Center Theatre Group has created a new developmental pipeline for plays and musicals created by Snehal Desai, CTG’s Brindell and Milton Gottlieb Artistic Director.

The initial phase of CTG’s new works development has focused on Latinx plays and playwrights, as well as new musicals. They include a series of four readings, workshops and presentations, the most recent of which was “Mama of the Row or Who Raised the Rent?” a displacement of Bertolt Brecht’s “Mother Courage” by Luis Alfaro, with a 10-day workshop from Nov. 10-19 at The Music Center Annex, home to CTG’s rehearsal rooms and administrative offices.

Alfaro, an associate professor at the University of Southern California and director of the MFA in Dramatic Writing program, is a former associate artistic director of CTG. He also currently serves as the 2025-26 Atelier Samuel Beckett Fellow.

Workshops, readings and presentations are crucial to CTG’s mission and to the development process of plays. Over the course of the development cycle, playwrights, actors and directors gather to read, analyze and rework the text. The process is rigorous and reflective, focused on structure and substance. In the case of “Mama of the Row,” the focus on music was an instrumental part of the workshop. Originally, Mary Alfaro Velasco and Vaneza Mari Calderon, bolero and mariachi musicians were brought in to just play music for the show – but during the development process, they became key collaborators.

“Mariachi is a very strong tradition, but no one’s really creating new mariachi work,” Calderon said. “That’s the cool thing about ‘Mama of the Row’ – we get to bring out instruments and our flavors and our sounds to create something completely new.”  

Three other developmental projects took place over the past several months in Los Angeles and New York City. Other works in development include the new musicals “WEST: The Final Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” and “The Turning,” as well as “Aya” by Fernanda Coppel.

Since becoming CTG’s third artistic director, Desai used his inaugural programming year to introduce One CTG, which combined season programming and subscriptions across CTG’s three venues – the Ahmanson Theatre, the Mark Taper Forum and the Kirk Douglas Theatre.

“As CTG’s third artistic director, I am renewing our commitment to fostering, developing and, in time, producing the next generation of trailblazing plays and musicals – as well as providing support to the writers, directors and creative teams who bring them to life,” Desai said. 

In addition to workshops, the nonprofit CTG has ongoing artistic programs to develop new plays and support playwrights, as well as local artists and companies, through the LA Writers’ Workshop and the LA Artist Residencies. For information, visit centertheatregroup.org.