WESTPORT — Three playwrights have been commissioned to write new works by the Westport Country Playhouse, a first for the local theater.

The commissions for authors Matthew Greene, Monet Hurst-Mendoza and Johnny G. Lloyd are funded through the Laurents/Hatcher Foundation Award. It was established in 2010 by Tony Award-winning playwright, director and screenwriter Authur Laurents, who wrote the books for “Gypsy” and “West Side Story,” and Tom Hatcher, an actor and real estate developer, who was Laurents’ partner for 52 years.

Each playwright will write a new play, which will be developed and supported by the Westport Country Playhouse through its New Works Initiative, according to a statement issued by the playhouse.

Greene is a playwright, librettist and lyricist whose play, “Thousand Pines,” had its premiere at Westport Country Playhouse, and the autobiographical “Good Standing” played at Theater Row as part of the United Solo Theatre Festival.

Hurst-Mendoza is a New York City-based playwright, whose plays have been developed with the playhouse, as well as Long Wharf Theater, Rising Circle Theater Collective, the Public Theater, Institute of Contemporary Art Boston and others. She is currently an executive story editor for the 23rd season of the television program, ”Law & Order: SVU.”

Lloyd, a New York-based writer and producer, was the winner of the 2021 Bay Area Playwrights Festival for “The Problem With Magic, Is:” and also has been commissioned by Clubbed Thumb and Second Stage Theatre. Currently he is a member of the Ars Nova PlayGroup, and director of artistic development at the Tank and producing director for InVersion Theatre.

“Welcoming these three magnificent writers means a great deal to me and to the Playhouse, as a significant incubator of new work,” Mark Lamos, the Westport Country Playhouse’s artistic director, said in the prepared statement. 

“Though we’ve been developing new plays and musicals for years, these commissions take us to a new level of importance on the national theater scene.”