THE OUTRAGE: A QUEER WRITERS’ RESIDENCY
NOTE: This year’s presentation will be at the TUSTEN THEATRE in Narrowsburg, NY in association with the Deep Water Literary Fest. The event is FREE and does not require reservations. Donations at the door will be accepted!
It’s time once again for the outing of The Outrage, the third annual residency for queer writers at NACL, led by C. Julian Jiménez (Yulan, NY), who has assembled a cohort of remarkable artists to join him for a week of intensive writing and sharing, culminating in a public presentation of new works.
The Outrage: A Queer Writers’ Residency was born out of a need for a space where queer writers can be in community, write, and share with one another for intentional and honest feedback.
The video below, featured in our Member Journal The Periodic Table last July, offers a deeper look into this unique residency.
THE OUTRAGE IN DEEP WATER
This year, we are pleased to be partnering with the Deep Water Literary Fest, which will host an evening of readings by The Outrage artists at the Tusten Theatre in Narrowsburg, NY. The event is FREE and reservations are not required. Donations will be accepted to support the work of NACL and the continuation of the annual Outrage residency.
2025 Outrage artists C. Julian Jimenez, Marcus Scott, and JJ Keyes | Photo by Brett Keyser
“Writing inhabits multiple times at once, drawing from memory and possibility. The Outrage: A Queer Writers’ Residency embraces the nonlinear nature of both artistic practice and queer life. Queer lives have never moved in a straight line. We inherit fractured histories and imagine alternative futures. It’s the only way to make meaning across multiple temporalities at once. In the spirit of Deep Water’s Time Shift theme, the residency creates space for stories that move between archive and invention, allowing writers to encounter the past and future as active collaborators in the work of the present.”
EVENT SPONSORS
Additional support for The Outrage is provided by Theatrical Rights Worldwide.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Introducing the 2026 Outrage Residency Cohort
Pictured (top row): AZ Espinoza, Garrett Zuercher, Jessica Charles; (bottom row): reid tang, Francesca Pazniokas, Mark-Eugene Garcia, C. Julian Jiménez
JESSICA CHARLES writes dark comedies and absurd realities. As a Black queer storyteller, her work sits at the intersection of Fabulism and Protest Theater to uplift historically underrepresented voices. Her passion is both archiving and bringing to life the magically nuanced stories of people like her/(us). Proud to be born and raised in Oakland, CA, the rich tapestry of Black people, culture, resistance, her ancestry, and her upbringing shape the way she walks, talks, sees, and writes about the world. She graduated from Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London and the University of California, Berkeley. Her play Antiquated F*ckery had its debut at 59E59 Theaters with The Pool. She is a member of National Black Theatre’s 2025-26 Keep SOUL Alive Micro Development Reading Series, a finalist for the 24/26 NBT I AM SOUL Playwriting Residency, and a SPACE on Ryder Farm 2024 Creative Resident. Jessica is an alumna of the New Roots Queer+ Artist Residency 2025, Liberation Theater Company’s New Voices Writing Residency 19/20 and a finalist for The Lark’s Van Lier New Voices Fellowship. Other works include: Geeky, [THE BLACK WOMAN] and The Myth, "the gen-u-ine n*gga show!", In the tradition, Inflatables, and more.
jessicacharleswrites.com
AZ ESPINOZA is an afro-futurist-trans-masculine-feminist making magic through theatre. As a playwright, director, mover and maker their praxis is grounded in community building, embodiments of queer joy, and decolonial ritual practice. AZ’s plays include full-length works Caribbean King (Cannonball Festival Special Presentation 2025), All My Mothers Dream in Spanish (2023 world premiere at Azuka Theatre y Teatro del Sol), and Homeridae (2024 NNPN National Showcase of New Plays). His one-act responses to The Bakkhai, Pericles, Mae West’s The Drag and more, are sites of expression where adaptation serves as a tool for revolution. AZ’s directing work includes Benjamin Benne's Alma (Passage Theatre) William Shakespeare’s Macbeth (DelShakes); Alice Childress’s Wine in the Wilderness (PAC and BlackBestFriend). Recent embodied performance work has been supported by the SubCircle Residency and Leah Stein Dance Company. AZ is a theater educator for all ages, most recently at Haverford College and Ursinus College, and is a lifelong student of liberation everywhere, and for everyone.
