terry milner

Courses Taught:
Plays in Progress Mentor

“I respond to a wide variety of genres and styles of dramatic writing. My own interests tend toward plays that explore the idiosyncrasies of human behavior and their impact on the beautiful, diverse array of human relationships. I appreciate drama that explores humanistic themes with a spiritual dimension, and am particularly energized when a playwright treats otherwise unattractive, unpopular, even repugnant characters with compassion and fairness. I am always interested in seeing a diversity of sexualities, genders and backgrounds on stage, especially stories that depict the complex interactions between and among people of divergent interests and backgrounds.

I do not usually gravitate to plays that employ narrative, presentational storytelling; rather I delight in plays that find conflict and comedy in tiny details and small moments. If a play is able to do that while also addressing big ideas and universal themes… to me, that is magical.” 

TERRY MILNER is a playwright and screenwriter based in New York City. Terry’s first full-length play, The Jesus Fund, premiered in January 2014 at Burning Coal Theatre. His ten-minute play Nothing is Free was produced and published as part of the Collective:10 Festival in New York. His play Adam Then was a semifinalist for the 2015 O’Neill National Playwrights Conference and received an industry reading in 2019 starring Anthony Rapp. His latest play, Jasper, was a semi-finalist for the 2016 Bay Area Playwrights Festival and received a staged reading at Crashbox Theatre in New York, directed by Eddie Prunoske. Terry’s feature screenplay The Fiddle Player was a second-round selection in the 2017 Sundance Screenwriters Lab and his short screenplay Nothing is Free (based on his play) was a finalist in the Phoenix Film Festival’s screenplay competition and his half-hour pilot OMG took first prize at the 2018 Nashville Film Festival. Terry served as playwright-in-residence at West Virginia Wesleyan College, teaches writing for television as an associate instructor with Cheri Magid’s The Write Draft, and has directed at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts in the Graduate Drama Lab. Terry also brings many years’ experience as an actor to his work with dramatists, having worked as both a stage and screen actor for many years. He holds an MFA in Dramatic Writing from NYU/Tisch, a law degree from the University of North Carolina. Terry is a proud member of the Dramatists Guild, Actors Equity, and the Screen Actors Guild.