Phanésia Pharel (Playwright) is a Haitian-American playwright from a dragon fruit farm in Miami. The daughter of an immigrant teacher and farmer, she writes to honor people. Her full-length plays include DEAD GIRL’S QUINCEÑERA, THE WATERFALL, R&B , LUCKY, and BLACK GIRL JOY.
She is the incoming playwriting fellow at Emory University where she will teach and have a new play produced through their repertory company. She has received commissions from the Atlantic Theater, Lucille Lortel (Alcove), La Jolla Playhouse, Miranda Family Fund, Hero Theatre, City Theatre Miami, and the Latinx Playwrights Circle.
Her honors include Kilroys List, five awards from the Kennedy Center, two-time Bay Area Playwrights Festival Finalist/Honorable Mention, Jane Chambers Finalist, A is For Playwriting award recipient and the Frank Moffett Mosier Fellowship for Works in Heightened Finalist Prize.
Phanésia is a member of the Obie-winning EST/Youngblood group and The Wish Collective. Her work has been developed by the Playwrights’ Center, New York Stage and Film, SolFest, Thrown Stone, Shattered Globe, and Echo Theater Company.
B.A, Urban Studies, Barnard College of Columbia University.
MFA, Playwriting, UCSD 25′.
Taylor Reynolds (Director) is an OBIE-award winning director based in New York, originally from Chicago. Her work centers around joyful collaboration and new play development. Selected directing credits: Primary Trust (Signature Theatre), The Sensational Sea Mink-ettes (Woolly Mammoth), Fat Ham (Studio Theatre, Helen Hayes nomination for Best Director), This Land Was Made (Vineyard Theatre), Clyde’s (Berkeley Rep/Huntington Theatre), Tambo & Bones (Playwrights Horizons/CTG), Man Cave (Page 73), The Most Spectacularly Lamentable Trial of Miz Martha Washington (Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, New York Times Critic’s Pick), and Plano (Clubbed Thumb, Drama Desk nomination for Best Director). Taylor has also worked as a director and collaborator with companies including The Movement Theatre Company, Keen Company, Ojai Playwrights Conference, Baltimore Center Stage, MCC, EST, and The 24 Hour Plays. She is a New Georges Affiliated Artist, 2021 LPTW Lucille Lortel Award recipient, 2017-2018 Clubbed Thumb Directing Fellow, and Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab alum. BFA, Carnegie Mellon University. Member of SDC.
Thrown Stone Theatre Company (Co-Producer) Thrown Stone Theatre Company is the only professional theatre in Connecticut exclusively dedicated to new work. From commission to development to production, Thrown Stone empowers artists and audiences to engage with the important questions of our time. Founded in Ridgefield in 2016, the company has built a reputation for intimate, locally crafted premieres with national relevance. Thrown Stone’s collaboration with playwright Phanésia Pharel began with her first professional commission for the company’s 2021 season, “The Suburbs.” She conceived “The Waterfall” during Thrown Stone’s 068 Magazine Playwriting Fellowship in 2022 and received early development support through a 2023 workshop in partnership with The Old Globe in San Diego, followed by a 2024 workshop in Ridgefield, Connecticut, at the Keeler Tavern Museum and History Center. Now based at the Crystal Theatre in South Norwalk, Thrown Stone anchors its year-round season with professional productions of new plays. Additional programs, such as the CT Short Play Fest, commissions, and workshops, extend the company’s commitment to developing new work and cultivating the next generation of theatre artists and audiences in Fairfield County and beyond. More information is available at thrownstone.org.
