Paula Vogel and Michael Maso Launch New Playwrights Retreat in Wellfleet

Pulitzer Prize winner Paula Vogel and longtime Huntington Theatre managing director Michael Maso have announced plans to launch Bards on the Bay, a new residency program for playwrights and musical theater writers. The initiative will be housed at the newly established Nancy Nordhoff Theatre Center in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, with programming expected to begin in 2028.

Joining Vogel and Maso as a co-founder is philanthropist Grace Nordhoff, whose family has a long history of supporting writers and artists through initiatives including Hedgebrook, the acclaimed retreat for women writers in Washington State.

Located on a four-acre property overlooking Cape Cod Bay, Bards on the Bay will offer one- to three-week residencies for playwrights, composers, and lyricists. The retreat aims to provide artists with uninterrupted writing time, readings, mentorship opportunities, and community-building gatherings with fellow theater makers.

In announcing the project, Vogel cited the closures of major development programs including Sundance Theatre Lab, the Lark, and Space at Ryder Farm, as well as shrinking development budgets across the theater industry.

“We are in the most perilous time ever for writing and producing new plays,” Vogel said in a statement. “With Bards on the Bay, emerging and senior writers can mingle, share ideas and write the next plays to enrich our stages. Their voices must continue to be heard during this turbulent time.”

The residency will be housed on a historic property known locally as the Colony at Wellfleet. The site includes six mid-century Bauhaus-style cottages designed in 1948 by architects Nathaniel Saltonstall and Oliver P. Morton. Over the years, the cottages served as retreats for artists and writers including Paul Newman, Faye Dunaway, Bernard Malamud, and Lionel and Diana Trilling.

According to the founders, the property had not changed hands in more than six decades before Nordhoff purchased it through her newly formed company, Carry It On LLC. The property will now serve as the home of the Nancy Nordhoff Theatre Center, named in honor of Nordhoff’s mother, who co-founded Hedgebrook.

Rosey Strub, currently vice president of artistic strategy at Concord Theatricals, will serve as strategic adviser. Strub previously collaborated with Vogel on the pandemic-era virtual series Bard at the Gate, which presented 12 new plays online during the Covid shutdown and reached more than 10,000 viewers.

In addition to summer residency programs, the founders plan to develop community-focused programming during the spring and fall, serving year-round residents of Wellfleet and the Outer Cape.

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