Third Biennial William Saroyan Prize competition deadline extended

PanARMENIAN.Net - The Armenian Dramatic Arts Alliance (ADAA) this week extended the deadline to the Third Biennial William Saroyan Prize for Playwriting Award competition from Feb. 15 to March 15, The Armenian Weekly reported.

Three finalist plays will be selected by a panel of theater professionals and announced in early summer 2012. The grand prize winner will be announced in late 2012. Due to funding changes, the grand prize for this cycle will be a $5,000 award.

The 2010 winner of the Saroyan Prize, London-based playwright Silva Semerciyan (“Another Man’s Son”), has since signed with the famed literary agency Curtis Brown and received a weeklong development workshop of the play at the National Theatre, the pre-eminent theater in Britain, with an eye toward a full production. ADAA also presented a staged reading of the play at the Los Angeles Theater Center.

ADAA’s mission is to project the Armenian voice on the world stage through the arts of theater and film. It accomplishes this through two writing contests, play readings, the Boston Armenian Film Festival, and various networking events.

ADAA’s William Saroyan Prize for Playwriting for plays on Armenian themes is made possible by a grant from the William Saroyan Foundation, which established the award at ADAA in 2007-08 in conjunction with the William Saroyan Centennial.