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Relationships at the core of 2026 Play Right Prize winning scripts

trevor.kenney — Mon, 09 Mar 2026 21:08:18 +0000

Complex, yet deeply human relationships are the focal points of the winning scripts for the 2026 Play Right Prizes. Supported by Chancellor Terry Whitehead (BA ’94), the annual Play Right Prize competition encourages excellence and development in student playwriting. This year’s winners are Steele Prefontaine, Nikko Hunt and Naima Rain.

Steele Prefontaine won the top prize for Homebodies.

The three prize winners each receive tuition credit and dramaturgical support to bring their plays to life on stage, with the first-place winner receiving a staged reading during the Play Right Prize and Spirit Prize Gala.

Fourth-year drama (tech/design) student Steele Prefontaine is the first-place winner. His script, Homebodies, follows the final days of two brothers at odds, one caring for the other, as they confront themselves, their past and their present.

The Play Right Prize jury noted the pull of opposing themes of care and resentment, turning the myth of sibling rivalry on its head to create an absurd and confronting story.

Prefontaine says his inspiration came from the real-life story of Homer and Langley Collyer, who became tabloid fixtures in the 1930s for their life of seclusion and hoarding.

“When learning about their story, I found an inherent dramatic tension as I imagined what their final days must have been like. They became the basis of my characters, Ira and Harpo,” he says. “I found creative freedom in taking their story and transplanting it into rural Saskatchewan. Placing the story in Saskatchewan was an integral change in finding the tone of the play. I was able to draw on imagery, language and stories of the people and the land.”

Nikko Hunt's script for Hot Commodity, earned second place.

The first runner-up is drama (performance) student Nikko Hunt. For her play, Hot Commodity, Hunt explores a mentor/mentee relationship between two young women in the cosmetics industry.

Described by the prize jury as a timely, fast-paced and tightly constructed critique of the beauty industry, Hunt says the idea for her play came from realizing how much her life had been consumed by makeup and skincare products.

“I have spent more than I would like to admit on products that sometimes just sit on my dresser. The main culprit that kept influencing me to buy more was social media. Every time I would open my phone there would be a new lip gloss out, or worse, a new perfume that was a ‘must have’,” she says.

“I began workshopping the play in my Playwriting II class and continued to work on it after the class concluded. During that process I received helpful feedback from my classmates and from my professor, Greg MacArthur, and I used their notes to help guide the next drafts of the play.”

Naima Rain earned the third-place prize for her script, Goodbye See You Later.

Third-year drama student Naima Rain is the second runner up for the Play Right Prize with her play, Goodbye See You Later. The play explores the relationship between a father and daughter, taking place in limbo as the duo unpacks intergenerational traumas, addiction and the effects of residential schools.

The prize jury praised Rain’s submission as a mature and devastating testament of imagination, noting the script acts as both a lullaby and an elegy.

“By the end of the play, you are left wondering if the daughter will follow in his footsteps, as so much of her is made up of him,” Rain says. “The play itself was inspired by a conversation between my grandfather and me about tipi rings, and traditionally how, when someone passed away, their tipi ring would be closed, making it a death lodge.”

Prefontaine, Hunt and Rain will be recognized at the annual Play Right Prize and Spirit Prize Gala on March 19. The winners receive $1,500, $750 and $250 respectively in tuition credits.

Learn more about the plays on the ULethbridge Stories site.

2025 Play Right Prize winners create compelling written tales

trevor.kenney — Mon, 31 Mar 2025 22:14:14 +0000

Tales of friendship, youth and motherhood are the topics of the winning scripts of the 2025 Play Right Prize Competition at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge.

Carter Popielarz, Levi Mason and Maddie McKee are the winners of this year’s competition, highlighting the breadth and depth of talent that ULethbridge students possess in creative writing.

Drama (performance) student Carter Popielarz won first place in the competition for his script, Honk If You’re Lonely.

The Play Right Prize, sponsored by Chancellor Terry Whitehead (BA ’94), is an annual competition that awards $2,500 in cash prizes to students and supports their professional development in playwriting. This year’s jurors include Jenn Taylor, Managing Director of the Alberta Playwright’s Network, and award-winning playwright and alumna Chelsea Woolley (BA/BEd ’14), who received the 2024 ULethbridge Alumni Association Young Alumni Award.

Popielarz wins $1,500 for first place; Mason wins $750 for second and McKee receives $250 for third. All Play Right Prize winners receive professional dramaturgical support to further develop and refine their scripts for the stage.

Drama (performance) student Carter Popielarz won first place in the competition for his script, Honk If You’re Lonely. Described as a generous character study of friendship between two older men, Popielarz says he was intrigued by what it means to leave old lives behind, particularly later in life, exploring themes of change and regret.

Play Right Prize jury member Jenn Taylor took note of Popielarz’s nuanced writing. “Honk If You’re Lonely is the story of a man at a crossroads in his life. After a chance meeting at a small-town motel, he begins an unexpected journey with an uncertain end,” says Taylor. “This beautifully self-contained narrative explores questions of genuine connection and vulnerability in two lives constrained by expectations.”

