andrea markowitz

Hooked on theatre since age seven when she saw her first Broadway show, playwright, lyricist and composer Andrea Markowitz earned degrees in English, music and psychology, and pursued careers in advertising, human resources, academia, and freelance writing and editing before authoring her first play, FEEDING THE FURIES, a social satire that took third place in the Baltimore Playwrights Festival. Her latest work, FAIR GAME: OR THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING HONEST (a musical satire based on a true story about fake news) was just nominated for the best new script and best new score by the ariZoni Theatre Awards of Excellence committee (winner will be announced October, 2022). Andrea wrote both the script and the score! She’s also thrilled to have been awarded an Honorable Mention in the 2022 Jewish Plays Project contest, for her comedy/drama, APHRAH-CADABRA. Andrea is intrigued by the complexities of human nature and the interrelationships between seemingly discrete fields such as science, spirituality, politics, archaeology, history and fiction, and loves to create characters who are thrust into situations that require them to examine the world and themselves through multiple perspectives. Her recurring theme revolves around creating community through mutual respect and understanding. Andrea is a member of the Dramatists Guild of America, ASCAP, Honor Roll, International Centre for Women Playwrights, Alliance for Jewish Theatre, The Playwrights’ Center, and Maestra, and is Playwright in Residence at Desert Foothills Theater.

WEBSITE AND SOCIAL MEDIA
Website: http://www.feedingthefuries.com
FB: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100010319160490

MORE ABOUT ME
My most gratifying moment in the theatre was watching the rapt attention the audience paid to the staged reading I was awarded by the Arizona Women's Theatre Company for my very first play, FEEDING THE FURIES. I wrote FURIES in response to a competition for Arizona women playwrights, after thinking about writing a play for 20 years! (I'd seen tons of shows but never took a playwriting class nor held any theatre-related jobs.) I had four months to write the script before the submission deadline. I figured, if the play's not completed by the deadline, at least I've started to write it. But I "finished" it, and then discovered it was one of only two full-lengths to be selected for a staged reading. This acknowledgement was more exciting to me than anything else I'd accomplished in my life. And when I watched the audience's emotional emersion, heard their enthusiastic applause, and listened to their feedback about how deeply they identified with one of the characters, or knew someone like them, I realized, I can do this. I can write plays, and even more important, I can write plays that mean something to the audience. So I sought professional feedback on the script, learned how to polish the action and dialogue, and after many rewrites over the next two years, FEEDING THE FURIES received Third Prize in the Baltimore Playwrights Festival.

WHAT I'M WORKING ON
I'm working on a play that's based on the true story of a rising star in the jewelry business who becomes a convicted felon after being found guilty of securities fraud. When the prison medical staff’s indifference to her cellmate’s declining health contributes to the cellmate’s untimely death, the former jewelry entrepreneur has an epiphany and devotes the rest of her life to prison reform advocacy.

KEYWORDS
​Jewish, Family, Mystery, Political, Equality, Historical, Biography, Musical, Period, Mixed Genre