Lila Rose Kaplan

Lila Rose Kaplan (born July 1, 1980 in New York, NY) is a 21st-century American playwright. She currently lives in Cambridge, MA, where she is a Huntington Playwriting Fellow with the Huntington Theatre Company as well as a Next Voices Playwriting Fellow with New Repertory Theatre.
Lila Rose Kaplan writes modern myths and bittersweet comedies that delve into the mysteries of human relationships. Her play Wildflower made its Off-Broadway debut in 2009 at Second Stage Uptown and was published by Dramatists Play Service. Her other works include We All Fall Down, Home of the Brave, 100 Planes, Bureau of Missing Persons, and Tink. Her plays have been seen and/or developed at Second Stage, Arena Stage, La Jolla Playhouse, The Old Vic, Chalk Rep, Perishable Theatre, The Kennedy Center, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Center Theatre Group, Theatreworks, PlayPenn, The Lark etc. Awards include The National Science Award in Playwriting, The International Women's Playwriting Award, The Shank Playwriting Fellowship, and the I.J. Kapstein Award in Playwriting. In 2010, She was selected as an Old Vic/New Voices T.S. Eliot Exchange Playwright and Gladiators, one of her short plays, debuted at the Old Vic in London. Ms. Kaplan has been in residence at Harvard Business School, Cornerstone Theatre Company, Ensemble Studio Theatre, and the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics. She is a graduate of Brown University, where she studied with Sarah Ruhl and Paula Vogel. She received her MFA in Playwriting from UC San Diego, where she studied with Naomi Iizuka. Lila Rose has taught at UC Santa Barbara, Westmont College, Dartmouth College, and Primary Stages. She is teaching at Lesley University and The Gamm Theatre in 2013. She is a proud founding member of The Playwrights Union in Los Angeles. www.lilarose.org

Kaplan's play Wildflower, about a woman and her troubled son escaping their past in Crested Butte, botany, and sexual awakening was developed at PlayPenn Conferencein 2008 directed by Sarah Rasmussen and premiered at Second Stage Theater in New York City in 2009 directed by Giovanna Sardelli. It is published by Dramatists Play Service.

Her play Biography of a Constellation won the 2010 National Science Playwriting Award from the Kennedy Center. It explores the myth and life of Annie Jump Cannon, one of the Harvard Computers who developed the system of classifying stars into the spectral classes O, B, A, F, G, K, M.

Her exploration of the changing relationship between two sisters, Catching Flight debuted at the Manhattan Repertory Theatre in 2006 directed by Rosalie Purvis.

Her three short works, Duet, Panda Porn, and Amy & The Unicorn were part of the Camden Fringe Festival in London in 2010. In the same year, her one act about the onset of marriage, The Chapel Play, was part of the Chalk Reparatory Theater Flash Festival in Los Angeles.