For Popielarz, entering the Play Right Prize competition is a great way to get eyes on his work, as he receives valuable dramaturgical feedback. Winning the cash prize also allows students like Popielarz to learn without financial strain, kickstart projects and begin building a name in the industry.

English student Levi Mason is the second-place winner with his play, God is a Black Hole.

“I feel very honoured to be recognized for a piece of work that has been so close to my heart for the past two years,” he says. “I am interested in having the show fully produced in the next few years. I think a local theatre company would be a good option, as there are often many great actors in their 40s and 50s in the community who could really have a great time with it.”

English student Levi Mason is the second-place winner with his play, God is a Black Hole. In this script, three childhood friends meet at the edge of the apocalypse, confronting their choices and regrets as they seek validation from their found family. Levi says capturing the bleakness of the story, which was at first one of his biggest obstacles, ended up becoming something that he found joy in exploring.

“How could I make something about existentialism, nihilism and the end of the world and make it something that people actually want to read and watch? Despite the heaviness of the themes in this play, I actually find it quite joyful in a lot of ways,” says Mason. “It might be a play about the end of the world and trying to accept that nothing matters and dealing with religious trauma, but it’s also a play about friendship and healing and playing at the park.”

"God is a Black Hole muses on youth and friendship with great imagery that reveals both the small and astronomical aspects of growing up queer,” says Play Right Prize juror Woolley.

Drama (performance) student Maddie McKee took third place in the Play Right Prize competition for her play, Create. Described as an absurdist horror that follows a pregnant woman struggling to find inspiration to give birth, McKee says she began writing the play in her second year during a playwriting class.

Drama (performance) student Maddie McKee took third place in the Play Right Prize competition for her play, Create.

“Create is very personal to me and is a representation of how easily we can limit ourselves through our own self-doubt. Creating art is so vulnerable and intimidating, and the character’s journey reflects the complicated feelings artists have towards their work,” says McKee.

“A surreal journey through the act of becoming a mother, Create is a complex story birthed from a unique metaphor,” says Taylor. “Through the relationship between an artist and her muse, the audience comes to understand some of the anxiety, pressure and the need to be perfect that expectant mothers experience.”

For McKee, winning the Play Right Prize reminded her of the importance of her voice, prompting her to continue writing plays.

“Paid opportunities are crucial for emerging artists! It validates our art and proves that students deserve to be paid for their work. This is why the Play Right Prize is so important: it proves to students that we can be paid for our work, even as emerging artists, even before we finish our degrees.”

Learn more about the Play Right Prize winners: https://stories.ulethbridge.ca/2025-play-right-prize-winners/

Play Right Prize winner, Avery Raine, delves into the fascinating life of Albert Einstein’s first wife Mileva Marić

trevor.kenney — Thu, 12 May 2022 16:22:16 +0000

Psychology and dramatic arts student Avery Raine is the winner of the 2022 Play Right Prize competition. Raine’s play, Relativity, Etc., is an imagined rendition of the life of one of the true icons of the 20th century.

Avery Raine

Raine was honoured along with second and third-place winners Carter Debusschere and Achilles Friesen. Since 2008, Terry Whitehead (BA ’94) has been inspiring future playwrights through the Play Right Prize, awarding $2,500 annually to student playwrights and highlighting the winning entries at a public play reading.

For the winning script, Raine focuses on Albert Einstein’s first wife, Mileva Marić. She explores the tangled family dynamics of their sons, Hans and Eduard, and ruminates on the life that could have been for their daughter Lieserl, as she is suspected to have died of scarlet fever before the age of two.

“I looked more into Mileva’s life, and originally, it was just going to be about her. I wasn't going to focus on their kids as much, but there was so much there,” says Raine. “I'm very interested in Canadian feminist theatre, so that was a big part of wanting to tell Mileva’s story. I want it to be about her, but as it went on, it became about her and her children.”

Raine’s submission was praised by the jurors of the prize for its excellent composition, its lyrical take on ancestry and legacy and its unique perspective on mental health. This is Raine’s second win in the competition, having received the third-place prize in 2021. Raine receives $1,500 for her win this year and dramaturgical support to develop her script further. A reading of her play will take place at ULethbridge in the fall.

Winning second prize is dramatic arts student Carter Debusschere for his submission, Pressure Drop. Loosely based on a real-life air crash, Debusschere’s play uses an imaginatively crafted structure to tell a compelling story in a theatrically mature and innovative way. He utilizes an expressionist style that puts readers in the mind of the plane operator, who faces their demons while in the air.

Carter Debusschere

“The main dramatic convention is that the play works through memories,” says Debusschere. “Essentially, in these final moments of consciousness as the plane is going down, the lead character is able to go back to any specific memory in his past and relive it as if he was there.”

“I was very surprised, pleased and honoured to have won. Two very close friends of mine are the first and third place winners, so getting to share this honour with them has been very gratifying,” he adds.

