The winners sharing the £50,000 prize fund of the Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting, which is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year, were announced at Manchester’s Royal Exchange Theatre on Monday 21 July 2020.
The top prize of £20,000 went to the debut play by British-Nigerian writer Tolu Okanlawon from Hackney, East London. Based on extensive research of real events, Shooters follows African American photojournalist Gordon Parks as he documents the lives of a group of teenage boys in 1940s Harlem for Life Magazine.
The Judges’ Award of £10,000 was presented to Silva Semerciyan for her play Przewalski’s Horses, which follows a woman fleeing war-torn Kyiv to seek refuge with her estranged grandmother inside the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone in 2015.
The International Award, also £10,000, went to Jesús I Valles, a queer Mexican immigrant writer-performer from Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua and El Paso, Texas, who was unable to attend the ceremony. Spread follows a group of boys in 9th grade as they navigate the balance of childhood and the ever-present push of adult pressures.
Two of the shortlisted plays were eligible for the North-West Original New Voice Award, both of whose writers are from Stockport in Greater Manchester. The £10,000 award was presented to Daisy Miles, who is currently training with the Royal Exchange Theatre’s Young Company of Writers, for R Lady’s, her first full-length play. However, it was decided that the other eligible play, Dog Dog Dog by Terri Jade Donovan, would also be be recognised with a commendation and a £5,000 grant.
The ceremony was compèred by actor Julie Hesmondhalgh, who has performed many times on the Royal Exchange’s stage, including in a previous Bruntwood winner, Kendall Feaver’s The Almighty Sometimes. She went “off script” at one point to say how important she felt it was for writers to have a voice in a world in which we see genocide on our TV screens. Although she wasn’t specific, International Award winner Valles, in a speech read out by his agent, made explicit reference to the situation in Gaza in the theatre that was accused of cancelling a production for referring to that conflict—which it has denied—just a few months ago.
Selina Cartmell, Artistic Director at the Royal Exchange Theatre, said, “as a judge for this prize in its landmark 20th year, I’ve had the extraordinary privilege of reading work that has challenged, surprised, and moved me in equal measure. Our 15 shortlisted writers represent something remarkable—the courage to imagine different worlds, to ask uncomfortable questions and to trust us with their most profound creative insights.
“Each script on our shortlist offers a unique window into who we are as a society, and more importantly, who we might become. Shooters is an extraordinary play beautifully crafted by Tolu Okanlawon, a huge congratulations to him, to our other winners and to every writer who has shared their bold visions with us.
“None of this would be possible without the remarkable partnership between the Royal Exchange Theatre, the Oglesby Charitable Trust and Bruntwood. So, let’s celebrate our shortlisted writers, honour our partnerships, and look forward to a future filled with the stories we haven’t yet imagined.”
Credit: www.britishtheatreguide.info
