User:Rtheri3/AdamRapp Sandbox

Adam Rapp (born June 15th, 1968) is an American playwright, novelist, screenwriter, and film director. His play Red Light Winter was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 2006.

Early Life and Education
Adam Rapp was born June 15, 1968 in Joliet, Illinois. He has two siblings, an older sister Anne, and younger brother Anthony Rapp. He was raised Roman Catholic. His parents divorced when Rapp was five, and he and his two siblings were raised by their mother, who died in 1997. He attended Clarke College in Duboque, Iowa and was captain of the varsity basketball team. Adam Rapp orginally had dreams of becoming a professional basketball player, until he signed up for a poetry writing class at Clarke College, where he discovered he had a unique talent for creating stories. Adam Rapp then went on to complete a two-year fellowship at The Juilliard School.

Career
As of 2007, Rapp was the resident playwright at the Edge Theatre Company in New York City. He currently teaches at the Yale School of Drama. Rapp has stated he likes writing plays because of the companionship and togetherness that is involved in a production.

Plays
Adam Rapp first attended the O'Neill Playwrights Conference in 1996. In 2001, Adam Rapp's Nocturne was produced by the New York Theatre Workshop. It ran for 38 performances spanning between May to June of 2001  Nocturne has also been staged at Harvard University. It has been staged by notable companies, American Repertory Theater and the Berkeley Repertory Theatre. His play, Stone Cold Dead Serious, was produced in 2002 by the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Finer Noble Gases has been staged by the Rattlestick Theatre in New York City. This particular staging of Finer Noble Gases ran in 2004. Prior to this, Finer Noble Gases had been staged by Eugene O'Neill Theatre and the Actors Theatre of Louisville in 2000 and 2001, respectively. Red Light Winter was awarded the Joseph Jefferson Award in 2005 for its production at the Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago, Illinois. Red Light Winter was also nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2006. Rapp directed a production of Los Angeles by Julian Sheppard in 2007 at the Flea Theatre. In 2011, Rapp's The Metal Children made its regional debut at Swine Palace on Louisiana State University's campus. The production at Louisiana State University ran from March 23 through April 10, 2011 and featured student actors.

Novels
His first book, Missing the Piano, was published in 1996. After writing his second book, The Buffalo Tree, in 1999, Adam was invited to be the first author in residence at Ridgewood High School (Illinois). His novel, 33 Snowfish, was one of Young Adult Library Services Association top ten best books for young adults.

Film and TV
While he was working on The L Word, Rapp left in the middle of the season to attend the Edinburgh Festival.

Writing Style
Adam Rapp's inspiration for his characters and stories come most often from playing basketball and just walking the New York streets. He is very interested in the rhythm and language and personalities out of listening to conversations and voices. Once he finds the voice of a character, that character leads the story to the final product. The majority of Rapp's works feature small casts and are generally set into small spaces.

Themes
A common theme among Adam Rapp's plays is having his main characters be unconventional, lower-class Americans. His plays often combine stories of Midwestern longing with the idea of finding escape in New York. He combines humor with gloom, stating in an interview that he's "always really interested in really dark stuff."

Awards and honors
'

Plays

 * American Sligo
 * Animals and Plants
 * Bingo with the Indians
 * Blackbird (play)
 * Classic Kitchen Timer
 * CouchWorks
 * Dreams of Flying Dreams of Falling
 * Essential Self Defense
 * Faster
 * Finer Noble Gases
 * Ghosts in the Cottonwoods
 * Gompers
 * Jack on Film
 * Kindness
 * Members Only
 * The Metal Children
 * Nocturne
 * Nursing
 * Paraffin
 * Red Light Winter
 * Rose
 * Stone Cold Dead Serious
 * Trueblinka
 * Netherbones


 * Blackfrost


 * Night of the Whitefish


 * Dreams of the Salthorse


 * Decelerate Blue
 * The Edge of Our Bodies

Novels

 * Missing the Piano
 * The Buffalo Tree
 * The Copper Elephant
 * Punkzilla
 * Under the Wolf, Under the Dog
 * Little Chicago
 * 33 Snowfish
 * The Year of Endless Sorrows
 * Ball-Peen Hammer

Screenwriter

 * In Treatment
 * Blackbird (2007 film)
 * The L Word
 * Winter Passing
 * The Jury (TV series)

Director

 * Blackbird (2007 film)
 * Winter Passing

Creative Consultant

 * The L Word