Fall and Winter Updates: 2024 in Review
I think, somehow, 2024 has been the fastest year on record. It feels like the entire thing flew past in the blink of an eye. I find myself longing for more time, yet eager to step into 2025 and embrace my clean slate! There is so much magic to look forward to! But, first… here’s what has been going on since August!
Megan Laguna as Lucy and Michelle Osojnak as Medea in Murdering Medea
The majority of the late summer and early fall was spent tightening my dark comedy, Murdering Medea, which has been a work in process for a while now. We presented a staged workshop with EastLine Theatre this Fall and I finally got to see the most current draft on its feet.
I’ve come to accept that this play is too damned weird to ever be “perfect” (what is the platonic ideal of a baroque pearl?), but it was so gratifying to sit in a room and hear unhinged laughter or—my favorite—gasps of shock as the insane action played out on stage. Plus, playing with the blood and prop possibilities was a BLAST!
The reading was directed by Nicole Savin and featured Megan Laguna, Michelle Osojnak, and James Brautigam. I’m looking forward to another reading next month (with the same cast) before turning this script over to the producers for its world premiere this summer!
Production photo from These Gilded Souls at Baruch, credit to Elma Radoncic
I was also privileged to see the second New York State production of my adaptation of The Great Gatsby, These Gilded Souls. It was a stunning immersive production with so much detail and texture, from ghosts lurking in the corners during audience arrival to the rollicking choreography. The production was directed by Christopher Scott, who absolutely understood the assignment! I am continually amazed by the creative potential of this script, and can’t wait to see what becomes of it next… more on that soon!
Zoe Wilson and Meghann Garmany in an early reading of they have become the forest
I think my proudest accomplishment of all during the final quarter of the year was the completion of a new full-length two-hander! After attempting to write this play for years, I finally completed a draft of they have become the forest. It’s a queer, feminist revision of the myths of Apollo & Daphne and Pan & Syrinx—traditionally both stories about strong women, both cultural outliers under the patriarchy, who are ultimately reduced to objects that come to represent the men who hurt them.
In my play, both women get to live and breathe and love, transcending their myths and leaving the audience with a call to action. I call it a “campfire play” because the action of the play is storytelling, and I think there is a lot of exciting potential for creative problem solving. It is the quintessence of an Aly Kantor play, and I hope someone will give it a chance in 2025, because it really means a lot to me!
Image from the audio production of reANIMA produced by Broken Arts Entertainment
I also stepped very far outside my comfort zone this quarter and did something that terrified me! I find I’m drawn to theatre because of the ephemerality. The idea of my work existing in other formats really made me nervous—one, single chance to get it “right?!” Insane!!
However, I decided to submit an audio adaptation of my short sci-fi script reANIMA to the team at Broken Arts Entertainment, who transformed it into a truly stunning piece of audio fiction that I’m so incredibly proud of! Better yet, it received awards for best actor, best director, and best in anthology at the BAE end-of-the-year awards ceremony. I’m afraid to confess that they’ve created a monster, and I’m now interested in writing more for audio in 2025! We’ll see if anything comes of that!
In the meantime, you can listen to reANIMA on YouTube or download it on Spotify or any podcatcher! They really did a phenomenal job!
A bunch of lovely Playwrights Thriving Playwrights!
And perhaps the most unexpected thing of all… I finished ANOTHER full-length play in 2024!? This one was thanks to the Playwrights Thriving Secret Santa Title Exchange! I’ve always said I can do a lot with a great prompt and a deadline, and this project kept me very busy during the darkest nights of the year! Against all odds, I completed a full-length dark farce for teens called Ice in Their Veins… which is now available on NPX, against my better judgment. It’s about the fetishization of trauma and the internet gaze, and it is truly bonkers. It touches on topics including war orphans, skin care, murder plots, raw ambition, and the origin of vampires! You have been warned.
An image from Hot Blood Sundae
There have been a bunch of smaller productions and achievements throughout the past few months, too!
A monologue from my Medea adaptation, LULLABY PLAY, and my short play After Aulis were both produced by my friends at Rainy Day Artistic Collective.
Several high school and college productions of my most popular short plays, Hot Blood Sundae and Pandora’s Box of Donuts.
The premiere of my very subversive tragic romance, Meat Cute, at Truman State University… a cult favorite among my “fans"!”
Several more presentations of my play The Psychopomp, which was a winner at the Fern Street Play Festival. It was even performed in South Korea, marking my Asian premiere!
My play for youth, The Rosies, was selected as a winner at the Chameleon Theatre Circle’s 25th annual new play contest and was presented in St. Paul, MN.
An image from Meat Cute
There are a lot of exciting things to look forward to in 2025! Namely, the premiere of Murdering Medea, which was selected as the winner of the Telling Stories Playwriting Competition in 2024. It will be presented by the Black Swamp Players in June! I can’t wait to see what they’re going to do with this truly bonkers script!
Murdering Medea on the official signage!
Additionally, my friends at Mirrorbox Theatre in Cedar Rapids just announced These Gilded Souls as their season opener for 2025! This will be the play’s Iowa (and, in fact, midwestern) premiere! Mirrorbox has been a great supporter of this piece since 2023, and I can’t wait to see them bring it to life!
There are a lot of other small projects and collaborations in the works, too. I’m particularly pumped to finally have work in Memoriam Development’s annual Nightshade festival, and to work with a dramaturg with The Digital Development Project this winter. I’m hoping even more exciting and unexpected opportunities will present themselves, too. I’d love to travel some more in 2025!
At the moment, I’m in between projects (but, remember, I just finished a full-length re-write and two brand new full-length plays—I definitely earned this break!), and I can’t wait to discover the characters who will drive me crazy in the upcoming year! Onward!
