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Prize for Drama (2011-)
Louis Esson Prize for Drama (1985-2010)
Subcategory of Victorian Premier's Literary Awards
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Latest Winners / Recipients

Year: 2024

winner y separately published work icon The Jungle and the Sea S. Shakthidharan , Eamon Flack , 2020 Strawberry Hills : Currency Press , 2023 17261664 2020 single work drama

'A mother, in a time of war. She loses members of her family, one after the other – but she never loses hope. A rich, sweeping new play from the team that made the acclaimed Counting and CrackingThe Jungle and the Sea leans on two great pillars of literature – Antigone and the Mahābhārata – to forge a new story about surviving loss and the possibility of reconciliation.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

Year: 2023

winner The Return John Harvey , 2020 single work drama

'Once considered ‘exotic’ trophies of antiquity, the bodily remains of Indigenous men, women and children served scientific theories of evolution and were prized objects displayed on mantelpieces. In the cover of darkness, grave robbers would pillage burial grounds, to sell Ancestral remains to the highest bidder. Thousands were sold.

'Today, they are still locked away. Some are on display in museums, while others are hidden deep within the bowels of museums, universities and would rather forget. But now it is time to bring our people back to country.

'Through an epic story spanning 250 years, writer John Harvey (Heart is a Wasteland) draws us in with untold perspectives of macabre true histories and false justifications. In a directorial debut, Jason Tamiru joins forces with our Artistic Director Matthew Lutton for this immersive theatrical event that will give rise to how the repatriation of Ancestors can bring us closer to homecoming and healing.'

Source: Malthouse Theatre.

Year: 2022

winner y separately published work icon Milk Dylan Van Den Berg , 2020 Strawberry Hills : Currency Press , 2021 21417867 2020 single work drama

'Like a smack in the face.  That’s how I’d describe it.

'On the precipice of something life changing, a young Palawa man plunges into an exploration of self and Country. 

'Carried with the winds of a metaphysical Flinders Island, the land of his mob and the place where it all happened, he is drawn back to the dawn of colonization. To a woman who bore the brunt of the oppressors’ violence and then forward to her granddaughter, who buried the truth as a means of survival. Stirring up stories together, with parts both  achingly sad and unexpectedly funny, what unfolds reveals by slow degrees painful but important truths.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

Year: 2021

winner Wonnangatta Angus Cerini , 2020 single work drama

'Wonnangatta Station, 1918. Two men arrive at a dark and empty farmhouse looking for the manager, their friend Jim Barclay. No one’s heard from him for more than a month. Something’s amiss. Then a grim discovery sets the men off on a journey across the harsh Australian terrain, looking for answers, maybe for revenge.'

Source: Sydney Theatre Company.

Year: 2020

winner y separately published work icon Counting and Cracking S. Shakthidharan , 2019 Strawberry Hills : Currency Press , 2020 14530930 2019 single work drama

'On the banks of the Georges River, Radha and her son Siddhartha release the ashes of Radha’s mother – their final connection to the past, to Sri Lanka and its struggles. Now they are free to embrace their lives in Australia. Then a phone call from Colombo brings the past spinning back to life, and we are plunged into an epic story of love and political strife, of home and exile, of parents and children

'Counting and Cracking is a big new play about Australia like none we’ve seen before. This is life on a large canvas, so we are leaving Belvoir St and building a Sri Lankan town hall inside Sydney Town Hall. Sixteen actors play four generations of a family, from Colombo to Pendle Hill, in a story about Australia as a land of refuge, about Sri Lanka’s efforts to remain united, about reconciliation within families, across countries, across generations.'

Source: Belvoir St Theatre.

Works About this Award

Kick up the Arts Would Benefit Us All Chips Mackinolty , 2016 single work column
— Appears in: NT News , 14 February 2016; (p. 12)
Bovell's Dramatic Reward, 10 Years in the Making Jo Roberts , 2002 single work column
— Appears in: The Age , 12 November 2002; (p. 4)
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