical rollick.

Broadway World

Romeo & Juliet

HVSF Spring Touring Production
Directed by Emma Rosa Went

Featuring: Nettie Chickering, Liam Gerard, Tania Kass, Ty Lane, Naiya McCalla, Sophia Metcalf, Reagan Tankersley

With: Music by Ray Duncan, Set by Ant Ma, Costumes by Charlotte Palmer Lane, Movement by Kelsey Burns, Fights by Dan Renkin

2022

Degenerates

An internal reading on Nov 21st of Degenerates by Else Went, through ‘Mondays @3’ at NYTW — featuring Zachary Desmond, Christopher Dylan White, Tyler Nowell Felix, Joshua de Jesus, and Olivia Rose Barresi

Romeo & Juliet Tour, HVSF

Hudson Valley Shakespeare’s 2023 Full Season Announcement

The Changeling

Emma opened Mercury Store’s third season with a project focused on exploding The Changeling and creating a radical adaptation in three dimensions with Else Went and the Mercury company (September 26-30)

An Oxford Man

An internal workshop of An Oxford Man by Else Went at MTC, commissioned through the Sloan Initiative and presented on August 16th

All’s Well That Ends Well

A three-day workshop at Scranton Shakespeare, performed July 21st

Emma returned to SSF to examine All’s Well and present a ‘staged-reading’ for one night only, lighting designed by Jon Biller, choreography by Kristen Brooks Sandler

Much Ado About Nothing

At Opera House Arts, in Stonington ME— June 29th-July 17th

“Wonderfully vital, energetic, and beautifully produced” — BOSTON ARTS DIARY

‘The boys are back from fighting, and now the 'merry war' begins. When Don Pedro and his soldiers return to Leonato's house, old sparring-partners Beatrice and Benedick are reunited and the party can finally start. While friends and family scheme to bring them closer to the altar, another plot is being laid that will test the community, and rewrite what old friends think they know about each other. This outdoor performance includes live music by folk composer Ray Duncan.’

Hunter MFA Playwrights Festival

HARD PLACES, by Garrett Zuercher

A Staged-Reading, May 10th

Featuring: Jackson Torii Bart, Stewart Caswell, James Caverly, Kimberley Hale, Jory Murphy, and Chris Ogren

Stage Managed by Miriam Rochford

2021

HVSF Community Bake-Off

Nov 13th — 7 PM, Nov 14th— 5 PM

INFO & TICKETS

Created by the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Paula Vogel, the Bake-Off is a community playwriting event in which participants are given a list of “ingredients” surrounding a theme to incorporate into their play to inspire creativity. The theme for HVSF’s 2021 Online Bake-Off is Sustainability.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

The Inaugural Season of the Connecticut Shakespeare Festival

Midsummer: July 7-17

‘Magic blows into town as a Duke and a Duchess prepare for their wedding day, some amateur actors rehearse a play for the party, and four young lovers run into the woods – where a kingdom of fairies emerges to enchant, transform, and entangle us in their dreams. Shakespeare's A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM – one of the most enduringly popular plays of all time – is a wild and whimsical celebration of love, nature, and the magic of theatre itself.’

Broadway World

Gallathea

A digital reading of Gallathea, written by John Lyly and directed by Emma, at Red Bull Theater (co-produced by the Drama League) on March 15th, 2021 — Get info HERE

First performed in 1588, John Lyly's Gallathea is a queer love story set inside the landscape of classical myth. In order to avoid becoming dinner for a sea monster, Gallathea and Phillida are sent into the forest dressed as boys. Meanwhile, three shipwrecked brothers set out to seek their fortunes, Cupid stirs up his usual trouble, nymphs fall for mortals, and Neptune–God of the Sea–waits to make his move. This playful pastoral of love, desire, and finding yourself is an affirmation of identity–joyfully reclaimed for 2021.

Featuring: Olivia Rose Barresi, Helen Cespedes, Nathaniel P. Claridad, Yonatan Gebeyehu, Amy Jo Jackson, Layla Khoshnoudi, Rami Margron, Christopher Michael McFarland, Jason O’Connell, Aneesh Sheth, David Ryan Smith, and Zo Tipp.

