The 10th Annual Hartford Jewish Playwriting Contest

Sunday, May 17th, 2026 @ 7pm

Dessert reception beginning at 6 pm

$10 General Admission

*Plus a $3.50 service charge

It's a combination of a TED Talk, a play reading and American Idol ... and it needs your vote! Join our Artistic Democracy and vote for Hartford's best new Jewish play of 2026.  Come see a fantastic cast in these plays.

Directed and Hosted by Illana Stein

Generously supported by the National Endowment for the Arts

FLATBUSH LYSISTRATA - Lila Rachel Becker, Washington, DC

Three Hasidic women gather at an axe-throwing parlor to plan a sex strike.  A play about how women carve spaces for themselves within fundamentalism.

HAVURAH - Margot Connolly, Brooklyn, NY

After a shooting at a synagogue, a club of Jewish college students is left reeling, while their Christian counterparts try to help without knowing how.

SHURA: The mission of identifying life -Roee Joseph, Tel Aviv, Israel

A playwright-soldier documents the impossible task of identifying the dead after October 7th, uncovering the fragile line between witnessing horror and choosing life.