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SHORT NEW PLAY FESTIVAL 2026
This year's theme? REFINISHED
Six brand new short plays will be selected from an open-submission process and presented in live in-person staged readings alongside two new short plays by commissioned writers. ​
SUBMISSIONS ARE OPEN!
Submissions close at 12 PM NOON on March 23rd, 2026
Red Bull Theater’s annual Short New Play Festival has generated over 4,000 new short plays of classic themes and heightened language, presenting over 100 of them in a one-night-only Festival performance with some of New York’s finest actors and directors. In its first fourteen years, the commissioned playwrights have included Will Eno Larissa FastHorse, Marcus Gardley, Madeleine George, John Guare, Stephen Adly Guirgis, Jeremy O. Harris, David Ives, Craig Lucas, Robert O’Hara, Dael Orlandersmith, Heather Raffo, Theresa Rebeck, José Rivera, Anne Washburn, Doug Wright, Anna Ziegler, and winning entries by writers such as Anchuli Felicia King, Patricia Ione Lloyd, Lynn Rosen, and Jen Silverman. Stage Rights has published a 5-volume collection of the plays from the first 10 years of Red Bull Theater’s annual Short New Play Festival as RED BULL SHORTS.
EXPLORE PAST YEARS FESTIVALS
15th annual Short New Play Festival
14th annual Short New Play Festival
13th annual Short New Play Festival
12th annual Short New Play Festival
11th annual Short New Play Festival
10th annual Short New Play Festival
9th annual Short New Play Festival
8th annual Short New Play Festival
7th annual Short New Play Festival
6th annual Short New Play Festival
5th annual Short New Play Festival
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