THE JANE CHAMBERS AWARD recognizes new plays and performance texts created by women writers which present a feminist perspective and that provide significant opportunities for female performers. This annual award, founded in 1984, welcomes experimentations in form and in subject matter. It is given in memory of lesbian playwright Jane Chambers, who through her plays such as A Late Snow, My Blue Heaven, Last Summer at Bluefish Cove, and Kudzu became a major feminist voice in American theater. Sponsored by the Women and Theatre Program with the Association for Theater in Higher Education, the contest understands feminism to cross an array of class, sex, race, national, ethnic, theatrical, and/or geographic perspectives. The Jane Chambers Contest winner receives $1000 and a rehearsed reading at ATHE’s annual summer conference, where she is recognized at ATHE's Awards Ceremony.

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Read more about Jane Chambers and her work at JaneChambers.org.

The 2020 contest is currently accepting submissions! Please find more information on the contest website. The deadline for submissions is February 15, 2020.

Contact our Jane Chambers coordinators Jennifer-Scott Mobley and Maya Roth with questions.

2019 Winner

WTP is pleased to announce the 2019 Jane Chambers Contest winner: In the Cervix of Others, by Alice Eve Cohen. You can read an excerpt of the play here!

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Runner Up: 

Iphigenia Point Blank: The Story of the First Refugee by Lisa Schlesinger

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Honorable Mentions: 

The Butch Project by Lynne S. Brandon
Magdalena's Crossing by Carolyn Nur Wistrand

Derecho by Noelle Viñas

Queen Cleopatre and Princess Pocahontas by Rhiana Yazzie

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See the curation notes for all the plays here.