THE LOUD KARMA EMERGING WOMEN AND NONBINARY PLAYWRIGHT AWARD
Sponsored by Loud Karma Productions, LLC
Description
SUBMISSIONS NOW CLOSED FOR 2025. SUBMISSIONS NOW CLOSED FOR 2025 AS OF 6/12/25
Loud Karma Productions was created because women and nonbinary playwrights deserve to have their voices heard. We are dedicated to producing works of emerging and marginalized artists who find themselves overlooked for reasons that have nothing to do with their talent. Our mission is to support emerging women artists and artists of any gender who are marginalized because of age, disability, gender, or ethnicity. We support the LGBTQ+ community, POC, and are an ally business.
It is no secret that female and nonbinary playwrights are underrepresented in theatres across the US and internationally. In a study released by the AAPAC, in a recent Broadway season, 86 percent of the produced playwrights were white males. Women and nonbinary voices are woefully underrepresented in spite of the amazing, groundbreaking, and vital work they are creating.
It is the goal of Loud Karma Productions to celebrate and recognize emerging female and nonbinary playwrights and provide opportunities for these deserving women and nonbinary writers to have opportunities—both in experience and support—for their reach to continue to grow and their careers as playwrights expand—and take their work to the next level.
Qualifications
1. The applicant must define themselves as a woman or nonbinary person.
2. The applicant must have a play or musical that they have written in production at the 2025 Hollywood Fringe Festival. If the playwright submits a musical, they must have written the book for the show. (We understand that librettists may be working with others, but this award will be for the book of the musical or play only, and only the individual author of the book will be considered for this award.) In the case that a writing team applies and wins as a team, the cash award will be split, but each playwright will have an opportunity to have their work produced in the upcoming Loud Karma Production as either a team or individual writers.
3. The applicant must submit an application and copy of their play through the Hollywood Fringe Website for this award no later than the final cutoff date as designated by the Hollywood Fringe Festival. (Because this is a writing award, our team of judges will ONLY judge you on the written work. This will be deleted as soon as judging is concluded, and the intellectual property of the playwright will be protected.)
SUBMIT YOUR APPLICATION HERE: https://tinyurl.com/4yztxuhe
SUBMIT YOUR PLAY HERE: [email protected]
4. The finalists or their representatives must attend the Hollywood Fringe Awards and Closing Ceremony.
Methodology
The award will be judged by our panel in two ways:
1. The written script.
2. The application.
Each judge will be provided with two 5-point rubrics for judging both the application and the written play. At least 3 judges will submit a score for each applicant play. The judging is weighted first and most heavily on the written work and secondly on the strength of the application.
3. The script of each submitted play will be read by at least two- three judges. Semifinalist and finalists will be read again by at least two judges.
4. The final tally of the rubric score for the application and the written play will be combined and a winner and runner up will be chosen. Finalists will be notified so they can be in the audience at the Hollywood Fringe Awards and then both the winner and the runner up will be announced and honored on stage by Loud Karma Producer, Grace Jasmine, and one of her colleagues to be determined on the Fringe Awards stage.
Reward
The Loud Karma Emerging Women and Nonbinary Playwright’s Award will provide the following opportunities to the winner and runner up for this award:
A 500.00 cash prize to used be as the playwright wishes to promote their next play venture. (Runner up will receive a 250.00 cash prize. Additionally, if a third play deserves recognition, a third prize will be awarded.)
A framed Certificate honoring their achievement.
An opportunity for the playwright to submit a new work they have written—either a short play or monologue—for consideration as part of an upcoming Emerging Women and Nonbinary Playwrights Event produced by Loud Karma Productions. The runner up will also be invited to submit a monologue or short play for production in the same event.
An opportunity for the First, Second, and Third place winners to be submitted to an Equity Theatre for possible inclusion in their Equity New Works Program. (Last Year’s Winner, Starr Shapiro’s show OBSESSED received an EQUITY reading at a prestigious regional theatre.)
We especially encourage woman and nonbinary playwrights who identify as any of the following to apply: older, queer, disabled or POC.
