Brian Scanlan

Finalist: O'Neill National Playwrights Conference '25
Lux, isolated and working remotely during the pandemic, makes a friend online who recommends a unique video game designed to be played slowly, allowing players to process the stages of grief at their own pace. Intrigued, Lux begins to play the game, but soon stumbles upon the world of speedrunning, where gamers race to finish games in record time. As their online fame swells, Lux is forced to confront the deeper emotional battles they’ve been avoiding.

A memory play about generational trauma, 'hurt people / hurt people' takes inspiration from Thomas Hardy's 'Tess of the d'Urbervilles' to tell a modern story about addiction and sexual violence through the eyes of Tess, a young woman seeking economic and emotional stability after her stint at rehab is cut short by the death of her alcoholic father.

Finalist: Bay Area Playwrights Festival '21
‘Young Men & Recovery’ chronicles the weigh-in of a middle school football team, where players’ weight determines whether they’re eligible to touch the football during games. As the boys make their final preparations to weigh under 185 pounds, new additions to the team force everyone to re-examine their identity, both on and off the field.

A full length verse adaptation of Victor Hugo's 1831 novel.

'Esmeralda' centers on its teenage Romani protagonist, whose gift of unearned grace regularly saves the lives of the men who pursue her, deepening the resentment of her oppressors, who target her race, age, class, faith, and sexuality.

This adaptation aims to refocus the narrative and affirm the story’s eternal quality by presenting it faithfully through an updated lens.

Winner: Best Play [Pittsburgh New Works Festival, 2019]
Five performers have forty-five minutes to put on an accessible yet dignified one-act adaptation of Sophocles' Oedipus Rex, full of comedy, tragedy, verse, improv, musical theatre, and hip-hop.

Winner: Best Play [The Players Theatre New Play Festival, 2017]
The true-life story of the final hours of a bull that escaped a Queens slaughterhouse in February 2017.

A young woman engages in a relationship with a wealthy, married man.

Winner: Best Play [Manhattan Rep, 2017]
Michelle and Troy want a baby, but scheduled sex, fertility hacks, and mounting frustration have turned intimacy into a chore. In one absurdly eventful attempt, they confront the strain, humor, and love that survive when conception doesn’t go as planned.

Three actresses audition for a musical until they need to solve a MURDER where EVERYONE IS A SUSPECT.