Jean Ann Douglass

Jean Ann Douglass

Jean Ann Douglass is a playwright, performer, and artist. Her play The Providence of Neighboring Bodies was named one of the Best Shows at the Edinburgh Festivals in 2018 by the Guardian, who called it a "surreal and wonderfully written drama... pure poetry". It is published by Oberon Books.

Jean Ann is currently under commission by Playwrights Horizons and Montana Rep (slated for...
Jean Ann Douglass is a playwright, performer, and artist. Her play The Providence of Neighboring Bodies was named one of the Best Shows at the Edinburgh Festivals in 2018 by the Guardian, who called it a "surreal and wonderfully written drama... pure poetry". It is published by Oberon Books.

Jean Ann is currently under commission by Playwrights Horizons and Montana Rep (slated for production Fall 2020) and her other plays include Seneca Falls (2021 Weissberger Award Nominee), Ladycation, and Some Editing and Some Theme Music, which have been produced or developed by Playwrights Horizons, Clubbed Thumb, New Georges, Montana Rep, Dutch Kills Theater, and WildWind Performance Lab.

With her partner Eric John Meyer, she is the co-director of Human Head Performance Group, a company best-known for The Truck Project: a series of plays performed in Budget rental trucks for small audiences. Together, they have created Due to Events, Obfuscation, and FISH, and will premiere Thought Leadership Pleasure Cruise in 2020. Human Head has received residencies at The Brick and Drop Forge & Tool, and taught collaborative playmaking at Concordia University and Hamilton College.

She is a New Georges Affiliated Artist, a former Artist-in-Residence at MASS MoCA, and was an adjunct professor and guest lecturer at Brooklyn College. Jean Ann holds an MFA from Brooklyn College in Performance & Interactive Media Arts, and a BFA from Tulane University in Dance & Theatre.

"...as Albee did so violently to the sanctity of families, Douglass does to female friendships" (Helen Shaw, Time Out New York).

Plays

  • Seneca Falls by Jean Ann Douglass
    Recommendations: 1
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    Cast: 
    6
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    Genre: comedy, docudrama/historic + 5 more
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    Keyword: suffragists, women's suffrage + 5 more
    Genre: comedy, docudrama/historic, drama, experimental, period, political, tragedy
    Keyword: suffragists, women's suffrage, feminism, historical feminism, American history, 19th Amendment, Constitution
    Carrie defines the rules; Amelia envisions a husband who darns her bloomers; Frederick renounces his manhood; Margaret rides the train; Eileen drinks sherry; and Mabel lets someone else bandage her wounds. Variously platonic, romantic, and erotic, Jean Ann Douglass's Seneca Falls is an anachronistic triptych through late-nights in the first 72 years of the women’s suffrage movement: 72 years of mostly a lot of waiting.
  • The Fog by Jean Ann Douglass
    Cast: 
    3
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    Genre: drama, experimental
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    Keyword: ghost, montana + 5 more
    Genre: drama, experimental
    Keyword: ghost, montana, forest, gothic, fire, COVID, pandemic
    Commissioned by Montana Rep, in answer to the question: how can we still do live theatre during the pandemic? The play contains characters who never come in contact with one another and was premiered outdoors at a fire tower, which allowed audience members and actors to safely socially distance outdoors.

    Fresh from university, clutching proposals and plans, a man tends his newly assigned patch of...
    Commissioned by Montana Rep, in answer to the question: how can we still do live theatre during the pandemic? The play contains characters who never come in contact with one another and was premiered outdoors at a fire tower, which allowed audience members and actors to safely socially distance outdoors.

    Fresh from university, clutching proposals and plans, a man tends his newly assigned patch of forest. At night, he visits with his wife. At night, the forest is free. Inspired by gothic drama, the Great Fire of 1910, the creation of the national forest service, and Gifford Pinchot's secret marriage to a ghost.
  • The Providence of Neighboring Bodies by Jean Ann Douglass
    Recommendations: 1
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    Cast: 
    3
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    Genre: comedy, drama + 1 more
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    Keyword: Beavers, women + 7 more
    Genre: comedy, drama, experimental
    Keyword: Beavers, women, beer, coffee, airbnb, Rhode Island, History, friendship, prejudice
    It’s an exciting day for Dora here in North Providence, Rhode Island. Today is the day Dora is going to make coffee, go outside, and make friends with Ronnie. Ronnie lives in the apartment next door, so of course they were meant to be friends. Ronnie isn’t sure how she wound up living in North Providence for all these years, with a balcony overlooking the parking lot and the weird hill across the street. But...
    It’s an exciting day for Dora here in North Providence, Rhode Island. Today is the day Dora is going to make coffee, go outside, and make friends with Ronnie. Ronnie lives in the apartment next door, so of course they were meant to be friends. Ronnie isn’t sure how she wound up living in North Providence for all these years, with a balcony overlooking the parking lot and the weird hill across the street. But here they both are, where nothing exciting has really happened since the great beaver purge of the mid-20th century. That is, until Jane shows up at Ronnie’s door. Maybe she’s just the distraction they need.
  • Ladycation by Jean Ann Douglass
    Cast: 
    14
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    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 3 more
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    Keyword: vacation, friendship + 7 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, drama, experimental, immersive
    Keyword: vacation, friendship, ensemble, magical realism, Relationships, jealousy, memory, wedding, existential
    It’s been ten years since college graduation, and this group of seven ladyfriends has gathered for their annual ladycation. When it all gets to be too much, they each have an object they can talk to. The women are women. The objects are men.
  • BACK TO SCHOOL - From A to B and Back Again by Jean Ann Douglass
    Cast: 
    3
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    Genre: drama, experimental
    Genre: drama, experimental
    On a school bus inside and outside of time.