Bio
I’m an award-winning emerging playwright whose plays have been seen at the Kennedy Center Page-to-Stage Festival, Source Festival, Playwrights’ Theatre of New Jersey, Imagination Stage, Rorschach Theatre, Olney Theater Center, Active Cultures, Journeymen Theater, and many schools and community theatres.
My ten-minute Trash Talk was “bubbly, delightful” (DCist), and “the best of the evening” (DC Citypaper); Volga Goatman was described as a “mini-epic…that had the audience laughing” (theatreDC.com). Crunch Time won the “Best Writing” award at Bethesda Urban Partnership’s Play-in-a-Day competition at Imagination Stage in 2009. In the same competition in 2010, Spin won “Best Writing” and “Best Overall Production.”
In addition to writing plays, I’m a busy professional actor and teaching artist in and around Washington, D.C. Since 2007, I’ve taught hundreds of theater workshops in more than a dozen states; in subjects ranging from interactive storytelling with two-year-olds, to writing and staging musicals with grades 2-5, to stage combat with teens, and professional development with theater educators.
My experiences as a teaching artist sparked my interest in writing high-quality Theater for Young Audiences and young actors. Past commissions for scripts have come from InterAct Story Theatre, Synetic Family Theater, Educational Theatre Company, Emergence Theatre, and Encore Stage & Studio. The Twelve Daughters of Hercules, an original comedy for teenage actors, was written and staged with a project grant from the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County, MD.
I also write fiction under the pen name “Ben Rovik.” Sample my books on your favorite beeping e-reader through Amazon or Smashwords.com.
I graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Johns Hopkins University with a B.A. in Writing. My plays are available through this website, with selected titles available through Heuer Publishing.
Thanks for visiting! Please browse my full-length, one-act, educational theater scripts, and monologue collections. Feel free to pick one up with secure one-click shopping.
FAQ
Business Questions
- Can I pay by check?
- Can I videotape a performance?
- Do I pay royalties to use a script for class or forensics?
- How can I re-mount a production for a competition?
Writing Questions
Can I pay for scripts or royalties by check, or do you only accept payment online?
Yes, you can pay by check for anything except e-scripts. However, paying securely online through Paypal is the much quicker, more direct, and more convenient option. www.benkingsland.com/writing never sees your card number, your account information, or any other sensitive material; Paypal securely handles all of that. All you need is a major credit card to get your order processing with one click.
E-scripts are only available for online purchase.
To pay for a hard copy by check, don’t click any of the Paypal buttons on the site. Instead, email bkplays AT gmail.com with the script(s) you’d like to order and mention “pay by check” in the subject or body. You will receive a confirmation email within 24 hours with an address to which to mail the check. Make your check payable to Ben Kingsland. Once your check is received and verified, your scripts will be put in the mail within two business days.
To pay for royalties by check, refer to the license agreement for the address to which to mail a check. Make the check payable to Ben Kingsland, and make it out for the amount indicated in the Paypal invoice that will be emailed to you.
My theater will be producing a BK play! Can we videotape the performance? What can we do with that video?
Yes, please feel free to videotape your rehearsals or performances of one of my plays! There are a few restrictions on what you can do with the video; things that’ll help me keep piracy in check. Here’s the breakdown:
“The Theater may record, photograph, or videotape the performance, or any rehearsals, and may use such photographs, audio or video clips from a performance for promotional purposes in print or online. The Theater may distribute single copies of its archival recordings to the cast and crew of its production of the Script, either without charge or at cost, provided that the Theater includes a written notice in the form of a label on each copy distributed, that clearly states the performance is of the Author’s copyrighted work, and that such recordings are for personal use only, and may not be further licensed, sold, or conveyed without restriction on use.
“The Theater is not permitted to engage in such activities as selling video recordings of a performance for profit, distributing the full video (not clips) of the performance online for any reason, or licensing the video recording to a third party, such as a local TV station.”
Email me at bkplays AT gmail.com with any questions.
I want to use one of your scripts for a forensics competition at school. Do I need to pay performance royalties?
No! My crack legal team tells me that use of a script in a purely educational setting, like a forensics competition or in-class lesson, is governed by Fair Use. The only cost to you is the price of the script: $5.50 for any e-script. Feel free to explore my whole catalog for one-acts, duets, and selections for your forensics team or class.
Take a special look at my monologue collections, compiled specifically with student actors in mind, from middle school to college.
Our community theater put on one of your one-act plays, and now we want to take the same production to a one-act competition! Do we need to pay for additional royalties?
Congrats! In most cases I’d ask that you pay for one additional performance of royalties to re-mount a production for a competition. Please email bkplays AT gmail.com to discuss the specifics of your situation.
When did you start writing?
Elementary school. My Pillow Police series was a big hit, spawning numerous spinoffs in Miss Bracalilly’s class. Merchandising deals fell through, unfortunately.
Why do you write plays?
Playwrights get it both ways. Writing is a solitary activity, but putting on plays is collaborative. So a playwright gets to have the independence and creative control of writing a show, and then the satisfying, surprising give-and-take that comes from seeing how other artists interpret what you’ve written. It’s like throwing a party. You set the mood, you buy all the right snacks and drinks, you dust off the vacuum, you make everything as welcoming as possible. But your control over the situation ends the minute the guests arrive, with their own moods and tastes and ideas. I say the host’s job is to roll with whatever happens and enjoy him- or herself. If I didn’t want uncertainty at my party, I’d buy a party hat and a tub of frosting and dig in with a spoon by myself with the blinds drawn. And if I didn’t want other artists to help me tell my stories, I wouldn’t write plays.
Do you ever revise your plays? If I’ve purchased an e-script, and you later revise the show, what happens to my copy?
All the scripts you’ll find here are performance-ready, and most of them are performance-tested. That said, there’s nothing wrong with a little tinkering now and then!
I reserve the right to tweak, revise and repost any plays as I get feedback or new ideas. (Just like a fiction author might make changes between editions through a conventional publisher.)
If you purchased a script that I later decide to revise, BK Plays will send you an email letting you know that there’s a more recent version. You can respond to bkplays AT gmail.com to receive a free e-script replacement updating you to the latest version. If you purchased a hard copy of the earlier version, you are still eligible for the free e-script update. If you want a new hard copy of the updated script, you will have to pay full price to have a new one printed and shipped.
I’ll make an announcement in the News section any time I’m uploading a revised version of a script.
View Cart
