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Coming June 2025 to Washington, D.C. and NYC

Pride Plays returns in 2025 with an expanded celebration of queer stories, featuring performances and programming in both D.C. and NYC. This year, we are proud to partner with Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company in Washington, D.C. as part of WorldPride 2025, and Rattlestick Theater in New York City.

Stay tuned for more details for our NYC programing.

PridePlays - Photo Credit Thomas Mundell 9.JPG

Amplifying Queer Voices, Celebrating Our Stories.

Our History
Launched in 2019 by the original founders Michael Urie, Doug Nevin, and Nick Mayo, in partnership with Rattlestick Theater, the initial festival hosted 19 separate works and involved more than 200 artists over five days. Pride Plays then presented a virtual festival in 2020, along with several online workshops. Pride Plays has also supported LGBTQIA+ creative initiatives, including Donja R. Love's Write Out Loud program. In 2024, Sam Gravitte and Sammy Lopez joined as the Pride Plays 2024 Celebration producers.

 

Director Ibi Owolabi will join the festival programming team for Pride Plays 2025, advancing the festival’s commitment to amplifying queer voices and stories as the organization continues to grow and expand in New York City and beyond.


Our Mission
Pride Plays’ mission is to celebrate and platform queer works, introduce new voices to the theatrical ecosystem, and support the next generation of artists. We hope to foster a deeper understanding of and appreciation for queer stories.

Our 2025 Pride Plays in D.C.

PONY

by Sylvan Oswald

Directed by Will Davis

Presented Tuesday, June 3 and Thursday, June 5

Time: 7:30pm

 

When Pony, a formerly incarcerated trans guy, moves to a small rural town to start a new life, he quickly becomes entangled with its isolated community. He starts to fall for a waitress who is obsessed with a local murder; his social worker doesn’t understand him; and he is pursued by a young trans man who thinks Pony could be the father he always wanted. Amid this whirlwind of fear and desire, Pony must find the strength to confront the stories he's been told about masculinity, violence, and self-worth.
 

THE NORMAL HEART

by Larry Kramer

Directed by Zhailon Levingston

Presented Wednesday, June 4 and Friday, June 6

Time: 7:30pm

 

Originally published in 1985 and celebrated in a passionate and eloquent 2011 Broadway revival, this definitive edition of Larry Kramer’s play features an updated version of the script, as well as notes on both the original production and the revival.

 

A searing drama about public and private indifference to the AIDS plague and one man's lonely fight to awaken the world to the crisis, The Normal Heart was based on Kramer’s real-life experience. Produced to acclaim in New York, London and Los Angeles, the play centers on Ned Weeks, a gay activist enraged at the indifference of public officials and the gay community. While trying to save the world from itself, Ned confronts the personal toll of AIDS when his lover dies of the disease.
 

NOVIOS

by Arturo Luíz Soria

Directed by Danilo Gambini

Presented Tuesday, June 3 and Thursday, June 5

Time: 7:30pm

 

A motley crew of cooks hurl insults, grab ass, and compete to be the most macho en el calor of a gringo’s kitchen but, when a new dishwasher arrives rupturing the haze of machismo and sparking a love affair with Luiz, the youngest amongst them, Gallo, the head chef and guardian to Luiz, must do what she can to wrangle the men before the train goes off the rails, jeopardizing her whole operation. 
 

THE HOTEL/MAKEDA - A BALTIMORE CYCLE PLAY

by Lady Dane Figueroa Edidi

Directed by Ibi Owolabi

Presented Wednesday, June 4 and Friday, June 6

Time: 7:30pm

 

Nearly a decade after World War II, Genieve Adams has made The Hotel Makeda one of Baltimore’s most celebrated destinations. But, even with all of its success, family secrets, the legacy of slavery, and familiar regret threaten to tear it apart. Can Gen protect her family and her business or will she be consumed by the shifting alliances of those she holds most dear. The Hotel/ Makeda: A Baltimore Cycle Play examines a business woman’s life as she navigates love, history, family, and systemic pressures and it invites us to reflect on what exactly do we mean by the American Dream.  
 

FEAR & WONDER

by Jason Tseng

Directed by Emily Hartford

Presented Tuesday, June 3 and Thursday, June 5

Time: 7:30pm

 

In a forbidden love story, Jabez and Ryan, two boys of color, navigate a Christian summer camp together in the early 2000s. Their friendship quickly grows into a budding romance that they try to keep alive after returning home. Challenged by their parents, the hazards of landline phones, and their faith, they are forced to secrecy. Finding solace in each other and their shared love of music, theology, and Harry Potter; the reality of living in between two worlds threaten to keep them apart as they navigate their blossoming queer identities and teenage angst in their conservative faith communities.
 

MOTHER MARY

by KJ Moran Velz

Directed by Charlotte La Nasa

Presented Wednesday, June 4 and Friday, June 6

Time: 7:30pm

 

Taxi driver Jo Cruz knows the streets of Boston like the back of her hand, but no road map can prepare her for meeting Mary O’Sullivan, a Catholic school teacher with a boyfriend and a strict Irish mother. Despite rising tensions between their Irish and Puerto Rican communities, Mary and Jo start connecting over daily rides to work - sharing hot dogs, library books, and a lineage of islands under Catholic and colonial rule. But their new friendship takes a turn when Mary asks Jo to take her on a risky road trip where there’s no going back. A new romcom about choice, the women who choose, and the sinners and saints that make Boston home.

NYC programming coming soon!

Our 2024 Pride Plays

Pride Plays returned to in-person programming with a vibrant celebration, featuring readings of Pure Glitter by Douglas Lyons, Debt by Adrian Einspanier & reid tang, and Saint Brigid by Hannah Benitez. See highlights from these powerful performances in the photos below.

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