Young People's Playwriting Competition

Norfolk Young Voices is putting you centre stage with the Young People's Playwriting Competition.

The Norfolk Voices Maddermarket Theatre fundraising festival is saluting some of the most exciting creative talents living and working in Norfolk from 14-21 November 2020.


If you are aged between 16 and 18, the Maddermarket Theatre wants to hear from you now! We are launching a playwriting competition for young people who live and study in Norfolk. This central Norwich-based community theatre, which celebrates its centenary in 2021, is reopening after lockdown with a celebration of Norfolk Voices and yours could be included.

We want an original 1,000-word monologue. You can write about anything you like but it has to begin with the following phrase: There's nothing out there I promise you!

Entries from individuals and schools are both welcome.

The winner, and two guests, will get free tickets to the festival on Sunday 15 November 2020 at 8 pm to see their winning monologue performed on the Maddermarket stage following the performance of James McDermott's play Rubber Ring.

We are keen to support all you budding writers. You will find advice, tips and resources on our website. These have been developed in collaboration with popular playwright and poet James McDermott, playwright and former UEA playwriting lecturer Antoinette Moses, and Richard Hand, radio and theatre producer and professor of media practice UEA.

The judges are: James McDermott, Antoinette Moses and Miche Montague, artistic director of MOCO Theatre.

Submissions should be emailed to competition@maddermarket.org.uk
by 10 October, 2020

Stuck for ideas? You will shortly find advice and writing tips on our website at maddermarket.co.uk/norfolk-young-voices.

The Judges

James McDermott is a Norfolk based playwright, poet and creative writing teacher.
His plays include Rubber Ring, winner of Pulse Festival's Suitcase Prize, and Time and Tide, nominated for an Offie for Best New Play. He is currently writing new plays for HighTide, Eastern Angles, Hampstead Theatre, Norwich Theatre and the Mercury Theatre Colchester. as well as a series for television. His debut poetry collection 'Manatomy' was published this year to rave reviews. James is also a Diversity Consultant at Norwich Arts Centre, a Trustee of Suffolk's INK New Writing Festival, a Board Member of Holt Festival and a Board Member of Norwich Pride.

Antoinette Moses is an award-winning playwright and an author with extensive experience in teaching creative writing. She has published over twenty bestselling books of language-learner fiction and written over nine plays. She taught scriptwriting at the University of East Anglia for ten years and is now a Trustee of the Maddermarket Theatre. Antoinette also co-founded and produced UEA's Festival of Literature for Young people (FLY) and, re-founded and ran the Cambridge Animation Festival. She is now writing crime fiction and her first novel in this series, A Public Murder, comes out later this year.

Miche Montague began her studies in acting with the British American Drama Academy, learning from the likes of Dame Judi Dench and Sir Derek Jacobi. Artistic director of MOCO Theatre, a company which creates site-specific, immersive projects, she is passionate about supporting and nurturing individual potential. Miche has a long-standing relationship with the Arts in Norfolk. She has worked as the principal youth drama tutor at the Norwich Playhouse, as youth director at the Maddermarket Theatre, and artistic director of the Sewell Barn. Many of Miche's former students now have successful careers in film, television, and theatre, perhaps most notably Sam Clemmett who is currently starring on Broadway as Albus Potter in The Cursed Child and is the patron of MOCO Theatre


This news item was published : 18 September 2020.

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