Talking Direction: Podcast

Emma is in conversation here with Gabriel Stelian-Shanks (Artistic Director of the Drama League) on making classical theatre now, and many other topics! LISTEN HERE

Tabling: The Podcast

Emma had the honor of facilitating table-work for Hamlet, to be released in five podcast episodes (one per act) through February with Tabling: The Podcast along with a full radio-play recording of the text through the ISC’s Radio Shakespeare Lab

Featuring: Julia Larsen, Zoë Goslin, Patrick Harvey, Olivia Rose Barresi, Ariana Karp, Joe McGurl, Colin Holmes, Else C Went, Finn Kilgore, Will Cary, Erin Noll, Andrea Lopez, and Tim Palmer

Assisted by Harrison Densmore, Dramaturgy by Isabel Smith-Bernstein

Mirror Game

by Else C Went
Directed by Emma Rosa Went
Starring Juliana Canfield
Edited by Tim Joy
Produced by Weston Playhouse

Part of “One Room,” in Weston’s 2020 Season (NY Times Critics’ Pick!)

Premiered August 7th

Drama League: Classical Directing Fellowship

Emma is the Drama League Classical Directing Fellow for 2020, in a cohort alongside some amazing Directors Project Fellows and Residents, and will be the first Classical Directing Fellow to present work in DirectorFest (a Revelation Reading at Red Bull Theater) early in ‘21.

Announcement in Broadway World, Playbill

Henry IV

HENRY IV is OUT NOW! LISTEN FOR FREE

Scranton Shakespeare, Summer 2020

by William Shakespeare
Adapted & Directed by Emma Rosa Went
Scranton Shakespeare Festival’s 2020 Season

Sound Design by Else C. Went
Musical Orchestration by Ray Duncan
Project Manager Michele Corregio
Assistant Directed by Lizzie Gumula

Featuring: Hailey Bachrach, Conor McGuigan, Tim Palmer, Olivia Rose Barresi, Will Ormsby Cary, Zoë Goslin, Daniel Holme, Colin Holmes, Ty Lane, Julia Larsen, Joe McGurl, Luke Antony Neville, Erin Noll, and Tamara Sevunts

Female Nude Seated

A new play by Carolyn Gage
Presented as an online-staged-reading by Counterclaim Productions
May 16th at 7:30 PM

Directed by Emma Rosa Went
Assistant Director: Harrison Densmore
Assistant Producer/Dramaturg: Abbey Joan Burgess

Featuring: Olivia Rose Barresi and Morgaine Gooding-Silverwood

Featured in: Broadway World
Read a Review: Gay City News, GO Magazine, Bi-Coastal Babble

WATCH THE READING and the TALKBACK

2019

The Same Shirt Show Part 2:
Beckett Without Beckett

A work-in-progress showing at The Drama League, as part of the First Stage Residency Festival, August 9th at 8 PM.

If it’s not funny, it’s illegal…

Devised & performed by Julia Larsen and Olivia Rose Barresi.
Devised and Directed by Emma Rosa Went.

Richard III

Shakespeare’s harrowing political thriller
at The Scranton Shakespeare Festival

July 19th, 20th, 21st, and August 4th

Courage! To The Field!

A (mostly) New Play in Verse
by Else C. Went (after Shakespeare)

April 25-28th and May 2-4, 7 PM
At The Tank

Courage! To The Field! is an alternate-history-play, a good old-fashioned party, and a story told with music. With disguises, swordplay, romance, fiddles, hijinks, and more – history is theatre, and it belongs to everyone.

This workshop production of Courage! To The Field! is made possible through a Tim Bond Production Grant from the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. 

Initiative: Ink’d Festival

Thursday, April 18th
at 3pm (Part I) & 7pm (Part II)

For the INK’d Festival at The Playwrights Realm, we present Else C. Went’s new play Initiative.

The Shirt Show Part 2: Beckett Without Beckett

An Exploration of Masculinity and Existentialism Inspired by the Themes and Works of Beckett, but Containing No Actual Beckett, We Swear

That’s right— The Shirt is back in 2019, with a First Stage Residency at The Drama League, read all about it.

All things Shirt are devised by Olivia Rose Barresi, Julia Larsen, and Emma Rosa Went. Just three humble lady-clowns in a game of chicken with the Beckett Estate.

2018

Initiative

Through Else C. Went’s Fellowship at THE PLAYWRIGHTS REALM, we are developing Initiative, part one of their two-part ensemble epic on adolescence, set in coastal California at the turn of the millennium and the dawn of the internet age. Initiative will be presented in April as part of the Ink’d Fest. (Workshopped in November at The Realm)

What \\ Washed Ashore // Astray

A new play by Benjamin Benne

A Staged-Reading Series at the CAMPFIRE THEATRE FESTIVAL, in Boise ID.

September 7-9, at the Boise Contemporary Theater, Campfire is "a three day festival created by theatre makers, for theatre makers," and brings guest artists from around the country together for three days of workshops, community, and new work. 
 

As You Like It

by William Shakespeare
At the Scranton Shakespeare Festival

July 13, 14, 15, & 29.

