The Eugene O’Neill Theater Center in Waterford has appointed the new artistic director of its National Playwright Conference — the fourth in the renowned conference’s six-decade history.

The new permanent artistic director is Melia Bensussen, who has served as the guest artistic director since last March and is also artistic director of Hartford Stage.

Bensussen was chosen from more than 180 applicants after a search led by Arts Consulting Group. The National Playwrights Conference (NPC) focuses on the development of new works and new voices.

“It is so exciting. I’m just really over the moon. It’s a dream job for me,” Bensussen said in a phone interview.

O’Neill Center Executive Director Tiffani Gavin said in a statement, “I am so excited that Melia will be joining us as the next Artistic Director of the National Playwrights Conference. She has demonstrated an unwavering devotion to emerging writers throughout her career, especially to those who are bilingual or of color, and I look forward to working with her as she brings this energy and commitment to exploration with her to the O’Neill.”

Bensussen first came to the O’Neill to direct a show about 20 years ago, when Jim Houghton was running the NPC.

“I thought I had landed in theater paradise,” she recalled.

She said she think it’s an ideal creation of the American theater and mentions its most salient aspects: “The fact that the whole National Playwrights Conference is focused on development — truly not on product — and it is truly a place to develop work as opposed to get it ready to produce. The history of the place, the setting, the fact that this amazing staff over these years has taken care of artists as a priority. You are fed and housed, and you only have to think about the work. And it’s summer, you’re by the water, and the best of American theater talent comes to play for a week.”

Bensussen, 61, said that every summer, she would hope that she’d get invited back to the O’Neill. She started out directing a show for NPC and then was asked to direct for the National Music Theater Conference. In the meantime, she was also teaching master classes at the O’Neill’s National Theater Institute, a training program for undergraduates.

She is the second woman to be artistic director in the conference’s history . She assumes the job after artistic director Wendy C. Goldberg’s 18-year run ended in late 2022.

Bensussen has a long list of credits aside from the O’Neill. A few examples: She directed productions at such theaters as Huntington Theatre Company, La Jolla Playhouse, and Baltimore Center Stage. She has worked with new work programs including New York Stage and Film, and Sundance. She spent more than a decade as chair of the performing arts department at Emerson College in Boston.

As NPC’s artistic director, she said she thinks about “the privilege of being able to program a diversity of voices — and how what a privilege it is to be able to program toward finding unique artistic voices.”

One of the major things she wants to do going forward is to increase the collaboration between the O’Neill and other theaters in Connecticut. She noted that these are stressful times financially for all theater institutions, and the organizations could look for ways to do more together.

Recently, for instance, students from the Yale School of Drama MFA design program came to the NPC to work as designers.

Bensussen said that she also wants to help writers advance their plays to workshops or productions after their time at the O’Neill.

“The National Playwrights Conference has been the think tank and the development center for the American theater since its inception. When it began, it had a direct connection to Yale Rep (then-NPC artistic director Lloyd Richards was dean of the Yale School of Drama and artistic director of Yale Repertory Theatre). It was an automatic feeder program, if you will. What Tiffani and I have been talking about — and Tiffani has already, as executive director, been looking into some of this — is how to create more opportunities for the plays developed at the O’Neill through the National Playwrights Conference to have next-step workshops or productions,” Bensussen said.

When the NPC started, there were a lot more chances for plays to be produced around the country, she said. With budget cuts, the fallout from COVID, and the lack of corporate funding, those opportunities have shrunk.

“It’s really crucial that the National Playwrights Conference continues its open admission, its being a gateway for playwrights of all experience levels. But then, once you’re at NPC, once you’re selected, how do we further support you as a playwright in what happens next?” she said.

Bensussen said she’s also very interested in seeing how NPC can collaborate more with NTI and how to bring those students to participate in the work of developing new plays.

Bensussen will keep her job at Hartford Stage, which involves more academic-year scheduling, as opposed to the O’Neill’s summer-focused conference. She noted that Richards and Houghton both ran theaters — Yale Rep for Richards, Signature for Houghton — while they headed up the NPC.

She said that, as an artistic director for regional theater or as a freelance director, you have to focus on production affordability. NPC allows you to focus on what a playwright’s voice needs to be developed.

Bensussen, who said she has always loved text, whether in the form of novels or plays, said, “To be in a position where I can support writers — it’s such a gift to be of service in this way. … I am so grateful to be able to do that in conjunction with the great team that exists at the O’Neill Theater Center.”

Her background

Bensussen grew up in Mexico City — her father is Mexican, her mother is North American — and loved theater as far back as age 4 when she went to a children’s theater show. “I’m one of those who got addicted early,” she said.

She figured she would go into acting. She remembered watching directors when she was in high school; all were male. At the time, female directors weren’t exactly plentiful.

“I remember having a fantasy that I’d be a famous movie star and then they’d let me direct. It was kind of a long-winded (idea), a circular path,” she said.

She started directing when she was a student at Brown University. During her senior year, she applied to acting programs and, she recalled with a laugh, “I remember thinking through my acting auditions that they weren’t talking to me about the right things. I ended up coaching other people’s acting monologues instead of focusing on my own.”

She got into an acting program, but when she looked at the schedule, she had a moment of realization: she didn’t want to be an actor.

“The joke is, ‘What I really want to is to direct.’ I lived that joke,” she said.

She likes directing a show, and being an organization’s artistic director, for the same reasons — being able to harness other people’s talents and to be a translator of sorts.

“I feel like directing for me has been an act of translation, what is on the page versus what has to be onstage, how an actor interprets a moment versus how a playwright interprets it versus how an audience will hear it. I feel like it’s a great way to harness languages and incorporate different talents,” she said. “I’d love to be a conductor, I’d love to create symphonies; I don’t have those talents. But as a director, I get to create a symphony from words and voices and images using the great and better talents of those around me. That is really the greatest joy.”

When Bensussen was at the O’Neill directing shows and teaching, she wasn’t there long enough to get a real sense of the level of devotion of the center’s local fans. Over this past summer, she got the chance to see recurring patrons and to talk with them.

“When you’re only there for a week, you don’t realize how many regular audiences there are and how committed the community around the O’Neill is,” she said.