The Department of Theatre Arts is pleased to announce that the winning playwright for this year’s Neighborhood Playwrights Series is Karen Schaeffer. Karen’s winning entry, HEAD VOICES, was selected by a committee comprised of Drake Theatre students and faculty. HEAD VOICES will be produced as a staged reading Friday, Sept. 13, and Saturday, Sept. 14, in the Turner Jazz Center as the first production of our 2024–2025 Main Stage Season. The reading will be directed by Drake Associate Professor Erin Degner.

This is Karen’s second win in the NPS competition. Her play PROLOG (co-written with her son, Alex Schaeffer) was the winning entry in 2023.  Congratulations to Karen and we hope you will join us for the reading of HEAD VOICES in September.

— Josie Poppen, Theatre Arts