2025 Roundup

how do you measure a

A reminder before we begin - I have not one but two NYC presentations of new plays in January! I’m beginning 2026 with a reading of my Uncle Vanya adaptation and a staged workshop in NYC of my metatheatrical autobiographical fever dream of a play lisa; a fantasia January 16th & 17th at Theater Row - more details are at the end of this post.

Hope to see you there!

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

I write this post in the midst of That December Week – you know the one, the muddy, murky in-between series of days sandwiched in the middle of Christmas and New Year’s Eve. The week where time seems to stand still even as it stubbornly moves forward. It feels like a thick cream-based soup. Part of me is grateful for the quiet, part of me is resentful because it makes it so much harder to get motivated about – well, anything. My inbox is quiet and so do I want to be. But there are still things to do – Substack posts to write, plays to rewrite, a script to rehearse – all things I love, but the energy of the week makes it so, so much harder.

But I’m here now! And I’m excited to share some highlights from the year. Not my year in rejections – that will happen later this week with December’s Rejection Roundup, but pretty much every other statistic I could think of – that’s all here.

This doesn’t encapsulate the immense joy I felt this year – the intense laughter, the warm fuzzy moments spent with friends, the hours of professional zoom meetings and coffees, the time spent staring into space, trying to motivate myself to do anything, the hours spent stressing about the future. This is but a quiet snapshot, an imperfect picture but a picture nonetheless.

We mark the passing of December into January as a year, socially agreed upon as such, and so there’s a lot of pressure placed on the ending of the one and beginning of the other. But you can begin any time. A full year is nice to look at – it’s a neat and tidy encapsulation of time. But our lives extend beyond those borders. So remember that, as this year ends and another begins. Your creative life knows no such boundaries – you are always beginning.

So without any further preamble – here’s my year in review.

This year, I wrote:

• 2 new full-length plays (We’re Okay, We’re Okay, We’re All Gonna Be Okay and The Evergreen Players Proudly Presents a New Version of Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya)

• 1 45-minute play under a pseudonym

• 1 10-minute screenplay (Practice)

• 15,000 words of a new novel (currently untitled)

• 5,000 words of a different novel (also untitled)

• 35 Substack posts (including this one!)

• Co-wrote a feature-length screenplay (Second Puberty)

I rewrote:

• Star-Crossed (my second novel, 2 drafts)

• We’re Okay x3 (2 drafts)

• Evergreen Players (still technically rewriting it right now this very minute lollol)

• That Time Terri and Lily Took a Road Trip to See the Laura Ingalls Wilder House (2 drafts)

• The Violet Sisters (1 draft)

• lisa; a fantasia (2 drafts)

• I HATE SHAKESPEARE (a solo show, 1 drafts)

I had readings, workshops, productions for:

• The Violet Sisters (2 readings, 1 self-produced reading in Massachusetts, and a workshop with The Playwrights’ Center)

• We’re Okay x3 (NYC workshop with The Farm Theater, first University Production with Austin Peay)

• Evergreen Players (2 internal readings with Boomerang, one virtual, one in person)

• butterfly effect (1 virtual reading with Lather, Rinse Repeat)

• That Time Terri and Lily…(three readings, one virtual with Lather, Rinse, Repeat, one invited reading and 1 public reading with Good Apples Collective)

• lisa; a fantasia (2 times, one self-produced reading in February and now, come see us in January!)

• For The Love Of (or, the roller derby play) (University production + a reading in NYC)

• The Virtuous Fall of the Girls From Our Lady of Sorrows (Middlebury)

• Mercutio Loves Romeo Loves Juliet Loves (Boston University)

Had two plays published:

• Mercutio Loves Romeo Loves Juliet Loves

• The Virtuous Fall of the Girls from Our Lady of Sorrows

I taught:

• 3 First Draft classes at ESPA

• 1 Creating the Fictional You class with Playwrights’ Center

• 3 Novel Writing 101 classes

• 2 one-off playwriting workshops (hire me!)

• 1 advanced novel writing class

• 1 tarot/writing workshop

• and got to work with about 20 playwrights one-on-one (if you want to work with me one-on-one, reach out!)

