NEW PLAY DEVELOPMENT

 Through this program, Theatre Exile has presented live readings of local playwrights’ scripts while they are in progress for an audience of peers and casual theater fans. These readings provide an opportunity for playwrights to see their work performed for an audience and receive constructive critiques from their community. 

2025 STUDIO X-HIBITION READINGS

  • GIRL DOLLS: The American Musical

    GIRL DOLLS: The American Musical

    Written and Performed by

    Pax Ressler and Jackie Soro

    Monday March 10, 2025 @ 7pm


    What is an “American”? What is a “girl”? And most importantly, what is a “doll”? This devised cabaret musical from Jackie Soro and Pax Ressler will investigate and explode the nostalgia and hidden histories of our plushy-bodied playthings.

     What is an "American?" What is a "girl?" And most importantly, what is a "DOLL?" This devised cabaret piece from Jackie Soro & Pax Ressler grapple with these questions and more—inquiries that refract into dizzying issues of identity, nationality, gender, and race. Using memories, dolls, photos, and personal stories—combined with research into the phenomenon of the coveted (and expensive) Mattel(TM) American Girl Dolls—Ressler and Soro playfully explode the nostalgia & hidden histories of their childhood playthings.

    GET TICKETS HERE
  • DEAD MEAT

    DEAD MEAT

    by Paige Zubel

    Monday June 16, 2025 @ 7pm

    It’s the end of the world. A once-promising medication goes awry, mutating 51% of the world’s population into shells of human beings, with only the basic motor functions left to chase, bite, and kill. (Yep. They’re zombies.) Three men—seemingly alone in the apocalypse—honestly are pretty all right with it. With all the women gone, they can finally kick back, relax, and get back to their men-only BBQ. Until Alex—an intersex woman—distorts the dichotomies in which they view their black-and-white world. How is Alex alive? Is Alex's life worth saving? And—ultimately—how can the men go about saving Alex when women are strictly against the BBQ rules? In a quest for survival, adaptation is necessary. Will masculinity bend for a new world, or is the pull of the routines of a lost time too strong to resist?

    COMING SOON

  • STAY TUNED

    COMING SOON

2024 READINGS:

2023 READINGS:

For over 25 years, Theatre Exile has committed to cultivating the future of theater through new play development. New play development began in 1996 when Theatre Exile presented a world premiere of The Further Adventures of the Gavone Family, a locally written show by Joseph Sorrentino. That commitment to new and cutting-edge work has continued to thrive and grow. In 2010, Theatre Exile formally launched Studio X-hibition, which presents live readings of local playwrights’ scripts while they are in progress for an audience of peers and casual theater fans. These readings provide an opportunity for playwrights to see their work performed for a live audience and receive constructive critiques from their community. 

Through this program, Theatre Exile has contributed to the development of over 27 plays, 15 of which were later produced for regional and national audiences. Additionally, several shows have received notable awards and commendations, including the Smith Prize, Kesselring Honorable Mention Prize, and the Plays for Now grant from Venturous Theatre.

New play development has remained one of Theatre Exile’s core tenets since premiering Sorrentino’s show in 1996. Since its formal launch in 2010, Studio X-hibition has grown to include staged readings, workshop development programs, and writers’ workshops that support new, gritty, provocative theater. The annual series brings Philadelphia’s local playwrights to Theatre Exile as they explore a new piece that can challenge and provoke audiences to think about the process of storytelling. Through another program, Out of Exile, Theatre Exile commissions playwrights to create an original play for theatergoers of all ages.