Nationally recognized playwriting program
Boston University’s three-year Master of Fine Arts (MFA) playwriting program, offered by the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences in close collaboration with CFA’s School of Theatre, engages students with workshops, classes, seminars, and professional actors in the classroom and theatrical productions.
Students graduating with an MFA in Playwriting from BU…
- Learn the skills to WRITE ORIGINAL dramatic works for the stage
- Effectively COLLABORATE with directors, actors, and other theatre artists building a production
- Gain an APPRECIATION of the drama of the past and how these works can benefit the playwrights’ personal journey in dramatic writing
After more than 30 years of building our nationally-recognized Playwriting Program—founded by Nobel Laureate Derek Walcott in 1981—BU offers a three-year MFA in Playwriting that combines the best of BU Graduate School of Arts & Sciences’ traditions with an exciting collaboration with BU School of Theatre.
At BU, playwriting students’ voices are encouraged, nurtured, and challenged. They get to work with a vibrant community of artists, from actors to design students. Only four to five graduate students are accepted to the MFA playwriting program every two years, assuring students of individual, hands-on attention from our faculty during all phases of the MFA degree program.
visit the official bu playwriting website
Degrees Offered
MFA Playwriting Faculty
meet the mfa playwriting faculty
CFA Playwriting Faculty Members for Theatre Arts Students
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Kirsten Greenidge
Director, School of Theatre; Playwright; Associate Professor; Playwriting Track, Director; Theatre Arts, Chair; Performance, Co-chair
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Kristin Leahey
Assistant Professor, Dramatic Literature & Dramaturgy
New Play Initiative
BU’s New Play Initiative (NPI) expresses the School of Theatre’s participation in the development of new work. This special initiative provides playwrights, directors, designers, and actors with a variety of developmental options to support the collaborative creation of new work for the theatre. Students, faculty, alumni, and guest artists are given the opportunity to utilize the creativity of the rehearsal room to develop their plays, which are then presented through workshop productions. But the life of these new plays doesn’t end on the BU stages. Many New Play Initiative productions are often later fully produced by member companies of our Professional Theatre Initiative.