NEW YORK CITY: Primary Stages has named Inda Craig-Galván as the recipient of the Jeffry Melnick New Playwright Award for her play Welcome to Matteson!. A reading of the winning play will be presented at Primary Stages Studios on Sept. 9.
The annual award aims to recognize a playwright the selection committee deems worthy of wider recognition. This year’s selection committee included Sasha Emerson, Robert O’Hara, Jiehae Park, Christopher Schout, and Leah Nanako Winkler. The other finalists for this year’s award included Sanaz Toosi, Joshua Young, and David Zheng.
Welcome to Matteson! is a dark intra-racial comedy that explores reverse gentrification and follows a suburban couple’s attempts to welcome new neighbors to the neighborhood.
Craig-Galván’s play include Black Super Hero Magic Mama (Geffen Playhouse, Los Angeles) and I Go Somewhere Else (Playwrights’ Arena, Los Angeles). Her work has been developed and presented at Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, Oregon Shakespeare Festival Black Swan Lab, San Francisco Playhouse, American Blues Theatre, and others. Honors include the Kilroys List, Kennedy Center Rosa Parks Playwriting Award, Steppenwolf’s The Mix, Blue Ink Playwriting Prize, Humanitas Prize Play LA, and Princess Grace Playwriting Prize (runner-up). Craig-Galván is a story editor on “How to Get Away with Murder” and previously wrote on ABC’s “The Rookie.” She earned an MFA in Dramatic Writing, University of Southern California.
