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About the contest

The Prague Post Playwriting Contest started in 2007 with the goal of bringing together artists and the theatergoing community. For its inaugural year, more than 100 scripts were submitted. The winning play was "Burn Your Bookes" by Richard Byrne, who offered the following thoughts for this year's contest:

“When playwrights sit down at their desks, they’re writing with one goal in mind: To see their play produced.

”After all, a script only truly becomes a play when a director takes up the playwright’s vision, and actors wrestle with the characters, and sets and costumes and lights and sound animate it. And, of course, when an audience finds its seats and the theater plunges into that sweetly anticipatory darkness.

”For the three finalists of the 2008 Prague Post Playwriting Contest, that goal will become reality. It certainly did for me last year when I sent off my one-act play, “Burn Your Bookes,” to the judges late last fall. By late February, I was in Prague, watching my play take shape in rehearsals, with the talented Czech director Julek Neumann at the helm.

”As gratified as I was to actually win the contest last year, the real prize was that production and everything that came with it: the new friendships forged in the crucible of putting on a show, the attention lavished on my play by the contest’s tireless and savvy organizers, and the things I learned as a writer through the process and the performances.

”I can’t say enough good things about The Prague Post Playwriting Contest. But there’s only way for you to have the same fabulous experience that I had in Prague: Get writing and submit your work!

This year's timeline

This year, we’re dedicating even more time to the judging and production of the plays.

• Sept. 26: Submission period begins
• Nov. 30: Submission deadline
• Dec. 19: Semifinalists announced
• Dec. 9: Finalists announced
• Mid-January: Auditions
• Mid-February: Rehearsals begin
• February-March: Performances of the finalists and awarding of prizes