MARK-EUGENE GARCIA is an award winning Chicano playwright and a proud member of the Dramatists Guild. He is a graduate of the City College of New York and studied book and lyric writing with the Academy of New Musical Theatre and the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Writing Workshop. Playwriting Awards include: 2025 Candela Playwright Fellow, 2021 Jerry Harrington Award For Outstanding Creative Achievement in Musical Theatre Winner, 2018 UnFringed Festival Best of Festival Award Winner, 2016 Vancouver Ovation Award for Outstanding New Work nominee, 2013 Planet Connections Outstanding Book of a New Musical nominee, 2012 Jacob Weiser Playwriting Award for a Fully Realized Drama. Productions include: EIGHT TALES OF PEDRO (The Secret Theatre, The Queens Theatre), SHINING IN MISERY: A KING-SIZE PARODY (Capital City Theatre, 54 Below, The Other Palace), STANDBY (Towle Theatre, New York International Fringe Festival- Encores Selection, New York Musical Theatre Festival, Next Link Selection), THE HOLY COWS OF CREDENCE SOUTH DAKOTA (Planet Connections Theatre Festival, Puzzle Theatre Festival), FACING EAST: A NEW MUSICAL (Jericho Arts Center), and UNMISSED CONNECTIONS (Planet Connections Theatre Festival). Other Plays include: FLAKE OF SNOW, WITH BATED BREATH (formerly UP IN THE AIR!), WHAT FRIENDS ARE FOR , ONE NIGHT AT THE GOLDEN BOOT, INSCRIPTIONS, and KEYS. In addition to his writing career, he is also part of the Management Team of The Drama Bookshop and co-hosts THE DRAMA BOOK SHOW! on the Broadway Podcast Network.
C. JULIAN JIMÉNEZ is a Queer, Puerto Rican and Dominican playwright. They hold an MFA in Acting from The Actors Studio Drama School. Playwriting awards include: New Dramatists Residency (Class of 2027), 2019/2020 Rita Goldberg Playwrights' Workshop Fellow at The Lark, 2017 & 2018 Pipeline Theatre Company PlayLab, 2018 LaGuardia Community College’s LGBTQIA+ History Project Grant, 2015 Queens Arts Council Grant, 2009 Public Theater Emerging Writers Group, and 2014 Best New Work Motif Award. Productions include: ‘Man Boobs’ (Pride Films & Plays, 2011), ‘Nico was a Fashion Model’ (Counter-Productions, 2013), ‘Animals Commit Suicide’ (First Floor Theater, 2015), ‘Locusts Have No King’ (INTAR, 2016), ‘Bundle of Sticks’ (INTAR, 2020), ‘Alligator Mouth, Tadpole Ass’ (Theatre Rhinoceros, 2020), ‘¡Oso Fabuloso & The Bear Backs!’ (INTAR, 2021), 'Bruise & Thorn' (Pipeline Theatre, 2021), and ‘Ronald Reagan Murdered My Mentors’ (Fuse Theater Ensemble, 2023). They are a co-producer and co-writer of the hit web series, ‘Bulk,’ and Professor and Chair of the Communication, Theatre, & Media Production Department at Queensborough Community College.
FRANCESCA PAZNIOKAS is a playwright and filmmaker making social surrealist work about disability, illness, queerness, and radical alienation. She was a member of SPACE on Ryder Farm’s 2024 Working Farm Residency, recipient of the 2023 NYC Women’s Fund for Media, Music and Theatre, winner of Clubbed Thumb’s 2020 Biennial Commission, finalist for the Franklin Furnace Fund, Actors Theatre of Louisville’s Heideman Award, and CartHorse Fellowship, and a semi-finalist for The Ground Floor at Berkeley Rep, Theatre503’s International Playwriting Award, and the Leslie Scalapino Award.
reid tang writes plays and things shaped like plays. Their work includes Isabel (NAATCO), DEBT (co-written w/ Adrian Einspanier), WORK HARD HAVE FUN MAKE HISTORY (Clubbed Thumb Summerworks), FUTURE WIFE (Relentless Award Honorable Mention, Goethe-Institut Beijing, Theatertreffen Stückemarkt), and Party in a Google Sheet (New Georges). Currently, they’re a resident playwright at New Dramatists, and have been part of Ars Nova's Play Group, the New Georges Jam, Clubbed Thumb’s Early Career Writers' Group, and NYTW’s 2050 Fellowship. They grew up in Singapore and presently live in Brooklyn, NY.
reidtang.com
GARRETT ZUERCHER (he/him) is the first profoundly Deaf theatre artist to earn an MFA in playwriting (Hunter College). His plays are created both in English and ASL, often simultaneously. Strongly rooted in claiming ownership of authentic Deaf narratives, his pieces reframe and elevate voices from deep within his own community. In his writing, he also prioritizes the visual form over auditory elements, teaching audiences how to listen with their eyes instead of their ears, even if they don’t know sign language. A two-time recipient of the Jean Kennedy Smith playwriting award, his narrative piece about a collection of diverse Deaf theater artists, INSIDE/LOOK, was commissioned by The Shed. Currently, he is a member of BMI’s bookwriting for musical theater cohort, with whom he is currently turning his original play, HARD PLACES, into a musical. On the side, he serves as the founding artistic director of Deaf Broadway for which he produces stagings of all-Deaf, all-ASL musicals in collaboration with Lincoln Center, including this year’s JEANINE TESORI’S VIOLET in Alice Tully Hall. Dedicated to bringing authentic Deaf voices to the mainstream, he is a staunch advocate for awareness and representation within the entertainment industry. Also an actor, director, dramaturg, filmmaker, ASL director, and Deaf Culture consultant, he is a proud member of AEA, SAG-AFTRA, and the Dramatists Guild.
garrettzuercher.com