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Billing is a Form of Compensation:
The Dramatists Guild Drafts New Authorial Billing Language
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In the theatre industry, the term “billing” refers to how the people who worked on a show are given credit for their contributions. For playwrights, composers, lyricists, and librettists who make their living on their names and reputations, billing is an important form of compensation.
In 2021, the Guild’s opera committee released its Model Billing Provision for Opera as part of the ongoing effort to ensure that librettists are given the same authorial rights as their composer counterparts in that space. In addition, each of the Guild’s model production agreements include billing provisions which conform with industry standard.
However, we understand that there are still lingering questions, especially regarding the differences in billing for musical theatre vs. opera vs. plays vs. devised theatre. Therefore, we wanted to ensure that our members are clear on what is and what is not the standard form of billing in any situation.
Discover our Best Practices for Authorial Billing so that you can be informed and empowered to advocate for yourself and to ensure that you are receiving the credit that you deserve, as set forth by current industry standards.
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National Estate Planning Awareness Week with DG©M
October 17 - October 23
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Join DG Copyright Management for National Estate Planning Awareness Week 2022!
Having a plan in place for the long-term care of your plays, songs, and musicals is the best way to ensure that your authorial intent and legacy will be honored and that your loved ones will be cared for. During this year's National Estate Planning Awareness Week, which runs from October 17 - October 23, the DG©M will offer free panels and resources on the significance of estate and legacy planning.
Whether you are looking to establish a legacy of philanthropy, wondering how to find a literary executor, hoping to set up an estate plan for little or no cost, or just in need of some practical advice, the DG©M has a session in store for you.
Register for the DG©M's National Estate Planning Week program today, and learn how to let your work live on!
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The DG©M is an estate planning consultancy and intellectual property management organization. Created to oversee the stewardship of plays, songs, and musicals that are bequeathed to the Dramatists Guild, or its related organizations, the DG©M’s primary objective is the protection of authorial intent. As a New York public benefit corporation, DG©M offers these programs free of cost to all communities.
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Banned Books Week - Sep 18 |
The Right to Free Speech is Being Threatened, Now More Than Ever |
Schools, libraries, religious organizations, and other community groups are banning books, plays, and musicals for purely partisan reasons. When works are banned – whether literary or theatrical- it is a constitutional infringement upon the opportunities, livelihoods, and rights of authors, including playwrights, composers, lyricists, and librettists.
To raise awareness regarding the societal dangers of censorship in the theatre industry and at large, the Dramatists Legal Defense Fund will present Banned Together: An Anti-Censorship Podcast featuring excepts from banned plays and musicals.
Available for one week only during Banned Books Week (which starts September 18), the podcast will feature songs, scenes, and monologues from ten shows that have been banned or censored in communities across the country.
Performers will include Emmy Award winner Bryan Cranston ("Breaking Bad"), four-time Tony Award nominee Raul Esparza (Leap of Faith, Company), Tony Award winner Celia Keenan-Bolger (To Kill a Mockingbird), Tony Award winner Lisa Kron (Fun Home, Well), and the Stonewall Chorale. Playwright and DLDF board member Lydia Diamond (Stick Fly, Smart People) will host the podcast and Chris Fenwick (Kimberly Akimbo, Fun Home) will serve as music director.
Banned Together is an annual initiative intended to raise awareness regarding the dangers of censorship in the theatre.
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Free Rehearsal Space at the Dramatists Guild Foundation |
The Dramatists Guild Foundation is now offering free space for playwrights, composers, lyricists, and librettists to use to rehearse, work, and collaborate!
Three separate spaces (the Music Hall, the Composers Corner, and the Writers Den) are available for use, all of which are located at the Foundation's offices in midtown Manhattan. These spaces are open to all dramatists, regardless of DG membership status.
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Our Online Continuing Education Courses Start September 12.
Last Chance to Register!
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Don't miss your last chance to register for the Dramatists Guild Institute's Fall 2022 semester! The DGI offers hands-on, rigorous, continuing education for playwrights, composers, lyricists, and librettists at all skill levels. Our fall semester courses start September 12.
This fall, we're offering ten online playwriting and musical theatre writing courses. Whether you're looking to develop a new skill, like writing theatre for a young audience (TYA), hoping to adapt an existing work for the stage, or seeking new ways to tackle challenging topics, you'll find a course that helps you expand your talents and hone your craft!
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Thursday, September 29
Atlantic Time: 8pm
Eastern Time: 7pm
Central Time: 6pm
Mountain Time (D): 5pm
Mountain Time (S): 4pm
Pacific Time: 4pm
Alaska Time: 3pm
Hawaii Time: 1pm
DG members are invited to attend a free training session and discover the new features for dramatists that are now available in Final Draft 12.
