THE SUSAN SMITH BLACKBURN PRIZE
2014- 2015 FINALISTS ANNOUNCED
MAJOR AWARD FOR WOMEN PLAYWRIGHTS CELEBRATES THIRTY- SEVENTH YEAR
“The Susan Smith Blackburn Prize has done more than any other single force to get plays by women collected and celebrated, but more importantly, produced.”- Marsha Norman, 1983 Winner for ‘night Mother
The Susan Smith Blackburn Prize has announced 12 Finalists for its prestigious playwriting award, the oldest and largest prize awarded to women playwrights. Chosen from over 150 nominated plays, the Finalists are
Lisa D'Amour (U.S.) - Airline Highway
Alice Birch (U.K.) - Revolt. She said. Revolt again.
Alecky Blythe (U.K.) - Little Revolution
Clare Barron (U.S.) - You Got Older
Clara Brennan (U.K.) - Spine
Katherine Chandler (U.K.) - Parallel Lines
Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig (U.S.) - The World of Extreme Happiness
Lindsey Ferrentino (U.S.) - Ugly Lies the Bone
Zodwa Nyoni (U.K.) - Boi Boi Is Dead
Heidi Schreck (U.S.) - Grand Concourse
Ruby Rae Spiegel (U.S.) - Dry Land
Tena Štivičić (U.K.and Croatia) - 3 Winters - 2015 WINNER
The Winner of the 2014-2015 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize will be named at the Awards Presentation on March 2 in New York City. The Winner will be awarded a cash prize of $25,000, and will also receive a signed print by renowned artist Willem de Kooning, created especially for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. Each of the additional Finalists will receive an award of $5,000.
The Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, co-founded by Emilie S. Kilgore and William Blackburn, honors outstanding new English-language plays by women. Many of the Winners have gone on to receive other honors, including Olivier, Lilly, Evening Standard and Tony Awards for Best Play. Eight Blackburn Finalist plays have subsequently won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
The Houston-based Susan Smith Blackburn Prize reflects the values and interests of Susan Smith Blackburn, noted American actress and writer who lived in London during the last 15 years of her life. She died in 1977 at the age of 42. Over 350 plays have been honored as Finalists since the Prize was instituted in 1977.
In 2013, Prize founder Emilie S. Kilgore was awarded a Lilly Lifetime Achievement Award for her work promoting women playwrights. The Susan Smith Blackburn Prize received the 2010 Theatre Communications Group's National Funder Award. The annual honor goes to a company, foundation or other entity for “leadership and sustained national support of theater in America.”
Last year's Winner of the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, Chimerica by Lucy Kirkwood also won the U.K.'s Olivier Award for Best New Play and the Evening Standard Award for Best Play. Subsequent to winning the 2012-2013 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize for The Flick, Annie Baker was honored with the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, a Steinberg Playwright Award as well as with the Horton Foote Legacy Project. The Nether byJennifer Haley, Winner of the 2011-2012 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, will receive its New York premiere opening February 4 in a production by MCC Theater at the Lucille Lortel Theatre, directed by Anne Kaufmann. In the U.K., the Royal Court's production of The Nether, directed by Jeremy Herrin, is transferring for a run on the West End, set to open on February 23.
Other recipients of the Prize include Caryl Churchill’s Serious Money, Katori Hall’s Hurt Village, Paula Vogel's How I Learned to Drive, Chloe Moss’s This Wide Night, Judith Thompson’s Palace of the End, Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti's Behzti (Dishonour), Sarah Ruhl's The Clean House, Rona Munro’s Bold Girls, Dael Orlandersmith's Yellowman, Julia Cho’s The Language Archive, Gina Gionfriddo's U.S. Drag, Bridget Carpenter's Fall, Charlotte Jones' Humble Boy, Naomi Wallace’s One Flea Spare, and Moira Buffini's Silence.
The international panel of Judges for the 2014-2015 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize includes, in the U.S., actor Carmen Herlihy, director Liesl Tommy and Chay Yew, artistic director of Chicago's Victory Gardens Theatre. U.K. judges are BAFTA and Emmy award-winning actor Rebecca Hall, playwright Rona Munro and National Theatre associate director Bijan Sheibani.
