Founded by Robert Wilson in 2006, the Long Island-based Watermill Center will serve as the residence for the writers during the development, while NYTW's Manhattan home will be utilized as a public performance and rehearsal space.

The companies are seeking applications from writers who create theatre "where music plays an integral role or defines the essential theatrical language of the work," according to an announcement. The residency will not focus on the traditional American art form of musical theatre as typically represented on Broadway, but "other innovative forms that are often marginalized."

In July Watermill and NYTW will select one resident to initiate the program. The review board includes Wilson, Marina Abramovic, Alanna Heiss, Albert Maysles, Jonathan Safran Foer and Richard Sennett. NYTW's Jim Nicola and Linda Chapman and Watermill directors Jorn Weisbrцdt and Sherry Dobbin will announce the winning resident.

NYTW served as the birthplace of the Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning musical Rent. Other works presented there include Athol Fugard's My Children! My Africa!; Doug Wright's Quills; Claudia Shear's Blown Sideways Through Life; Tony Kushner's Slavs! and Homebody/Kabul; Caryl Churchill's Far Away and A Number; Paul Rudnick's The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told; and the Five Lesbian Brothers' The Secretaries.

The Watermill Center is situated on six acres of wooded and landscaped grounds in Watermill, NY. For further information and applications visit WatermillCenter.

By Adam Hetrick