The ETPEP Award, run by the Finborough Theatre, is a playwriting prize for people who work in the theatre industry who are new to writing.
Due to these challenging times, they have extended the deadline for this year to Tuesday 30 June 2020, so anyone who hasn’t written a play yet, but feels they would like to, now has time to enter.
They will also share the cash prize more widely to try and give a little bit of support to more people, so the first prize will now be £6000, and there will now be ten runner up prizes of £300 each.
The ETPEP Award 2020 is a playwriting prize for new UK playwrights who work in the theatre industry, run by the Finborough Theatre in association with the Experienced Theatre Practitioners Early Playwriting Trust (ETPEP).
The Award’s purpose is to find and nurture a playwright who has worked in theatre for two years or more (but not in a literary department setting or as a paid script reader), who is looking to further their ambitions and skill in the art and craft of playwriting.
The ETPEP Award 2020 is open to UK residents of any age who have not had a play professionally produced, and who have worked front of house, in administrative roles, on stage, backstage, lighting, design etc. or in a creative capacity in theatre for at least two years, either now or in the past.
The award is intended to target and encourage those who are currently working in theatre but who are new to playwriting, and therefore, the Award is not open to those who have worked in any capacity in a literary department, a literary agency, theatre critics, or those who ever have undertaken paid script reading work.
The award will be judged completely anonymously until the very final shortlist and interview stage, and brief feedback will be provided on every entry.
The winner will receive a prize of £6,000, a development relationship with the Finborough Theatre including one-to-one dramaturgy with Finborough Theatre Artistic Director and playwright Neil McPherson; a rehearsal workshop with actors and a director to develop the play; and a staged reading performance of the winning play at the Finborough Theatre, London on Sunday, 20 September 2020 (subject to confirmation, depending on events).
The judges for the 2020 Award are playwright Winsome Pinnock; Artistic Director of the Finborough Theatre and playwright Neil McPherson; Literary Manager of the Finborough Theatre and playwright Sue Healy; Actor, Playwright and Activist Athena Stevens; and Clive Webster of the Experienced Theatre Practitioners Early Playwriting Trust, which founded the award. More judges will be announced shortly.
Full submission guidelines and how to enter available here.
