Lia Romeo wins Urbanite Theatre's Modern Works Festival

Following its five-day Modern Works Festival for female playwrights, Urbanite Theatre announced that the winner of its 2024 competition is Lia Romeo, for her play "A Nice Motherly Person."

Romeo takes home $3,200 to help develop her new work.

Romeo's play was one of three finalists out of more than 300 works submitted. The other two were "I'm Saving You a Seat" by Sarah Elizabeth Grace and "In the Mouth of the Beast" by Baylee Shlichtman.

Image courtesy of Whitney Kidder

“Each of the finalists' plays was unique in style, contained fantastic writing, and made it nearly impossible to choose a winner,” said Urbanite Producing Artistic Director Summer Wallace in a statement. “All three of our finalists deserved to take home top honors." 

Sponsored by the Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation and Carole & Malcolm Schwartz, Urbanite's Modern Works Festival drew sold-out audiences from Sept. 4-8 for staged readings of the three finalists, talkbacks, parties and a keynote presentation by playwright Lauren Gunderson.

"A Nice Motherly Person" explores the challenges of new motherhood and riffed on characters familiar to fans of Peter Pan.

A recent graduate of the Juilliard playwriting program, Romeo teaches creative writing at Fairleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey. Her plays have been developed at institutions such as the O’Neill, La Jolla Playhouse and the Lark and have been produced at companies including Laguna Playhouse, Unicorn Theatre, Project Y Theatre and New Jersey Repertory Theatre.