I traveled to:

• Cancun, Mexico for my birthday

• Las Vegas, Nevada for fun

• Chicago, Illinois for secret reasons

• The Villages, Florida 3 times to see my parents

• Throggs’ Neck, The Bronx for a mini-retreat

• Minneapolis, Minnesota to workshop The Violet Sisters with The Playwrights’ Center

• Jacksonville, Florida for a retreat with Clamour Theater

• Clarksville, Tennessee to see the first production of We’re Okay x3

Other highlights of the year included:

• Getting to meet one of my best friend’s kid (he’s the best kid, ever, sorry other kids)

• Getting to work with one of my best friends on two different projects and seeing a bunch of theater with her

• Getting to write a screenplay with my other best friend and actually doing it

• Receiving two commissions

• Meeting a bunch of new people who are now some of my favorite people

• Reconnecting with a friend and becoming Book Buddies with him

• Seeing a New York Liberty game at the Barclays Center

• Hosting Thanksgiving

• Being Honored at Retro Theater’s Gala

• And being loved and loving the best partner a person could ever hope to have

Lowlights included:

• Our family dog crossing the rainbow bridge

• My dad being in and out of the hospital and rehab 3 times

• Spending most of November sick

• Dealing with one of the most unprofessional actor experiences ever (don’t worry, there’ll be a Substack about it someday)

• Dealing with some really intense and disrespectful students (I’m so lucky this is a rare occurrence but they were extreme and it was rough!)

I read 31 books and my favorites were (in no order):

• Homeseeking by Karissa Chen

• The Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali

• Clytemnestra by Constanza Castati

• All’s Well by Mona Awad

• Penitence by Kristin Koval

• Alive Day: a Memoir by Karie Fugett

• The Strange Case of Jane O. by Karen Thompson Walker

• The Women by Kristin Hannah

• I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself by Marisa Crane

• My Volcano by John Elizabeth Stinzi

(All written by women and/or non-binary folks!)

I watched 136 movies and my Top 10 were (in order of 1-10):

1. The Wild Robot

2. Sing Sing

3. Smile 2

4. Bird

5. Beau is Afraid

6. The Ugly Stepsister

7. Nickel Boys

8. Drive My Car

9. Grand Theft Hamlet

10. Bring Her Back

I also watched a bunch of theater but sadly don’t keep good track of it =/ yikes but I loved Marjorie Prime & The Baker’s Wife.

Next year, I’d love:

• to have some more productions of my work – especially The Virtuous Fall of the Girls from Our Lady of Sorrows and Mercutio Loves Romeo Loves Juliet Loves.

• for something to happen with This Happened Once at the Romance Depot Off The I-87 in Westchester.

• The Violet Sisters to finally receive a production.

• to focus on writing another screenplay

• to finally finish my third novel

Looking back at the year, I’m pretty friggin proud of what I’ve accomplished. I mean, I wrote two plays, man! And they’re both plays I’m really psyched about. I taught so many classes and got to meet so many new writers and have been inspired by all their work. I made opportunities instead of waiting for them to appear.

I took huge-ass risks and a lot of them paid off. I mean, starting this Substack was a risk – and I honestly cannot believe how warmly it’s been received. I never considered myself any kind of essayist but you’ve all literally proven me wrong. Thank you all for reading – each one of you has truly made my year in a really special way.

And just for fun, here are the most popular posts of the year (in no particular order):

• Bad Notes

• How to Write a Producible Play

• The Stories We Tell

• Submission Season

• Development Hell

• The Cycle of Being an Artist

• On Lists & Off Lists

Photo by Kyrie kim on Unsplash

I hope you take some time and reflect on your year, too, if you haven’t already. The good, the bad, the great, the okay, the outstanding and meh. What came easy? What was hard? And what do you hope for as you enter 2026?

Whatever it is, I hope you enter into the year with an open heart and a stubborn confidence. You can create anything - and everything.

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A few announcements before you go -

• Very excited to be jumping into the new year with this staged workshop of lisa; a fantasia. It’s a metatheatrical absurdist autobiographical fever dream of a play - and I’m in it! Three performances only, January 16 & 17th at Theater Row. You can find out more information and reserve tickets here.

• Tickets are available for Boomerang Theater’s reading of The Evergreen Players Proudly Present a New Version of Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya. January 9th at 7:30pm! Also in NYC.

• MERCUTIO LOVES ROMEO LOVES JULIET LOVES and The Virtuous Fall of the Girls From Our Lady of Sorrows are available to be purchased and licensed from Original Works Production! Please consider licensing these plays as part of your upcoming theater season.

Thank you for making my year so special. Your support of this Substack means the world to me. I’ll see you in a few days for December’s Rejection Roundup where I’ll outline my rejection/submission/etc. stats for the whole year. Until then, protect your art – and your heart. And have a happy new year.