Beckwith Theatre Company is now accepting entries for the Second Annual Local Playwrights’ Festival of 10-minute Plays. Eight entries will be selected for February 2026 performances. This CALL FOR ENTRIES includes information about submitting your entry, the Festival format and timelines, and some suggestions that you may want to keep in mind when writing your play.

 

PURPOSE: The purpose of the Festival is threefold. First, to showcase talented playwrights living in our greater area. Second, to connect local playwrights with theatres. Third, to benefit BTC’s Capital Campaign drive. No royalties or director stipends are offered for these plays. No monetary awards are offered to those plays selected. All proceeds go to the capital campaign.

 

Residency Requirement: Playwrights living in Berrien, Cass, Kalamazoo, St. Joseph, and VanBuren Counties in Michigan, and Elkhart, Laporte, and Saint Joseph Counties in Indiana are eligible to submit plays.

 

Criterion for Submission: Playwrights are to submit plays that…

• Can be presented in a space not more than 12’ by 12’. (3 plays will be set up at a time.

• Require few set pieces and props.

• Have 5 or fewer actors.

• Have few lighting or sound cues.

• Can be performed in 10 minutes or less.

• Feature one or more of the particular theme, set piece, or property as follows.

  • Plays about or featuring senior citizens.

  • Plays that center around this particular prop - a paper bag filled with $3,000.

  • Plays that center around this particular set piece – a cat towe

  • Plays that center around this particular set piece – a bean bag chair

  • Plays that center around this particular prop – a woman’s hat circa 1920-1930

 

Play Submission Format: Information for Playwrights

• Text is to be typed using the 12 pt. Courier New or the Aptos Mono typefaces as both are similar to a typewriter and very easy for reviewers to read. I

• Character speeches should be single-spaced and flush left.

• The character name should be in boldface caps, centered over the speech line or lines.

• Each page is to be numbered. Numbers may be top right, bottom right, or both.

• Entries must be submitted in an electronic/digital format. They may be submitted as an Adobe PDF file or as a regular MS Word file.

• Playwrights are to submit their entries in two separate files, as follows

  • Playwrights are to submit a title page that provides the name of the play, their name, their complete address, their contact phone number, and their email address. 

  • Playwrights are to have the name of the play and the page number at the top of each page of their script. Such may be provided in the header of each page.

• Excluding the title page, the play should not exceed 11 pages of text. The character name and speech lines may be single-spaced as long as there is a line break between different characters.

 

HOW TO SUBMIT ENTRIES: All entries are to be submitted digitally to btcplayfestival@gmail.com. Questions are to be directed to the same email address.

 

NOTICE to PLAYWRIGHTS: Please make note of these points.

• You may submit up to four plays.

• Entries submitted that do not conform to the submission criterion or submission format will not be accepted.

• Should one or more of your entries be selected, you agree that the Beckwith Theatre Company may present your work as interpreted by the selected director and actors, and that the Beckwith Theatre Company may use your name in promoting the 10-Minute Play Festival.

• Should one or more of your entries be selected, you will be offered two tickets for each performance.

• Should you wish, you will be publicly recognized at each performance you attend.

 

DEADLINES and Process Dates:

• Entry Deadline - October 13, 2025 (1by 1:59 PM that date)

• Submissions Reviewed and selected – October 31, 2025

• Notification to playwrights – November 1-7, 2025

• BTC will seek Directors  for the selected entries by November 8, 2025

• Directors and BTC will recruit and secure actors by December 8, 2025

• Directors and actors are expected to make their own arrangements to rehearse their play.

• Technical rehearsals will be scheduled at the Beckwith from February 1 through 5, 2026. Specific dates and times will be determined.

• Performances at the Beckwith are scheduled for February 6/7/8, 2026

 

Performance Dates: The first full weekend in February. Friday and Saturday evening and Sunday matinee, February 6-7-8, 2026.

 

Performance Format: There will be 2 Acts, with each Act having four 10-minute plays. Three plays would be set in advance, with a few minutes to set the fourth play. With introductions and announcements, plan 50 minutes for each act. The second Act would be set during intermission.

 

SELECTING the 8 Entries TO BE PRESENTED: A 3-person panel will review each entry will score entries on the following.

• Feasibility:  Could this play be staged easily in the festival space and format? Does it adhere to all of the criteria for Submission as stated above? (15 points)

• Essentials:  Does this play have the essentials for dramatic development?  Is there a protagonist?  Is there an antagonist? Does something really happen on stage?  (15 points)

• Story/Plot:  Does something happen? Does the story progress at a good pace and understanding?  Is the plot interesting enough to hold the audience’s attention?  Does the play capture your attention?  (15 points)

• Mood and Genre:  Is it easy to tell the genre and the mood of the play? Can the audience tell early on if they are seeing a comedy, melodrama, or thriller, etc.? Is the mood or genre carried out through the play? If not, is the twist or surprise logical and satisfying?  (10 points)

• Characters:  Are the characters interesting and credible?  Are they all necessary to the play?  Will the audience care about what happens to them?  (10 points)

• Dialogue:  Does the dialogue sound natural and credible?  Is it fresh and compelling?  Does it suit the character?  (10 points)

• Overall rating:  Is the dramatic situation or conflict interesting for an audience?  Did you enjoy the play?  Were you comfortable with the setting, situation, characters, dialogue, pace, and resolution?  Could you picture the action onstage?  Did you feel it was worth your time to get to know the characters and their story?   (25 points)

 

Here are some helpful guidelines for experienced and new playwrights wishing to enter this short-form play. 

• For our purposes, please keep the action of your play in a small stage space. The performing space for your play should not exceed 12x12 feet.

• For ease of production, as one of the festival productions, please limit your play to not more than five characters. You are encouraged to work with only two or three characters.

• Keep all of your characters on stage as long as possible. Entrances and exits create activity but may deflate the dramatic action. If characters have dynamic goals, they will stay on stage to pursue those goals. Think about characters that keep coming and going. Why? Must they? What is this doing to the action in your short-form play?

• For our purposes, you are to stay in one locale for a real-time conversation or dialogue. There are to be no breaks, no scene shifts, no blackouts, and no time lapses.

• This year, ten-minute entries must conform to a theme and include the same prop or set piece described elsewhere in this Call for Entries. But whichever you select, you must show the prop or set piece, rather than just talk about it! The set piece or prop you select should be central to your play.

• 10-minute play scripts are not to exceed ten typed pages in the format detailed elsewhere in this Call for Entries.  The shortness enables us to keep your whole play in mind as we see how it may fit into our Festival format.

• Your short play must have a beginning, a middle, and an end – and all the other pieces of a longer play; i.e., a protagonist, an antagonist, a dramatic question, and a climax.

• Keep your play ‘realistic’ or ‘naturalistic.’ Neither is boring.

• The short form play has no patience for long exposition. Let information find its way into the rising action. Also, note that using a narrator to provide information is a lazy playwright’s way of providing context! Avoid long speeches.

• Make sure your crisis and your climax are ‘onstage events’ rather than talked about as happening being off stage or ‘now I realize’ or ‘from memory’ speeches. 

• Keep the action onstage. Don’t talk about something that happened elsewhere or at another time; make all the action happen on your stage in your play.

• Make sure to review the information in the complete Call for Entries.

 

That’s it. Have fun. Write and re-write until you submit your play.