Former judges of The Susan Smith Blackburn Prize over the past thirty-seven years are a Who’s Who of the English-speaking theatre and include Edward Albee, Eileen Atkins, Blair Brown, Zoe Caldwell, Jill Clayburgh, Glenn Close, Harold Clurman, Colleen Dewhurst, Edie Falco, Ralph Fiennes, John Guare, A.R. Gurney, Mel Gussow, David Hare, Jessica Hecht, Judith Ivey, Tony Kushner, Phyllida Lloyd, Francis McDormand, Cynthia Nixon, Janet McTeer, Marsha Norman, Jim Parsons, Joan Plowright, Marian Seldes, Fiona Shaw, Max Stafford-Clark, Tom Stoppard, Meryl Streep, Daniel Sullivan, Jessica Tandy, Paula Vogel, Sigourney Weaver, Wendy Wasserstein, August Wilson and George C. Wolfe among more than 200 artists in the United States, the United Kingdom and Ireland.
About the Finalists
Lisa D'Amour (U.S.) - Airline Highway
Submitted by Steppenwolf Theatre Company and Manhattan Theatre Club
Airline Highway is a Steppenwolf Theater commission and is currently running at Steppenwolf, directed by Joe Mantello. The production will transfer to Manhattan Theater Club's Samuel J. Friedman Theater (Broadway), opening on April 23.
Clare Barron (U.S.) - You Got Older
Submitted by Page 73 Productions
You Got Older received its world premiere in the fall of 2014, directed by Anne Kauffman and produced by Page 73 at HERE Arts Center in New York City.
Alice Birch (U.K.) - Revolt. She said. Revolt again.
Submitted by the RSC (U.K.) and the Wilma Theater (U.S.)
Commissioned by the RSC, Revolt. She said. Revolt again. was performed at The Other Place at the RSC in Stratford in June and July 2014 and then played at the Royal Court Theatre for two performances in July 2014 and the Latitude Festival.
Alecky Blythe (U.K.) - Little Revolution
Submitted by the Almeida Theatre
Little Revolution was produced by the Almeida Theatre in the Fall of 2014.
Submitted by Soho Theatre
The one-woman play Spine premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe (winner Fringe First, Herald Angel) and then ran at Soho Theatre in October, 2014.
Katherine Chandler (U.K.) - Parallel Lines
Submitted by Sherman Cymru
Welsh theatre Dirty Protest premiered Parallel Lines in November of 2014.
Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig (U.S.) - The World of Extreme Happiness
Submitted by Marin Theatre Company
The World of Extreme Happiness debuted in a workshop production at the UK’s National Theatre. Its world premiere is a co-production with the Goodman Theatre (Fall, 2014) and the Manhattan Theatre Club (beginning February 3, 2015) directed by Eric Ting.
Lindsey Ferrentino (U.S.) Ugly Lies the Bone
Submitted by The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center and Roundabout Theatre Company
The world premiere of Ugly Lies the Bone will be produced off-Broadway by Roundabout Theater Company (Roundabout Underground) in the Fall of 2015. Ugly Lies the Bone was developed at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. The play was also chosen for Roundabout Theater Company's Underground Reading Series, Premiere Stages New Play Contest, Florida Studio Theater's New Play Festival, and The Great Plains Theater Conference.The play has an upcoming production at The Bloomington Playwrights Project and was produced at Fordham University in 2014.
Zodwa Nyoni (U.K.) Boi Boi is Dead
Submitted by West Yorkshire Playhouse
Tiata Fahodzi, the UK's leading African theatre company, in co-production with West Yorkshire Playhouse and Watford Palace Theatre will premiere Boi Boi is Dead beginning mid-February, 2015.
Heidi Schreck (U.S.) Grand Concourse
Submitted by Playwrights Horizons
Grand Concourse premiered at Playwrights Horizons in October of 2014 and will debut on the The Steppenwolf Theatre mainstage in June 2015..
Ruby Rae Spiegel (U.S.) Dry Land
Submitted by Colt Coeur
Tena Štivičić (U.K.) 3 Winters
Submitted by The National Theatre
3 Winters was produced at the National Theatre in London in December 2014.