The Lab@SCR

About The Lab@SCR

The Lab@SCR is a comprehensive play-development infrastructure that provides resources with which artists can imagine, create and develop new work for SCR and for the American theatre. These initiatives are all housed in The Lab@SCR.

• Pacific Playwrights Festival: This annual three-day festival showcases the best in new American plays and musicals. Founded in 1998, it serves as a meeting-ground for national theatre professionals and avid local new-play fans by presenting seven new plays—in readings, workshops and productions. Going forward, it will provide a forum for sharing work emerging from The Lab@SCR and as a means to advance the development of that work. PPF aims to promote co-productions, multiple productions and new opportunities for America’s finest playwrights, and to foster a sense of community among artists and audiences devoted to new American theatre.
  
  
• Musicals: Beginning in 2020, SCR committed to the goal of including one musical or music-theatre piece in each Pacific Playwrights’ Festival.
  
  
• Samples from the Lab: In 2024, SCR launched Samples from The Lab. Samples from The Lab offers SCR audiences an exclusive sneak peek at the work being developed at SCR, with several casual, process-focused readings and presentations throughout the season. 
  
  
• Pinnacle Commissions: On its own, or in partnership with a like-minded theatre, SCR will periodically offer a large, “pinnacle commission” to a major American playwright. The inaugural commission of $60,000 is in partnership with Playwrights Horizons.
  
  
• Mid-Career Commissions: SCR commissions exceptional mid-career playwrights, offering higher compensation, with an eye toward encouraging their continued contributions to the American theatre in the face of lucrative opportunities in other media.
  
  
• Emerging Commissions: SCR places a special emphasis on investing in early-career playwrights, for whom a commission serves as both financial support—at a time when it’s particularly needed—and a vote of confidence.
  
  
• CrossRoads Commissions: SCR’s CrossRoads Initiative provides commissions to writers whom the theatre brings to Orange County for immersive, community-engagement residencies at the beginning of and at key moments in their creative process. CrossRoads promotes a shared sense that new projects are being created for this community, inspired by this community and with the active engagement of people who live in Orange County neighborhoods.
  
  
• Lab/Work: These in-house readings and workshops will take place when a writer wants to work with actors and/or other collaborators without having a public audience at the end of the process. The Lab@SCR will provide numerous manners of in-house readings or workshops, ranging from a one-day table reading to a long-term exploration. By tailoring the collaborative experience to the needs of the individual writer and project, Lab/Work puts the emphasis on process and discovery.
  
  
• Lab Residencies: Sometimes for a creative artist, it’s just about retreating from the demands of everyday life and being given a place and the time to write, away from the usual distractions. SCR playwrights always know they can find that retreat, now funded by The Lab@SCR.
  
  
• NewSCRipts: SCR’s first new-play development program, NewSCRipts, was created in 1985 and opened a window on the development process for interested audience members. The program, which was active from 1985 to 2024, allowed playwrights the chance to hear their work-in-progress read and to receive audience feedback. From 2021-2024, SCR expanded the NewSCRipts series to include NewSCRipts in Schools. In addition to the public reading at SCR, select readings in the series received a subsequent presentation at a local college or university.