Brooke Berman (Playwright)

Brooke Berman is an award winning playwright whose work has been developed and produced across the US and in London (at the National Theatre and the Royal Court). She was born in the Midwest, raised around Chicago’s North Shore, migrated East and has lived all over the country. Originally trained as an actor and solo performer in the experimental theater, Brooke began performing her own work on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, taught herself to write plays, and produced them -- most notably in an evening of one-acts called “Girls, Girls, Girls!”  that included Adrienne Shelley’s writing/directing debut. Brooke returned to school, attending Juilliard’s prestigious playwriting program, where she studied with Marsha Norman, Jon Robin Baitz and Christopher Durang.
Brooke’s plays include: SMASHING  (developed at the O’Neill, premiered at the Play Company in New York City, adapted as a feature film for Natalie Portman.);  UNTIL WE FIND EACH OTHER (produced at Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago., directed by Anna Shapiro, originally developed at the O’Neill and Makor); THE TRIPLE HAPPINESS  (produced at The Second Stage in New York City starring Ally Sheedy,  developed at Soho Rep in NYC, the Playwrights Center in MN, The Royal Court Theatre in London, The Hourglass Group in NYC and ASK in Los Angeles), SAM AND LUCY, A PERFET COUPLE (workshopped at the National Theatre in London), AMAZING (written for Childrens Theatre Company in MN) and others.   Her short play "Dancing with a Devil" was co-winner of the Heideman Award at Actors Theater of Louisville and presented as part of “Life Under 30” at the Humana Festival that year; the play was nominated for an American Theater Critics Best New Play award that year and published in numerous anthologies.  Another short play, DEFUSION, has been produced in numerous festivals and included as part of Christine Jones’s “Theater for One” project at New York Theatre Workshop. DEFUSION has been published in an anthology of short plays edited by Craig Lucas for Backstage.

As a screenwriter, she has written an adaptation of her play SMASHING for Natalie Portman, as well as a feature called MAJOR MINOR DETAILS. Her short film ALL SAINTS DAY, directed by Will Frears, recently won  “Best Narrative Short” at the Savannah film festival.

She is a member of New Dramatists, where she serves on the Board of Directors, as well as of the MCC Playwrights Coalition, the Dramatists Guild, PEN and Rising Phoenix Rep.

Brooke has taught playwriting and creative writing as a guest artist in the public school system, at assorted colleges, as well as privately to adults and through the “24 With 5 Teaching Collective” which she co-created at New Dramatists.  Brooke spent five years as the Director of the Playwriting Unit for MCC Theater’s Youth Company, a free after-school program for NYC youth. Brooke has mentored with the Young Storytellers Foundation.