With this new version of the Final Draft software, writers will be able to take their outlining to the next level. The Final Draft "1-2-3 process" enables dramatists to easily create, organize, and reshape the beats of their script. Discover the myriad of new features that Final Draft 12 has to offer, including advanced story building tools, PDF import, focus mode, track changes, and more!
This training session is for both new and advanced users of Final Draft software.
Already using Final Draft 12? An expert from the organization will be on hand to help answer questions along the way.
Learn more about career services, discounts, and other exciting benefits for DG members.
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DG Celebrates
Sondheim at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
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This fall, in collaboration with the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, the Dramatists Guild will present two special programs that celebrate the legacy of acclaimed songwriter (and past Guild Council president) Stephen Sondheim, including his advocacy work on behalf of his fellow writers.
These programs, which are free and open to the public, will be presented in association with the special Sondheim issue of The Dramatist magazine -- available later this month both online and in select bookstores.
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The Dramatist Guild Presents: An Evening with John Weidman |
September 15 at 6pm EDT
In this free conversation, Jeanine Tesori (Kimberly Akimbo) will interview writer, librettist, and advocate John Weidman, discussing his body of work, including Assassins, Pacific Overtures, and Road Show, as well as his upcoming projects. In honor of the Guild's The Dramatist magazine issue dedicated to Stephen Sondheim, Weidman will also discuss his longtime collaboration with the iconic songwriter.
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The Dramatists Guild presents: Sondheim: the Man, the Mentor, and His Music |
October 17 at 12pm EDT
His peers have frequently spoken about Stephen Sondheim’s lyric writing, but comparatively little attention has been dedicated to his music. In this panel of Broadway songwriters, moderated by lyricist and DG President Amanda Green (Mr. Saturday Night), composers Jason Robert Brown (The Last Five Years) and Tom Kitt (Almost Famous) will discuss the craft behind the legendary writer's music, as well as how Sondheim mentored a generation of theatrical composers. This panel is being presented in celebration of The Dramatist magazine's Sondheim issue, which honors the legacy, advocacy, and impact of Stephen Sondheim.
How to Register: Priority registration for this event will be offered to high school, college, and graduate students who are currently studying playwriting, musical theatre writing, and/or musical composition. Eligible students can reserve their spot by filling out the form using the link below. Tickets will be available to the general public starting in late September.
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The Sondheim Issue of The Dramatist magazine pays tribute to the artist, mentor, collaborator, and past President of the Guild, Stephen Sondheim; it is guest edited by DG Council member Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hamilton). This special issue will be available later this month on stands at The Drama Book Shop in New York, NY, the Samuel French Bookshop in the Royal Court Theatre in London, UK, Skylight Books in Los Angeles, CA, and East End Books in Provincetown, MA. It will also available to read or purchase online via the Dramatists Guild website, starting September 19.
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Help Us Welcome Our New Guild Staff |
The Dramatists Guild is delighted to introduce two new members of the Guild staff, our new BA consultant and staff attorney Leesa Fenderson, who is an Intellectual Property lawyer, and Elle Hartman, who is our new Volunteer Programs Manager.
Leesa Fenderson was born in Kingston, Jamaica and raised in Jamaica, Queens. She is a board member of Next Move Jamaica International, Inc, a non-profit that connects diasporic Jamaicans with students of need on the island. Before pursuing writing full time she was a member of the New York State Bar and an in-house attorney at an image licensing agency known for its curated art and representation of some the world’s most iconic image-makers.
Leesa has been dedicated to preserving the rights of artists and educating them on how best to manage their intellectual property since she worked as a contract coordinator at Hachette Book Group. That dedication led her to law school, but her desire to create art began to tug at her, years into her career as a lawyer. She began writing stories about her family, her triple consciousness as an immigrant, and how space and location are deeply tied to our physical and mental health...
Elle Hartman is from Waterford, Connecticut, having lived steps away from The Eugene O’Neill Theater Center on Long Island Sound, where she had a summer job and spent many evenings listening to first-time readings of the works of playwrights such as August Wilson.
Elle received a dual Bachelor of Arts in English and Italian Literature from Albertus Magnus College. After college, Elle moved to Orlando and worked for Walt Disney World in human resources. While at Walt Disney World, she handled Service Trade Council Union ADA and workers’ compensation placements, along with leading the staffing for the openings of ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex, All-Star Movies Resort, World of Disney, and Disney Vacation Club off-site locations. She then became Head of HR for 1,100 cast members at Disney’s Grand Floridan Resort and Spa and, along with her team, the recipient of Disney’s first RAVE (Respect Appreciate Value Everyone) Award for diversity initiatives at the resort, including training manuals for all departments in several languages other than English....
