Baker, Cho, Lee, Kirkwood and Spallen Are Blackburn Finalists

By Adam Hetrick
18 Jan 2010

Plays by Annie Baker, Julia Cho and Young Jean Lee are among the ten finalists for the 32nd annual Susan Blackburn Prize.

The 2010 Blackburn Prize, which honors new English-language plays by women playwrights, will be presented in New York city in early March. The winning playwright will receive $20,000 and a signed and numbered print by artist Willem de Kooning. All other finalists will receive a $1,000 honor, and the judges may also award a $5,000 Special Commendation for another outstanding work.

The ten 2010 Blackburn finalists follow:

The Aliens by Annie Baker
The Language Archive by Julia Cho
This by Melissa James Gibson
it felt empty when the heart went at first but it is alright now by Lucy Kirkwood
The Shipment by Young Jean Lee
The Nature of Love by Rebecca Lenkiewicz
East of Berlin by Hannah Moscovitch
The Swallowing Dark by Lizzie Nunnery
Enron by Lucy Prebble
Strandline by Abbie Spallen

Previous Blackburn Prize winners include Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti, Caryl Churchill, Gina Gionfriddo, Beth Henley, Wendy Kesselman, Marlene Meyer, Ellen McLaughlin, Susan Miller, Chloe Moss, Dael Orlandersmith, Sarah Ruhl, Judith Thompson, Paula Vogel, Naomi Wallace and Timberlake Wertenbaker.

*

Established in 1978, The Susan Smith Blackburn Prize is the first international award created to recognize women playwrights. The 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, and her sister, Emilie Kilgore, and husband, William Blackburn, established the award in her honor.