Originally from New Jersey, I've been in New York City for over 20 years and have soaked up its rhythms, its patois, its beeps and clangs, adding them to my writing toolkit. I'm also a 20 plus year expatriate from somewhere else, as many if not most New Yorkers are, and I know the dual sensibility of belonging to two places simultaneously.

In more detail, my writing is influenced by large, contrasting creative forces: great sitcoms, classic theatre, ridiculous romantic soap operas, and stand up comedy. All of these elements, plus New York City, are baked into the writer I am today.

I now write plays that try to take compelling ideas and add a unique contemporary dramatic spin on it. I still take inspiration from the cadence of stand ups, the sitcoms and the soaps, and blend them with ideas of traditional drama. My results are plays that sound like the rhythms of previous entertainments, but that have substantial dramatic questions buried within them. Imagine the zinging one-liners of Friends, New Girl or Hacks wrapped around a larger question, like is monogamy ever possible, or is there any limitation to what we can buy if we have enough money. Familiar outside, different insides.

My MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen from Point Park exposed me to more writers and styles of story. I found that I had heard of many terrific playwrights, but often hadn’t a chance to dive deep into their work. Now, in addition to my education on Shakespeare, Shaw, Chekhov, Miller and Williams, I gravitate to modern writers like Vogel, Fornes, Parks, Wasserstein and Nottage

Like all of these outstanding playwrights, I am looking to ask expansive questions. I start each project with as big a “What if…?” as I can find…

“What if you win millions of dollars, but it makes you a selfish person? Can you buy forgiveness, even from yourself?"
"What if your band returns from being on the road, only to find your ex-girlfriend's band has taken your place in the local scene? And what if you think she's a more gifted musician than you?"
and the one I'm working on right now...
"What if your high school closes forever, do you still have a past? Are memories of a place enough? And how can a place that educated so many kids all the same, yield so many different types of results?"

Within these big questions are characters who love, hate and dream. I remain curious about people, where they go after any brief casual encounter I might have with them (the barista, the bus driver, the overheard conversation on the subway), and what they might want from their day to day lives. with this in mind, I'm striving to make work about unseen moments--when you are alone with your thoughts, when you go home, when you are unobserved, what do you feel? What do you dream about? These are the moments I am trying to distill onstage.

As you can see, my process is a mix of upbringing, influences, my training, and my locale...all of which (I think) makes my writing idiosyncratic and uniquely my own.