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Art of Negotiating Theatre Contracts
It can be daunting to negotiate with a producer, theatre, or school that wants to produce your play or musical. But it is important to advocate for yourself so that you receive the treatment that you deserve.
Our guide on The Art of Negotiating Theatre Contracts will ensure that you know your rights as a dramatist, that you understand the current market, and that you recognize what you get in a negotiation.
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Devised Theatre Resource Guide
What happens when a theatrical collaboration expands beyond traditional definitions? Discover resources designed to help you form appropriate relationships with co-authors, devisors, and sponsoring theatres in the context of devised theatre!
This guide summarizes the ways in which devised theatre is made and offers contractual templates that ensure the equitable participation of the parties involved.
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Broadway Contract Guide
Learn all about the Dramatists Guild's Broadway Approved Production Contract in this APC booklet guide!
Discover when to obtain the APC for First-Class Productions, how to use the APC, and what APC certification means. This guide also includes important information on the rights and responsibilities of DG members when they are produced on Broadway, such as Guild assessments and our Broadway Consultation member benefit.
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Best Practices for Contests and Festivals
What should you look out for when trying to decide whether to apply to a contest or festival?
This guide offers best practices that playwrights, composers, lyricists, and librettists can consider when weighing submission opportunities for contests and festivals, so that they will be empowered to make informed submission choices. (Please be advised that these guidelines reflect ideal industry practices, not current minimum standards.)
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Contracts and Best Practices |
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Download a DG Best Practice, Model Contract, or Guide Today! |
Because the Guild tracks national and worldwide trends, we are able to provide certain model contracts that reflect up-to-date industry standards.
We encourage our members to use these models to educate themselves and to use them as guides when entering into productions or collaborations.
Devised Theatre
Anti-Piracy
Best Practices
Broadway
Collaboration
Commissions
Diversity and Inclusion
Licensing
Live Stream/Digital Theatre
Negotiation
Opera
Production
Translation
Underlying Rights
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We would like you to be informed, educated, and well-equipped when you navigate the business side of theatre. There are so many questions that writers have about this industry; we want to bring those questions and answers directly to you. Dear Business Affairs features DG members' most pressing questions, answered by staff in our BA department.
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Question: What should I do if someone performs or changes a play, musical, or devised work without permission?
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Your work cannot be performed without your permission. And it is never okay for someone to change your words, lyrics, or notes, without your approval.
This rule applies whether the desired alteration is a significant change to the text, such as rearranging scenes, adding lines, cutting an entire monologue, or removing an explicit word. It also applies to changing the setting or casting requirements. Casting requirements and settings are a part of an author’s work; if any defining characteristics are written into the stage directions, such as a character’s age or gender, then they cannot be changed without written authorization.
As a part of the Dramatists Guild's effort to support dramatists and their allies in this fight, we've created a telephone hotline and form through which anyone can anonymously report instances of copyright infringement – the Guild will reach out to writers, licensors, and publishers of theatrical works to follow up on the reports.
To anonymously report copyright infringement, or if you don’t know where to go to request a script change, you can call DG's #DontChangeTheWords hotline at 1-855-71-WORDS and leave a report via voicemail. You can also fill out this form to report infringement in your area.
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We are writers; what we love to do most... is write! Second to that, we love rehearsing in the room with performers and getting to see our work fully realized and produced.
However, as writers, we will inevitably have to deal with the non-creative, not-so-fun, but very essential part of our industry-- the business. We might come across some complicated looking terms, such as subsidiary rights, copyrights, or collaboration agreement.
What do these terms mean, and why do we need to know them? The DG Glossary is your handy go-to guide on important terms that every writer of the theatre should know.
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Per Diem
A “per diem” is a payment or stipend paid to an author by a producer to cover an author’s living expenses (such as meals and local transportation) incurred while the author is working on a production away from home, including the periods of a production’s casting, rehearsals, previews, and the official press opening. These payments may be paid on a daily or weekly basis, and are often calculated and payable based on per diems payable to other creative personnel working on the production, such as the director or actors. Per diems are paid in addition to the reimbursements of an author’s expenses that are incurred for travel and housing.
If you are working on an out-of-town production of your play or musical, then you should feel empowered to ask for a per diem. To learn more about how to advocate for yourself and negotiate a fair per diem, please check out our guide on the Art of Negotiating Theatre Contracts.
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