Bring current work of any type (fiction, poetry, play, screenplay) to WCL and discover just how all your container choices impact the emotional experience of your audience.
How you tell a story—genre, scope, tone, length, aesthetic and structure—makes all the difference in determining how your story will be felt..
“When do your containers start again after the first of the year? They are my North Star, with you guiding the way. Thank you from the bottom of my heart all the way down to my toes”
“Roland, you and your Container Lab have given new life to my 30-year dormant pen. Grateful for the experience, your expertise, and the incredible members of the group. Thank you! ”
The first Writers’ Container Lab was held in the Spring of 2025 for 5 weeks. Very shortly, participants requested that the workshop be extended for another 5 weeks.
The Writers Container Lab met for the final session of 2025 on December 28th.
REGISTRATION FOR 2026 WCL IS NOW OPEN
LABS RUN IN 9-WEEK SESSIONS
CURRENT LAB MEMBERS ARE GIVEN PRIORITY ENROLLMENT
Mondays 7-9PM EST
Bring your current work to the lab and use it to deepen your understanding and commitment to your craft.
“The container conversation is fulfilling, challenging and expansive. It’s generative, passionate, and fun; offering a plethora of options…”
Mondays 7-9PM EST
2026 SESSION 1 RUNS JAN 26 - MAR 23
2026 SESSION 2 RUNS APR 6 - JUN 1
2026 SESSION 3 RUNS AUG 3 - SEP 28
2026 SESSION 4 RUNS OCT 26 - DEC 21
Session 1 Price: $450
Purchase all 4 sessions for only $1,180
(that’s a 33% discount)
online via zoom
“Roland is sharp. The artists he attracts are sharp. His hands-on workshops inspire me to grow artistically and approach my work with more compassion, precision, and depth”
2 essential questions
too many writers forget to ask about each new work.
1.
what is this really about?
2.
What container will best serve the needs of this story?
A failure to find the ideal audience can usually be traced to the author’s failure to thoroughly explore these two questions.
In the Writers’ Container Lab, we’ll consider any of so-called containers (short story, novel, memoir, essay, full-length play, one-act play, monologue, radio play, online monologue, song, musical, opera, film, podcast serial, etc.) you may have an interest in pursuing.
And together we will try to understand what might be the emotional impact of various choices you make about how you deliver your story to its audience.
We will ask questions about choices around art form, yes, but also around questions of length, scope, tone, venue, aesthetic and form. Because in the end every choice you make will either help your audience connect to the emotional center of your work or interfere.
It’s your job to learn how to sort through it all to really take stock, to separate what’s connecting from what’s not.
Becauise no matter what sort of project you set out to create, work that connects with people emotionally is the work they never forget.
And that’s the work every writer wants to be making.
“Class was so juicy and delicious, Your prompts gave me a way into my memoir writing that would never have occurred to me otherwise. ... I was often surprised and elated with what came tumbling through my pen and onto the page. ...The styles, voices and tones of the other writers in the group provide a rich bath of inspiration that supports and illuminates ways to grow my own voice... I got more writing done in that last lab than I did the whole year before.”
early bird deadline jan 5
When you register by Jan 5 you save 25%
“I don’t think I would have ever pushed through the way that I needed to and wanted to if I hadn’t met Roland, if he hadn’t been as excited and interested in what I was doing in my work and hadn’t helped me to find that excitement again in myself. That’s what he continues to do for me and has in the years since.”
Lots of writing to prompts in class will be combined with one hour of homework each week.
Together we’ll be assembling a battery of questions you will learn to ask again and again about each new project you undertake.
Container Lab is designed to be writer-driven. Bring your most pressing questions about your latest artistic obsessions to lab and benefit from a roomful of serious-minded curious artists eager to help each workshop member better understand their own work.
Understanding what you’ve made and how it works is key to being an effective shepherd in getting it out to the world.
Bring your current work to the lab and use it to deepen your understanding and commitment to your craft.
Mondays 7-9PM EST
2026 SESSION 1 RUNS JAN 26 - MAR 23
2026 SESSION 2 RUNS APR 6 - JUN 1
2026 SESSION 3 RUNS AUG 3 - SEP 28
2026 SESSION 4 RUNS OCT 26 - DEC 21
Session 1 Price: $450
Purchase all 4 sessions for only $1,180
(that’s a 33% discount)
Questions?
Email Roland today. rolandtec@gmail.com
“Roland Tec’s online playwriting course advanced my new script, and brought me into contact with a number of great peers all across the U.S. The bi-weekly gathering sessions on Zoom were at once informative, intense, and filled with plenty of laughter.”
“As a result of having only audited the first session of Roland Tec’s 3-day Advanced Monologue Weekend, I feel my new play is finally on its way. Several of the craft topics covered in Tec’s approach to monologue make me feel so much more in command of my script writing than ever before.”
What are writers saying they love most about creating new work in a roland tec workshop?
Click on any thumbnail below to hear it from the horses mouth.
