The 2011 R E Ross Trust Playwrights' Script Development Award Winners Announced

Four talented Victorian playwrights have won the 2011 R E Ross Trust Playwrights’ Script Development Awards and will share in $30,000 to aid in development of their play scripts.

These prestigious annual awards provide Victorian playwrights with grants of between $3000 and $10,000 to enhance their scripts through workshops with a Victorian-based theatre company or group, director or dramaturg. Award recipients are also offered the opportunity to further develop their works in rehearsed readings at the State Library of Victoria and fortyfivedownstairs in the Flashpoint series.

The 2011 award winners are:

Jane Montgomery Griffiths for A Little Piece for her Sister

Jane Miller for True Love Travels on a Gravel Road

Peta Brady for Strands

Diane Stubbings for The Parricide

Jane Montgomery Griffiths has also been selected to attend the 2012 PlayWriting Australia Script Development Workshop with her play, A Little Piece for my Sister.

The judges said the plays submitted demonstrated a diverse range and robust level of playwriting in Victoria. They said 'the four winning scripts are ambitious and adventurous works. Each demonstrates a sophisticated understanding of the theatre and what it can do, and yet they are as different from each other as they could possibly be.'

The Awards administrator at the State Library, Wendy Lasica, said The R E Ross Trust Playwrights’ Script Development Awards have become an anticipated part of the Victorian playwriting calendar.

'Since the Awards were established in 2003 they have been warmly welcomed by the playwriting community as a valuable support to the development of new works in Australia. The awards fill a gap in the industry and provide a wonderful opportunity for our talented playwrights to bring their works to fruition.'

The R E Ross Trust is a perpetual charitable Trust established in Victoria in 1970 by the will of the late Roy Everard Ross. Since its inception, The R E Ross Trust has distributed over 80 million dollars in grants for charitable purposes in Victoria.

The Awards are administered by the State Library of Victoria on behalf of The R E Ross Trust.