Canuck playwright Judith Thompson has scored the 2008 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, the annual kudos honoring female playwrights.
Selected for her play “Palace of the End,” a trio of monologues about the Iraq war, Thompson was awarded the $20,000 cash prize at the 30th annual ceremony held Monday eveningat Houston’s Alley Theater.
Three other scribes on the year’s shortlist for the award -- Lisa McGee (“Girls and Dolls”), Jenny Schwartz (“God’s Ear”) and Polly Stenham (“That Face”) -- received special commendations of $2,500 each.
“Palace of the End” recently ended its run at Canadian Stage Company in Toronto and is planned for an Off Broadway incarnation this summer from Epic Theater Ensemble. Thompson’s other plays include “Habitat” and “Enoch Arden at the Hope Shelter.”
Panel of judges for the 2008 Blackburn Prize includes Long Wharf Theater a.d. Gordon Edelstein, scribe Sarah Ruhl and thesps Edie Falco and Janet McTeer.
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