Director Jenna Worsham and Playwright Catya McMullen

What do a playwright and a director do when the theaters are closed, a pandemic is raging, and they want to be useful? Well, if they’re playwright Catya McMullen and director Jenna Worsham, they bring playwrights, actors, and directors together virtually to create The Homebound Project, an online series of short original plays that each actor performs on-camera in isolation. The Homebound Project has been a success in every sense of the word. McMullen and Worsham have gathered some extraordinary talent—playwrights like C.A. Johnson, Michael R. Jackson, Migdalia Cruz and Sarah Ruhl have contributed new work and actors including Daveed Diggs, Diane Lane, Blair Underwood, Phillipa Soo, and Cherry Jones have brought that work to life online. The Homebound Project is currently presenting its fourth digital series (July 15-19) with its fifth and final edition scheduled to stream August 5–9. That amounts to more than 50 new plays written, directed, and performed in the past few months with everyone donating their services to support a great cause. (More on that in the podcast.) Join us as McMullen and Worsham talk about creating The Homebound Project, finding and matching actors with playwrights, directing theater virtually, how the pandemic has affected the theater sector, and the promise the art of theater holds in times like this when story-telling is essential.