Whitney Rowland
She / Her / Hers
Playwrights' Center Staff
Minneapolis, MN
An American playwright specializing in magical realism and melancholic comedies. MFA in Dramatic Writing from Carnegie Mellon.
Biography

Whitney Rowland is a Minneapolis-based playwright and screenwriter. She has been a finalist for the Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, a semi-finalist for the Bay Area Playwrights Festival, a finalist for the UMass PlayLab, shortlisted for the Theatre503 (London, UK) New Play Award, as well as a finalist for both the Jerome Playwriting Fellowship and the Core Writer program at the Playwrights’ Center. Her plays have been developed at the Last Frontier Theatre Conference, Mid-America Theatre Conference, Kennedy Center American College Theater Festivals (regional and national), Great Plains Theatre Conference, and PlayPenn New Play Development Conference, where Whitney was named a 2019 Haas Fellow. Her work has been produced at Pittsburgh New Works Festival, Minnesota Shorts, Northwest Children’s Theater & School, as well as colleges and universities around the country. On the screen side of things, Whitney’s kids' sports feature-length screenplay THE BUZZBOTS was a winner in the 2017 CMU/Sloan Screenwriting Contest, earning her a $7,500 grant. Her family drama THE WAY UP was a 2016 finalist for the same award. Whitney holds a Bachelors from the University of Kansas and an MFA in Dramatic Writing from Carnegie Mellon. You can learn more about her work at www.rowlandwriter.com.

Plays

BIELA is the life story of Emilie von Biela, as told through the events surrounding the discovery, celebration, and eventual disintegration of her father’s greatest astronomical triumph: Biela’s Comet.  Rooted in actual historical events, BIELA is a fictional play about family, legacy, and the power of love and acceptance.

 

Cast:
With doubling, can be performed with 3F / 6M. Without, can be performed with 4F / 7M / 4 Either.

BUBBLE is an ensemble play following a PhD candidate, a financial bigwig and his boardroom cronies, a caught-in-the-middle mortgage broker and his hot-shot co-worker, a family of would-be "house flippers," a decent man cajoled into ruin, and a non-profit trio seeking to untangle the whole mess.  Some are villains.  Some are victims.  All, however, are motivated by the exact same thing: claiming their own piece of the American dream.

Cast:
With doubling, can be performed with a minimum cast of 4F / 4M.

TABULA RASA follows the story of Lila, a young woman who is married to the hard-working, but neglectful, Eric.  In the present, Lila's father Henry is dying.  As he withers away in the hospital, Lila's troubled mother begins to give away many of the family belongings.  When Lila discovers the old family table in her current dining room, her mind travels back to her tumultuous childhood.  These visions and memories from the past merge with her present conflicts with Eric and, after the death of her father, Lila is driven to seek solace in a mysterious neighbor nicknamed "Deuce."  As the play unfolds, Lila's reality comes into question, along with her memory, her identity, and her sanity.

Cast:
3F / 3M.

Claire is overwhelmed.  After moving back in to her childhood home to assist with her cancer-stricken mother's care, Claire is confronted by memories of the father who abandoned their family when she was young.  Worse still is her mother's stubborn refusal to blame him for his betrayal.  Her frustration and confusion are only complicated by the fact that her long-time boyfriend and co-worker, Lyndon, is pushing her to take the plunge.

With a globe-trotting, career-changing project only one day away, Claire has much on the line: the story of a lifetime, her relationship with her mother, her future with Lyndon, the opportunity to see the world, and a chance to shake off the demons of her childhood.  This article is at the heart of all of it.  But, is this piece more personal than she's letting on?

Cast:
3F / 1M.

A noblewoman, desperate for knowledge and willing to do anything to get it.  A group of young girls, hunted by their village.  A charismatic new student and her quiet sister, with a mysterious connection to the past.  BLOOD WILL TELL is an ensemble piece, written for young adult performers, which weaves a tale of vampire influence through the ages.

Cast:
Can be performed with a flexible cast of about 15, mostly female.

Carolyn and Truman.  Two people in love.  Two lives changed in an instant.  

