Benjamin Benne

Benjamin Benne

Benjamin Benne’s plays include: at the very bottom of a body of water, q u e r e n c i a: an imagined autobiography about forbidden fruits, and #nowall. He’s a recipient of the 2017-18 McKnight Fellowship in Playwriting and 2016-17 Many Voices Fellowship at The Playwrights’ Center, as well as the 2017 Robert Chesley/Victor Bumbalo Playwriting Award. His work has been produced/developed by the O'Neill...
Benjamin Benne’s plays include: at the very bottom of a body of water, q u e r e n c i a: an imagined autobiography about forbidden fruits, and #nowall. He’s a recipient of the 2017-18 McKnight Fellowship in Playwriting and 2016-17 Many Voices Fellowship at The Playwrights’ Center, as well as the 2017 Robert Chesley/Victor Bumbalo Playwriting Award. His work has been produced/developed by the O'Neill National Playwrights Conference, The Playwrights' Center, The Playwrights Realm, The Lark Play Development Center, Two River Theater, Pillsbury House Theatre, Teatro Milagro, Seattle Repertory Theatre, A Contemporary Theatre, Theatre Battery, Annex Theatre, Forward Flux, Umbrella Project, and Parley, among others. His plays have been finalists for The Playwrights' Center's Jerome Fellowship, Princess Grace Award, SPACE on Ryder Farm's Working Farm, Ingram New Works Lab, Blue Ink Playwriting Award, Bay Area Playwrights Festival, Headwaters New Play Festival, and Austin Playhouse Festival of New American Plays, as well as runner-up for the National Latino Playwriting Award and semifinalist for the P73 Playwriting Fellowship. Most recently, Benjamin's work was featured on 50 Playwrights Project's Best Unproduced Latin@/x Plays 2018 list. This fall, he will begin pursuing an MFA in Playwriting at the Yale School of Drama.

Plays

  • What \\Washed Ashore //Astray by Benjamin Benne
    Cast: 
    3
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    Genre: dark comedy, drama + 4 more
    Genre: dark comedy, drama, fantasy, movement/physical, political, tragedy
    Twin sisters, Cat and Chris, are reunited in a cabin on the Pacific Northwest shoreline. Everything has aged. The cottage. Their bodies. Dead things wash ashore. Ice caves melt. Conch shells become uninhabited. And one of them will die within the year.
  • Alma (or #nowall) by Benjamin Benne
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: drama, fantasy + 2 more
    Genre: drama, fantasy, political, tragedy
    Nearly 18 years ago, Alma crossed the border between Mexico and the United States pregnant with a child and great dreams for the life ahead of them. Now it’s December 2, 2016, Alma has been studying for her citizenship test while her daughter, Angel, studies for her SATs. But on the eve before Angel’s test, Alma comes home early to discover that Angel isn’t at home studying. A real-time, two-hander about an...
    Nearly 18 years ago, Alma crossed the border between Mexico and the United States pregnant with a child and great dreams for the life ahead of them. Now it’s December 2, 2016, Alma has been studying for her citizenship test while her daughter, Angel, studies for her SATs. But on the eve before Angel’s test, Alma comes home early to discover that Angel isn’t at home studying. A real-time, two-hander about an undocumented parent and their U.S. citizen child's differing visions of the "American Dream."
  • q u e r e n c i a: an imagined autobiography about forbidden fruits by Benjamin Benne
    Recommendations: 9
    ·
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 4 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, drama, fantasy, movement/physical, tragedy
    What's a boy to do when his favorite fruit is banana in a world that says he's gotta love mangoes? "q u e r e n c i a" (a Spanish word having to do with the longing to find or return to a place that feels like home) is a magical coming-of-age story about a young boy named Milo’s search for belonging as he grapples with friends, family, and his sexual identity, guided by a mysterious character called La Bruja.
  • at the very bottom of a body of water by Benjamin Benne
    Recommendations: 2
    ·
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: adventure, drama + 5 more
    Genre: adventure, drama, fable/folktale, fantasy, movement/physical, romantic comedy, tragedy
    Marina is being haunted. Every night, she dreams about drowning. Every week, she makes catfish soup. But when this ritual meal is disrupted by the disappearance of her fishmonger, she can no longer swim in the routine circle of her solitary life. She embarks on a surreal quest--all the way down to the darkest place she can imagine--to confront the ghost that is holding her captive...or rather, the ghost that she's been holding captive.