Playwrights Guild of Canada Announces Shortlists for Inaugural Playwriting Awards Celebration

On Monday, October 22, the Playwrights Guild of Canada (PGC) will announce the winners of its annual playwriting awards at its first-ever awards ceremony at Stage West in Mississauga. Today, the Guild announced its shortlist. Guests will be able to board a shuttlebus in downtown Toronto to attend the event, hosted by Damien Atkins, which begins at 6:30 p.m.

The Carol Bolt Award is presented annually in recognition of the best work premiered by a PGC member in the past year. This year’s shortlisted entries are:

• After Jerusalem by Aaron Bushkowsky, a dark comedy set in Israel about a teacher masquerading as an actress and a soldier with scriptwriting ambitions.
• The Happy Woman by Rose Cullis, a play about a performance artist that explores "the nature of happiness, the desire to be normal, and the tension between truth and lies".
• The Cave Painter by Don Hannah, a one-woman show about a visual artist facing a life crisis at 60.

The Best New Musical Award is presented to a musical by a PGC member that has not yet premiered publicly. This year’s shortlisted entries are:

• Hersteria by Sharon Bajer and Joseph Aragon
• Jamie Rowsell Lives by Lorne Elliot
• Tom Pinkerton: The Ballad of Butterfly's Son by Hiro Kanagawa and composer David MacIntyre

The Best New Comedy Award is presented to a comedy by a PGC member that has not yet premiered publicly. This year’s shortlisted entries are:

• Michael Rising by Damien Atkins
• Shorthanded by Michael Grant
• Aftershock by Evan Tsitsias

At the awards event, PGC will also present the winners of its Post-Secondary Playwriting Competition: Leah Jane Esau (Disappeared) and runner-up Maureen Gualtieri (The Green Man), as well as the winner of Theatre Ontario's 2012 Maggie Bassett Award, the generous and prolific Dave Carley and the winner of PGC's Lifetime Membership Award.

Theatre community members or media who wish to RSVP for the event should contact executive director Robin Sokoloski at 416-703-0201 or via email.

Photo Credit: Guntar Kravis. Maria Vacratsis, Martin Happer, Maev Beaty, Ingrid Rae Doucet and Barbara Gordon in the Nightwood theatre production of The Happy Woman by Rose Cullis, among the shortlisted plays for this year's Carol Bolt Award.