Two ways it could have gone.

Cast:
2F / 2M.

In the cold reality of his mother's hospital room, Aidan, a playwright, seeks to find closure.  He retreats into his work, drawing material from circumstances surrounding his mother's life.  As he weaves his tale, his siblings Hannah, Garvey, and his sister-in-law Robin, question his right to appropriate their lives into his play. It is through these real confrontations, and his exploration of memory and art, that Aidan comes to terms with truth, death, and the real meaning of family.

Cast:
4F / 3M.

THREE ROSES ON THE GRAVE: An Evening of Edgar Allan Poe is an ensemble piece, comprised of a triptych of adaptations written for young adult performers.

          PART I:  The Pit and the Pendulum

          PART II:  The Tell-Tale Heart

          PART III:  The Masque of the Red Death

With a minimalist feel and an emphasis on chorus work and large group movement,THREE ROSES ON THE GRAVE is a chilling and modern take on three of Poe's most famous works.

Cast:
Can be performed with a flexible ensemble cast of about 15.

Love.  Sex.  And, of course, flowers.

At times uproariously funny and heartbreakingly human, THE VIRGIN CLUB is an ensemble piece following a collection of women through a dreamy collage of first loves, last chances, and all those awkward, painful steps in between. 

Cast:
5F / 3M.

Chipper, cheery Diane is desperate for a job.  Mistress Lily, head of a corporate dominatrix firm, needs a worthy new employee.  But when Lily soundly rejects her application, how far with Diane go to get the upper hand?

Cast:
2F.

On a grey and windy afternoon, the young, determined Lena sneaks into Mr. Albrecht's yard with the intent to fly her best friend's kite.  When he confronts her for trespassing, she accuses him of yet darker crimes. Tensions between them rise with the winds, and their secrets unwind as the kite string unfurls from the spool. 

Cast:
1F / 1M.

A mountain of cigarette butts.  A collection of motivational post-its.  A stack of blank pages.

Emmeline, a novelist of moderate success, is suffering from extreme and paralyzing writer's block.  With only days until her deadline, she reaches out to her soon-to-be ex-husband to help her break the spell.  But, when Andrew doesn't play along, Emmeline becomes desperate. 

Cast:
1F / 1M.

When Husband comes home, utterly unapologetic after a night out on the town, Wife suspects the worst.  But what does their furniture have to say about it?

Cast:
1F / 1M / 3 Either.

Everything is perfect in Cate's world.  She has the house of her dreams.  She's married to Gerald, a hard-working, if reserved man.  She has good friends and book clubs and baking circles.  She's happy.   And to top it all off, today is her birthday.  

But, when her younger sister Maggie shows up, uninvited, and gives her a bizarre birthday present, Cate's carefully crafted world begins to fall apart.

Cast:
2F.

When Isabel has to leave her beloved cats at home to go to a work conference for a week, her father seems to be the perfect choice to house-sit; It's a chance to get him out of the country for a change.  But, as she explains the rules of the house to him, the distance between them becomes more and more apparent.

Cast:
1F / 1M.

Two years after his younger brother's accidental death, Wes's family is still held hostage by grief.  Now, on the eve of him leaving for college, can Wes finally break the spell that binds his parents?

Cast:
1F / 3M.

Virgil is fed up with Jenny's controlling, nit-picking ways.  When he finally gets up the courage to move out, it seems that Jenny will do just about anything to stop him.

Cast:
1F / 1M.

Bonnie is elated.  She's married to a loving, wonderful man and pregnant with their first child.  After attending a baby shower, she waits at her usual bus stop, giddily looking through her baby's gifts.  But a person from her past suddenly appears and offers her a choice.

Cast:
2F.

Jane is an emotionally-numbed new widow. Harrison is an inattentive, self-sabotaging fiancé. In seeking escape, these two strangers collide – both literally and figuratively – tangling their lifelines and setting them on a time-bending journey involving an intercontinental plane crash, a magical forest, and a choice that leads them both to an unexpected destination.

Cast:
2F / 3M.