Mark Plesent Commission Fund 2026 Final Presentations
October 5, 2026
Join us for the invited readings of new one-act plays from our 2026-2027 Mark Plesent Commission Fund recipients, C. Lee Dionne and Ashley Graves.
I Could Be A Florist by Ashley Graves
Authority Terminal by C. Lee Dionne
As the culmination of their commission, we could not be more thrilled to present this reading series and celebrate the artistry of these talented playwrights alongside our Working Theater community. Please join us in supporting the development of these brand-new one-act plays and the playwrights behind them as they hear their work out loud for the first time with an audience.
Mark Plesent Commission Fund
2026 Recipients
C. Lee Dionne
Having grown up in somewhat rural North Carolina, writer C. Lee Dionne is no stranger to aimlessness—that itch of unease. It’s apparent in his work, as protagonists often struggle to find their place, their “people”, or a sense of belonging. He’s also fascinated by performance: how we stage our survival for others, how absurdity shields pain, how memory can’t be trusted but music can hold what it drops. His scripts resist clean endings, lingering instead in the unsettled spaces where humor, grief, intimacy and estrangement coexist. The result is art that is as diaristic as it is cinematic—a call to those feeling lost, and an invitation to explore what it is we’re running from.
Ashley Graves
Ashley Graves is a South Jersey based playwright with a BA in Theatre Studies and English from Montclair State University. Her play KINKY was presented in a reading at CUNY School of Professional Studies in 2025. She is excited for her first professional collaboration to be with The Working Theatre. Her work explores Black womanhood, generational legacy, and emotional inheritance. Through dialogue driven storytelling, she focuses on the things people don’t say out loud, especially within families and communities. Follow her artistic journey on all socials @attashments.
Meet the Mentors
Brittany K. Allen
Brittany K. Allen (Ashley’s Mentor) is a Brooklyn-based writer/actor. Her plays have been produced and developed by Manhattan Theatre Club, Clubbed Thumb, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Portland Center Stage, Studio Theatre, and KC Rep, among other places, and her radio plays and podcasts have been produced by Fresh Produce Media and Playing On Air. She is an alumna of EST/Youngblood, The Public Theater’s EWG, and the Dorothy Strelsin New American Writers Group at Primary Stages. Awards include the Daryl Roth Creative Spirit Award, the Dramatists Guild Foundation Comedic Playwriting Prize, and recognition on the Kilroys List. Her writing life has been nourished by the late Lark, Hedgebrook, MacDowell, Ucross, and Juilliard, where she will join the Lila Acheson Wallace playwriting cohort this fall as a Hansberry-Lilly fellow. She periodically teaches on the playwriting faculty at the Sewanee Writers Conference, and is a WPLab fellow and resident artist with Colt Coeur.
Christopher Chen
Christopher Chen (C’s Mentor) is an Obie Award-winning playwright whose plays have been produced across the United States and abroad. Honors include the Steinberg Playwright Award, the Windham Campbell Prize, USA Fellow, the Obie Award (for Caught), the inaugural Ollie Award, the Lanford Wilson Award, a Sundance Time Warner Fellowship and the Paula Vogel Award. Current commissions include American Conservatory Theater, Portland Center Stage and the Mark Gordon Company. As a screenwriter he co-wrote the Sundance award-winning “The Accidental Getaway Driver,” the upcoming film “The Hole,” directed by Kim Jee-woon, and the upcoming television series “Spider-Noir.” He is a graduate of U.C. Berkeley and holds an M.F.A. in Playwriting from S.F. State.
Conceived with Mark Plesent before his passing in February 2021, The Mark Plesent Commission Fund supports the commission and development of new plays by working people — in particular, those who have not had the privilege or the resources to self-identify or support themselves professionally as artists, but who have shown extraordinary talent, consistency of practice and a commitment to writing within the mission of Working Theater. Mark recognized that many within the communities that Working Theater serves are storytellers themselves. The Fund will support five years of annual new play commissions, providing mentorship, financial support, and developmental support to writers who are deserving of an audience.
Known for bridging the access gap to theater, Mark leaned into work that reflected the racial, cultural, class, and economic differences of his constituency (what he called his beloved audience). He accepted that these differences would sometimes be divisive, but he always believed that ‘what makes us different is the most interesting thing about us’.
Learn more about Mark Plesent by reading the tribute to Mark in American Theatre, and take a look at previous recipients and mentors from the program here.
