The Miles Nadal Jewish Community Centre with The Harold Green Jewish Theatre, Segal Centre for the Arts, The Winnipeg Jewish Theatre and Neptune Theatre are proud to announce the winner of the 2021 Canadian Jewish Playwriting Competition: Precipice by Winnipeg playwright Primrose Madayag Knazan.
Honorable mentions go to 2nd place winner In Her Madim by Rebecca Ostroff from Toronto, Ontario and 3rd place winner Camp by Naomi Tessler from Toronto, Ontario.
The Winnipeg Jewish Theatre and The Harold Green Jewish Theatre will present a Between Stages public staged reading of Precipice (date TBA) as part of the prize. Knazan will also receive $1000 generously donated by the Asper Foundation.
Precipice follows Sharrah’s conversion story to Judaism, a journey that takes her from her future in-laws’ Seder table to a synagogue in the Philippines. Caught between her Filipino mother’s expectations and her brother’s estrangement from the family, she wonders if she’s ready to walk the path of the Torah.
Winnipeg playwright & author, Primrose Madayag Knazan, writes from a Filipino-Canadian, Jewish, and woman’s perspective. Her plays have been featured at Winnipeg Jewish Theatre (reading of Precipice at the So Nu? festival), Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre (Where.Are.You.From.), Winnipeg Fringe Festival, Sarasvati Production’s FemFest (Wildflowers & Wallflowers; Breast Milk, Best Milk), and Carlos Bulosan/Theatre Amihan’s Tales from the Flip Side Filipino-Canadian playwright’s festival (Then Comes Marriage). Her plays Shades of Brown and Two Browns Don’t Make a White have been published by Scirocco Drama and Playwright’s Canada Press. Her first novel, Lessons in Fusion, was published by Great Plains Publications.
Since 1995, Between Stages playwrights’ reading series has created opportunities for Canadian playwrights including Vern Thiessen (Einstein’s Gift, 1999 winner) to Hannah Rittner (Eilijah, 2019 winner) to hear their work read by professional actors, to work with a director or dramaturg, and receive feedback from a live or online audience in a welcoming community setting.
For more information about Between Stages or The Canadian Jewish Playwriting Competition, contact Deanna Di Lello, Coordinator of Arts and Culture | Miles Nadal JCC, 750 Spadina Ave, Toronto ON, M5S 2J2 416.924.6211 x 6251, deannad@mnjcc.org