A banished Duke and his followers seek refuge and peace in the Forest of Arden, where two young women on the run from court find freedom in disguise and love in the forest... As You Like It is the universal invitation; Shakespeare's anarchic, musical comedy of love-at-first-sight and the power of nature, where discord finds harmony, where evil is converted, where all identity is possible.

Featuring: Olivia Rose Barresi, Will Ormsby Cary, Daniel Holme, Irina Kaplan, Julia Larsen, Garrett K. Lyons, Conor McGuigan, Joe McGurl, Ben McNamara, Tamara Sevunts, Logan T. Sutton and Camille Upshaw

Old Names for Wildflowers

A New Play, by Else C. Went
Co-Produced by The Renovationists, The Tank, and Parity Productions

MAY 11th-25th, 2018:

Click HERE to read the full review from Stage Biz:

"The play is a powerful statement on survival and the qualities of those individuals who are able to overcome extreme odds to triumphantly stand in their light."

"Director Emma Rosa Went stokes the fires in the bellies of the characters to set the old paradigms aflame. She lets no moment go unexplored... Her work is marvelously detailed and completely absorbing."

Moth&Flame

Written by Sara Fellini
Starring Adam Belvo, and Sara Fellini
Produced by spit&vigor
Presented at the Center at West Park
April 5th-21st, 2018. 

The great Baroque painters Caravaggio and Artemisia Gentileschi confess their sins to a heavenly priest in purgatory. Gentileschi recounts her notorious rape and torture in order to reclaim her legacy and fully illuminate her brilliant life and art. Caravaggio, confused after his own brutal and untimely death, is searching for forgiveness — or possibly something deeper.

The Same Shirt Show

An Exploration of Masculinity in the Western Canon, as Performed by Two Women Wearing the Same Shirt, A Theatrical Revue OR: [THE SAME SHIRT SHOW]

Co-Created by and Starring Julia Larsen and Olivia Rose Barresi
Directed by Emma Rosa Went

ONE NIGHT ONLY. DIXON PLACE. FEB 23.  7 PM.  

A "post-feminist" comedic exploration of literature, co-dependency, and the importance of costume. Or something.

Julia Larsen and Olivia Rose Barresi tackle some of the most iconic scenes for men in western dramatic literature, from Shakespeare to Mamet… all while occupying a single XXXXL polo shirt. Bound together on a journey, both by serious feminism and by the actual polo shirt, they will attempt to answer the following question: Are two women better than one… man? Featuring sword-fights, hat-gags, possible songs, and the true meaning of (male) friendship. Is this a vanity project? NO ONE WITH VANITY WOULD DO THIS.

2017

Three Seconds: Barn Arts Collective

The Renovationists spent a thrilling week in Maine at the Barn Arts Collective workshopping Else C. Went's play Three Seconds. 

Featuring: Harrison Densmore, Julia Larsen, Olivia Barresi, Patrick Harvey, Zoë Goslin, and Finn Kilgore.

"Is loneliness something in the blood? Or is it something in the air? As life at White Rock Lighthouse shifts tidally back and forth across a century, Emory meets the only person who could inspire him to change his fate. Two distinct timelines weave into one family story of loneliness, thwarted hope, and the ocean."

(Residency October 8th-15th, Barn Arts Performance Saturday October 14th 7 PM)

Chemistry

by Jacob Marx Rice, in DarkFest at The Tank. 
July 29th & 30th, 2017

 "Scars blend better in the dark."

Featuring Juliana Bearse & Jovan Davis

Cello composed/performed by Ariana Karp
Produced by Daniella Benavides
Stage Managed by Rafaella Rossi
 

Old Names for Wildflowers: A Staged Reading

Presented by The Renovationists, Old Names for Wildflowers is a brand new play by Else C. Went, about witchcraft, queer family-making, and survival on the edge of the woods that "ring with the devil's whistle."

Invite-only staged-reading May 7th at 7 PM, Penthouse 2 Shetler Studios.

Featuring: Laura Baranik*, Adam Belvo, Sara Fellini, Zoë Goslin, Patrick Harvey, Sarah Keyes, Finn Kilgore, Jason O'Connell*, and Samantha Steinmetz* (*AEA)

2016

Much Ado About Nothing

in The Brick's 'Shakespeare in the Theater' Festival

Easy Leap Theatre Company 2016

TDF's ARTICLE on the Brick's 'Shakespeare in the Theater'
 

Boxcar, a play by Else C. Went

Produced at The Tank, 2016

A Renovationists Production

Theater in the Now interviews Emma on Boxcar HERE

Emma is profiled HERE in Visible Soul's "People You Should Know"