The Women's Prize for Playwriting has announced their annual finalist list of selected scripts. From more than 1000 submissions, these were initially longlisted into a pool of the "50 plays which will inspire and entertain audiences everywhere," and have now been ultimately narrowed down to five scripts. See the previously longlisted plays here. The winners of the Prize will be announced in a ceremony at the London Library January 19, 2024.
This year's finalists scripts for the Women's Prize for Playwrighting are Bellringers by Daisy Hall, LUMIN by Emma Gibson, Intelligence by Sarah Grochala, The Angels Were Worms by Shaan Sahota, and King Troll (The Fawn) by Sonali Bhattacharyya.
The judges for this year's submissions, chaired by Kiln Theatre Artistic Director Indhu Rubasingham, are journalist Samira Ahmed, playwrights April de Angelis and Chris Bush, actor Noma Dumezweni, literary agent Mel Kenyon, journalist and critic Anya Ryan, National Theatre Head of Play Development Nina Steiger, and Guardian Editor in Chief Katharine Viner.
Founded in 2019 by Ellie Keel and Paines Plough, the prize's mission is to campaign for equality in the number of male and female writers whose plays are produced on national stages in the U.K. and Ireland. In 2018, only 26% of new plays on major British stages were by women. In 2022, still only 30% of major productions in the U.K. had a credited female writer—including librettists and adapters.
