The Loop is nevermore...

From The Loop Online:

Hi, everybody. We hope you’re having a terrific start to the fall, and that you’re writing is growing in all directions. We have some bad news and good news to share with you. It’s time to wrap The Loop up. We started 8 years ago, when Facebook didn’t exist, Twitter wasn’t apart of the cultural landscape and the internet wasn’t a glorious proliferation of resources. What begin as a simple group email grew to 2500+ strong in a short amount of time. We went from emails, to Word documents, to pdf’s, to an on-line magazine, to its current incarnation. And that’s where it started going wrong. The Ning network, that hosts the Loop, is just too cumbersome, too awkward, too hard to navigate, doesn’t do justice to the submission opportunities and the site has essentially just become a social network (which is done much better in so many other different places). There are too many resources in this day and age that do things with more time, money, people and resources than we have and frankly, do them better. 

So we’re shutting it down at the end of this month. But we did want to leave you with a lot of resources that may or may not know. First, and this has been a long-standing confusion, The Loop is not tied to the Dramatists Guild. But you should be a member of the Guild if you’re serious about being a playwright. Aside from being tireless advocates for members’ rights and the extraordinary business advice from three staff lawyers, you get live-streamed seminars and workshops and podcasts from the country’s leading playwrights. Add to that a magazine that is all about you and your career, a national conference that explores what it means to be a writer in this day and age, a dynamic website that connects writers with the entertainment industry and simple being an integral part of your tribe. For more information, go to: www.dramatistsguild.com.  

We pull submission opportunities from a number of places, but start here with this relatively new site: http://www.submissioncalendar.com. 

An extraordinary resource for writers can be found at http://www.2amtheatre.com, or The Center for the Theatre Commons at http://www.howlround.com 

Also look at or subscribe to: 

 · Playwrights' Center: www.pwcenter.org 

 · Emerging Playwrights: info@emergingplaywright.com 

 · Sart Plays: sartplays@aol.com 

 · Northwest Playwrights Alliance: samanthaj.cooper@gmail.com 

 · The Playwrights Realm Gang: info@playwrightsrealm.org 

 · EBE Ensemble: info@ebeensemble.com (occassional email) 

And then below are more websites that are only sometimes helpful (always best to check the theatre's personal website to make sure the submission is still valid): 

http://www.stageplays-forum.com/ (see "Markets and Marketing" two-thirds of the way down the page) 

http://www.playwritingopportunities.com/ 

http://www.burryman.com/submissions.html 

http://p202.ezboard.com/benavantplaywrights 

http://www.nycplaywrights.org/nycplaywrights/ 

http://www.aact.org/cgi-bin/webdata_contests.pl?cgifunction=Search 

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/playsandplaywrights/ 

If you’re in a college or university program, check out The Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival at www.kcactf.org and look under the Kanin Awards. 

And finally, if you’re on Twitter, follow The Loop founder, Gary Garrison at this address: @PlayAtWriting. 

And one of the smartest men in the playwriting field, Gwydion Suilebhan, at this address: @GwydionS 

Or Adam Szymkowicz: @AdamSzymkowicz 

Or Jeremy Sony: @JeremyWrites 

Or I Follow Playwrights: @IFollowPW’s 

We wish you all the best with your writing. Remember, it all begins with you. Nothing in the theatre can happen without you being there first. You’re important, your vital, your essential. Hold fast to your dreams and tell your stories: we need to hear each other, our communities need to hear our stories and our culture desperately needs your heart and soul to shine a light on what it does right and what it does wrong. 

Write well, 

The Staff of the Loop