The jurors had especially high praise for the way the high stakes plot line engages the audience from the intriguing beginning to the shocking conclusion. Debusschere receives $750 for his submission and will also receive dramaturgical support from a member of the adjudicating jury.

The third prize goes to Achilles Friesen, a dramatic arts student minoring in philosophy. Their philosophy background shines within their play, So Long, which explores three young lost souls and the limbo-like state they find themselves in, tackling existential questions related to death, mortality and the afterlife.

For Friesen, they based the characters off of themself during a time of significant change in their life, highlighting the importance of genderqueer characters in play writing.“On top of educating people about philosophy and what it looks like in an artistic realm, it's also important to bring in all the genderqueer students and show them that there's roles for them here,” says Friesen. “I'm making sure I have that genderqueer element in everything I do. I feel like a lot of people have very similar struggles that these three characters have.”

The jury notes that Friesen’s characters, reminiscent of Pirandello and Camus, are carefully crafted to challenge these existential questions with a philosophical punch that will keep viewers thinking long after the ending. Friesen receives $250 for their play and dramaturgical support from the jury.

Achilles Friesen

“We’re so grateful to Terry Whitehead for his longstanding support of playwriting at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge, and every year we continue to celebrate the outstanding work of our students,” says Dr. Shelley Scott, interim dean of the Faculty of Fine Arts. “Many past winners have gone on to continuing careers in theatre, and this award is a real incentive and encouragement to keep working on their creative craft.”

The 2021 prize went to dramatic arts student Jessica Syratt, who presented her play at a virtual reading last year.

The 2022 Play Right Prize jury is made up of Drama Faculty members Dr. Shelley Scott and Dave Smith, as well as Trevor Rueger from Alberta Playwright’s Network, who will coordinate dramaturgical support for the second and third place winners.

Read more about the winners and their scripts here: https://stories.ulethbridge.ca/2022-play-right-prize/.

Drama student entry takes home top award in 2021 Play Right Prize playwriting competition

trevor.kenney — Mon, 08 Mar 2021 22:09:27 +0000

Dramatic Arts student Jessica Syratt is the winner of the 2021 Play Right Prize competition for her entry, The Evening Comes.

Jessica Syratt

Syratt’s play was described by the competition jury as, “a poetic, spiritually rich, three-woman rumination on the common experience of grief and loss through different ages and time periods. Beautifully structured, layered with song and ritual, and authentically moving, the play exhibits a mature understanding of the power of language to express, share, and hopefully to heal, profound sorrow.”

For her win, Syratt receives $1,500 and her play will be featured at a virtual play reading on Thursday, April 8.

The play will receive support from drama faculty member Justin Blum who will work with Syratt on the process of taking the written play to see how it would unfold on stage.

“Receiving this award is a huge honour,” says Syratt. “Playwrighting is something I very much enjoy, and to have the chance to share my work, and for it to have had an impact is a huge encouragement to keep growing and learning as an artist.”

Daylin Chase

Second prize in the competition, receiving $750, went to Daylin Chase. Her entry, Neosapien, tells the story of two scientists trapped in a world of their own making. The play imagines a world where the need to solve food insecurity pushes two scientists to skew their morality and ethics. Well-crafted characters and rich dialogue left the jury with a lot to chew on after reading.

"As someone who often spends hours daydreaming about being a writer and not doing any writing, I would like to personally thank the Play Right Prize for providing me the motivation to finish a one act play as well as the opportunity to submit it for such a prestigious award,” says Chase.

Avery Olson

Avery Olson receives third place and $250 for her play, Two Women on A Bench in the Middle of Winter, which tells a dramatic story that intelligently blends the recognizable reality of young women living in contemporary culture with the timeless quality of myth.

Vic and Bella are friends, intent on escaping the traumas of their everyday lives. Brought to a park bench by a mysterious figure, when things don’t go as expected they discover that it doesn’t take much to go from thinking about ending it all to fighting for their lives.

“It's a bit ironic for a writing prize, but I truly don't have the words to express what an honour it is to have placed in this competition — especially alongside some incredibly talented friends,” shares Olson. “I've been writing for as long as I can remember, and I'll take this as a sign I'm doing something right.”

Since 2008, Terry Whitehead (BA ’94) has been inspiring future playwrights through the Play Right Prize, awarding $2,500 annually to student playwrights and highlighting the winning entries at a public play reading.

The 2020 public reading was scheduled in the weeks after the COVID-19 shutdown, and to honour last year’s winning playwright, Quinn Larder, both the 2020 and 2021 winning plays will be read at the virtual reading. The event is open to the public and free to attend with no registration required, Thursday, April 8, 6 p.m. via zoom (https://uleth.zoom.us/j/94499868694).

The 2021 Play Right Prize jury was made up of drama faculty members Drs. Shelley Scott and Justin Blum, and Trevor Rueger from the Alberta Playwright’s Network who will provide dramaturgical support to the 2nd and 3rd prize plays.

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