I’m raising support to help launch two published plays: Colored Hearing and la fille noire + the bad boy.

Both plays are part of my larger work as a playwright. Work that moves through Black family memory, Southern history, racial spectacle, grief, public violence, buried records, and the old theatrical machines we inherit from tragedy, myth, and American history.

Colored Hearing is a Black Southern Gothic nightmare about a family in 1989 forced back into a twenty-year-old wound when evidence in a buried case begins to move again and feel suspicious.

la fille noire + the bad boy confronts the public spectacle around the lynching of Laura Nelson, her son L.D., and the violence of being remembered through the very image that tried to destroy them.

I have done the writing. I have begun the publishing process. Now I’m raising funds for the part that many independent playwrights cannot do alone: getting the work into the world with reach.

Funds from this campaign will help cover publication costs, ISBN and setup expenses, proof copies, author copies, review copies, shipping, press materials, basic advertising, and outreach to theatres, professors, libraries, reviewers, conservatories, directors, and artists.

The first goal is simple: get the plays printed, mailed, promoted, and read.

If the campaign goes beyond its first goal, the next phase will support live development: staged readings, artist stipends, rehearsal resources, venue deposits, dramaturgical support, and early planning toward future world-premiere productions.

This is not a request to fund a hobby. It is a request to help give serious theatrical work a public life beyond the manuscript.

Any support helps. A donation helps put these plays into the hands of people who may read them, teach/learn from them, review them, stage them, or carry the conversation with them into the next room.

How funds will be used?

Publication and setup expenses

ISBNs, print setup, proofing, copyright/library submission costs, and final publication preparation.

Author and proof copies

Copies for final review, records, archives, and professional outreach.

Review and theatre outreach copies

Books mailed to theatres, professors, directors, reviewers, libraries, conservatories, and artists.

Press and advertising

Launch graphics, press-kit materials, basic digital advertising, website support, and promotional materials.

Shipping and materials

Postage, mailers, packaging, and printed outreach materials.

Stretch funding: live development

If the campaign exceeds its first goal, additional funds will support staged readings, actor/director/dramaturg stipends, rehearsal resources, venue deposits, and early planning for future world-premiere productions.

To learn more about my work as a playwright, visit my website: http://www.hardawayancestry.com/drew-hardaway-playwright.html