PHILANA IMADE OMOROTIONMWAN
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PLAYS
Click on the underlined titles to read excerpts or download the full script on the New Play Exchange. 
Untitled
A work in the idea phase about the mandate that, with the exception of our heads, women be completely hairless.
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The Defiance of Dandelions (7W)
A play in progress about policing black femininity.

Do not speak too loudly or too little or too much.
Do not get out of the place you’ve been assigned.
Do not give birth to a meadow of dandelions.


For as long as they can remember, The Strongness, The Queerness, The Boisterousness, The Brazenness, The Thickness, and The Softness have been trapped in the In-School Shading Room. While they wait for a release that seems like it may never come, a bouquet is born and they begin to remember the selves and the world that they forgot. 

Production, We Will Dream Festival, 2023 (upcoming)
Workshop Production,
Seabury Quinn, Jr. Playwrights' Festival, 2018
Fireflies (5W)
It’s twilight time.
And the small, winged things--
like lovebugs and roaches and fireflies--
have begun to stir and search for light.
Will Then-Self find hers before she dies?
Or will Now-Self find other ways to survive?
Consisting of thirteen vignettes, Fireflies ​uses narration, movement, and music to tell the story of one girl’s longing and search for intimacy through the lives of insects. 

​Selection, Playwrights' Center Jerome Fellowship, 2018
Reading, Tantrum Theater's Rising Voices Reading Series, 2017
Finalist, University of Tulsa's WomenWorks, 2017
Staged Reading, Seabury Quinn Jr. Playwrights' Festival, 2017

Reading, UC Berkeley TDPS New Play Series, 2017
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Before Evening Comes (2W, 2M) 
With his 13th birthday around the corner, Totome is excited to meet “the butcher” and finally become a man. His mother, however, hopes to keep him whole for just a little while longer. 

​Before Evening Comes is a poetic exploration of what becomes of black boys and men in a dystopian future rooted in the founding myths of the black male body as either a commodity or a threat.


​Winner, David Calicchio Emerging American Playwright Prize, 2019
Semifinalist, Many Voices Fellowship, 2019
Semifinalist, P73 Fellowship, 2019
Finalist, Theatre503 Playwriting Award, 2018
Reading, Geva Theatre Center Festival of New Theater, 2018
Semifinalist, Relentless Award, 2017
Finalist, Princess Grace Playwriting Fellowship, 2017
Reading, La MaMa Experiments Reading Series, 2017
Development Workshop, Br!nk New Play Festival, 2016

Development Workshop, Bay Area Playwrights Festival, 2016
Strong Face, or Misogynoir (3W, 2M)
Maybe it's her "energy." Maybe it's her hair. Or maybe it's just her skin. Whatever it is, no one in Follywood seems to be able to see that actress Bentley Jones is a woman. Not even her hip-pop star girlfriend Yoni Baker. Or her man-in-a-dress rival Whip Williams. But when Bentley learns that major studio 19th Century Cocks has green lit a slavery-themed biopic guaranteed to earn its female star an impOSTOR nomination, she has to decide if she’s ready for her real close up.​

Reading, New American Voices, 2019
Reading, Athena Festival, 2018
Reading, Seabury Quinn Jr. Playwrights' Festival, 2016
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One-Acts
The Settlement (2W, 1M)
Isaac and Rebecca are new homeowners who find their domestic bliss permanently disrupted by the late night arrival of Shirley. Shirley claims the land on which the couple's home has been built belonged to her ancestors and is rightfully hers. 
Production (ten-minute version), Going to the River Festival, 2011

Sitting Under a Silk-Cotton Tree (2W)
Force-fed self-hatred by her mother, a girl called Roach tries to navigate her way to self-love.

The Wrinkles in Our Paths (5W)
A coming-of-age fairytale about being half princess, half beast, and madly attracted to trolls.
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One Mississippi Two (2W)
...

Select Short Plays
Brandon. Brumley. Bro. (1W, 1M) or
Carry Yourself With The Confidence Confidence... 
​A black female college student at a PWI seeks peace of mind by taking on the identity of a frat bro.
Publication, My Mother#*%!^X%#! College Life, excerpted monologue, 2017
Reading, Fade to Black Fest Reading Series, 2017
 
 
A Race Play (2P)
Production, Gi60: the One Minute Play Festival, 2016
Fireflies (2W)
While away at Girl Scout Camp, Lola discovers why some things need the darkness.
Reading, Voices HEaRd, 2019
Finalist, Heideman Award, Actors Theatre of Louisville, 2017

Fireflies from M.r. Fitzgerald on Vimeo.

Color ED (2W) 
Miss Snow wants to reach her goal of having 100% of students on task bubbling in circles, but Jade insists on coloring... with colors.
Reading, Little Black Dress Ink ONSTAGE: Volume Control, Semifinalist, 2018
Production, Prism Festival, Stay Awake! Theatre, 2017


​Dis Da Hood (2W) 
Ten years after Hurricane Katrina, two native New Orleanians prepare to protect their homes from a new force of nature: white millenials from the East Coast.
Finalist, Heideman Award, Actors Theatre of Louisville, 2016

How Are You Called? (2F, 1M) |
Girl wants to communicate with her ancestor, but she doesn't even know her name.
MOJOAA, Reclamation, 2018

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Mama Moon (5W) 
Mama Moon's descendants aren't being protected by her light.
Production, 20% Theatre Chicago Snapshots, 2017


The (Some) Body Shop (1W, 3M)
Most customers buy a Somebody Someone ™ because they want to fool others about their failure to connect. Eva, however, hopes a purchase might help her to fool herself.
Production, Tantrum Theater Bridge Company, 2018
Commission and Production, Ohlone College Playwrights Festival, 2018 


The Worst of All Evils/Pandora's Jar (1W, 1M) 
​
Pandora has grown tired of Hesiod's version of her life story and tries to take control of the narrative.
Reading, Voices HEaRd, 2019
Production, Little Black Dress Ink ONSTAGE: Hot Mess Winning Play, 2017
Reading, Little Black Dress Ink ONSTAGE: Hot Mess, Semifinalist, 2017
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