About

This year, the Griffin Award went online and we announced the winner on Thursday 25 June, 2020. You can watch the micro-excerpts of each of the shortlisted plays, performed by four talented actors, and discover who won the 2020 Griffin Award by checking out the online ceremony, or scroll down and all will be revealed!

Now in its 23rd year, the prestigious Griffin Award recognises an outstanding play or performance text that displays an authentic, inventive and contemporary Australian voice, with the winner receiving a $10,000 prize.

The plays are read anonymously by a panel of artists, who whittle them down to a shortlist of just five. The shortlist is put before a judging panel of industry leaders who select the winner. This year, a whopping 130 entries were received!

This year’s finalists are:

Grace Chapple for Never Closer
David Finnigan for 44 Sex Acts in One Week
Daley Rangi for Curiosity
Dylan Van Den Berg for way back when
Keziah Warner for LuNa

And we are thrilled to announce that the Griffin Award 2020 winner is Dylan Van Den Berg for way back when.

Check out the excerpt of his and all the finalists plays by watching the Award online!

The Griffin Award is generously supported by Copyright Agency Cultural Fund.

Online Ceremony Information

Thursday 25 June 7pm

Running Time
Approx. 30 minutes

Re-Watch the Online Ceremony
On Griffin’s YouTube Channel

Content Warning
Some of the shortlisted plays contain coarse language and adult themes.

About the Playwrights

Grace Chapple
Grace Chapple is a young writer, exported from Perth and based in Sydney. In 2017, Grace founded production company Brushstroke Productions, with whom she has written and produced two full length plays: Murder? She Asked (2019), and Not All A Dream (2018). Grace’s short play Someday was featured in the ATYP production Intersection: Arrival at the SBW Stables Theatre, 2019. Grace is also a creative for podcasting company Curio Network, with whom she has worked on three shows, and created the limited release podcast Odds & Ends (2017). She has recently completed the MFA program in Writing for Performance at NIDA.

David Finnigan
David Finnigan is a writer, theatre-maker and pharmacy assistant from Canberra. He’s an associate of science-theatre ensemble Boho (Australia), Coney (UK) and the Sipat Lawin Ensemble (Philippines). He’s a Churchill Fellow, an Asialink Fellow and the writer of Kill Climate Deniers. David’s online at davidfinig.com

Daley Rangi
Daley Rangi (Te Āti Awa) is an eclectic, award-winning multidisciplinary artist. Currently living on Whadjuk Noongar boodja, Daley was born in Aotearoa, with Māori whakapapa. They are neurodiverse and genderqueer, and utilise these lenses to infiltrate the outer limits of humanity, generating unpredictable and uncomfortable performance, visual, and written works, including Lipstuck, TANK, Hold Your Breath, and Curiosity. Daley participated in the Perth Festival Artist Lab, ATYP’s National Studio and Fresh Ink programs, and Black Swan State Theatre Company’s Emerging Writers Group, with whom Curiosity was developed and written. Daley is the Stephen Cummins Residency recipient and will be developing their epic de-colonial performance art work Takatāpui with Performance Space and PACT, alongside the Queer Workshop Intensive. A keen autodidact, Daley has achieved certificates in Māori Protocol and Language, Noongar Language and Culture, and Endangered Language Revival. Daley also won the prestigious Midsumma and Australia Post Queer Art Award for 2020. Intent on tearing down the status quo, Daley’s energies are focused on exposing the zeitgeist, speaking truth to power, and encouraging social change.

Dylan Van Den Berg
Dylan Van Den Berg is a Palawa writer with family connections to the northeast of Tasmania. His plays include Milk (The Street Theatre), The Camel (Fringe at the Edge), Why Am I a Fish? (Short+Sweet) and Blue: A Misery Play (First Seen/The Street Theatre). His work has been shortlisted for the Patrick White Playwrights Award, the Queensland Premier’s Drama Award and the Rodney Seaborn Playwrights Award. Dylan studied drama at ANU and the State University of New York.

Keziah Warner
Keziah is a playwright and dramaturg. She is an alumna of Melbourne Theatre Company’s Women in Theatre Program, Malthouse Theatre’s Besen Family Artist’s Program, Red Stitch’s INK Program, Playwriting Australia’s Post-Production Program and Soho Theatre’s Writer’s Lab (UK). She has been long-listed for Soho Theatre’s Young Writer’s Award and was the winner of the 2019 Patrick White Playwrights Award. Recent credits include: Control (Red Stitch, 2019), Help Yourself (MTC’s Cybec Electric, 2019) and Her Father’s Daughter (Hotel Now, 2018).

Watch the Excerpts

way back when by Dylan Van Den Berg
With Shakira Clanton

 

Never Closer by Grace Chapple
With Claire Lovering

 

44 Sex Acts in One Week by David Finnigan
With Andrea Demetriades

 

Curiosity by Daley Rangi
With Andrea Demetriades and Ryan Smedley

 

LuNa by Keziah Warner
With Shakira Clanton and Claire Lovering

Cast & Creatives

With Shakira Clanton, Andrea Demetriades, Claire Lovering, Ryan Smedley
Judging Panel Hilary Bell, Declan Greene, Michele Lee, Shari Sebbens
Host Tessa Leong
Presenters Phil Spencer, Kim Williams AM
Directors Declan Greene, Jack Mounsey
Videographer Jack Mounsey
Original Music and Sound Production Paul Charlier
Lighting Designer Benjamin Brockman
Broadcast Director Khym Scott
Producers Frankie Greene, Whitney Richards
Graphics Ang Collins

Accessibility

The Griffin Award will be captioned.