AMERICAN SON and DRY POWDER Tie for 2016 Laurents / Hatcher Foundation Award

Just announced, AMERICAN SON by Christopher Demos-Brown and DRY POWDER by Sarah Burgess (which just announced new additions to its cast at The Public Theater) have tied as recipients of the 2016 Laurents / Hatcher Foundation Award. The respective producing theaters will each receive $50,000 towards the production expenses of the premiere works. Burgess and Demos-Brown will each receive an award of $25,000.

"The quality of work was so high this year, it's the first time there has been a tie for the award. These are two wonderful plays about highly relevant topics -- race relations and the world of high finance," said David Saint, President of The Laurents / Hatcher Foundation about their selections.

DRY POWDER, which will be directed by Thomas Kail, is a "gripping, razor-sharp new play about the people molding and messing with the American economy" and will begin at The Public Tuesday, March 1, 2016. In a statement, Artistic Director Oskar Eustis said, "We are thrilled at this recognition for Sarah's work; the prestigious Laurents/Hatcher Award is an important recognition of the achievement of DRY POWDER."

Barrington Stage Company Artistic Director Julianne Boyd who will also direct AMERICAN SON, said "We are honored to be kicking off Barrington Stage's 2016 season with Christopher Demos-Brown's AMERICAN SON, a play that examines our nation's racial divide as seen through the eyes of an estranged, biracial couple."

Established in 2010, The LAURENTS / HATCHER FOUNDATION AWARD is an annual prize to be given for an un-produced, full-length play by an emerging American playwright. In addition to being one of the country's largest grants for new work, The Laurents / Hatcher Foundation Award is the first major award for playwriting to be named in honor of a gay couple: Tony Award winning playwright and director Arthur Laurents and his partner of 52 years, Tom Hatcher.

Arthur Laurents' career as a writer for the stage and screen spanned over 65 years, beginning with his play The Home of the Brave, which premiered on Broadway in 1945. Known for having written the books for musicals such as Gypsy and West Side Story as well as the screenplays for The Way We Were, The Turning Point and Alfred Hitchcock's Rope, Mr. Laurents premiered many of his most recent plays at New Jersey's George Street Playhouse. His final memoir, The Rest of the Story, was posthumously published in the fall of 2012.

Tom Hatcher, who died in October 2006, began his career as an actor but moved into real estate as a contractor and then as a developer. He created the private park adjoining the house in Quogue, Long Island that was home for the couple.

AMERICAN SON playwright Christopher Demos-Brown's other credits include Fear Up Harsh, which, among others, received a Steinberg Award Citation from the American Theatre Critics Association. Chris's other credits include Captiva, Our Lady of Allapattah, and When The Sun Shone Brighter which received the 2011 Carbonell Award for Best New Work, the 2010 Silver Palm Award for Outstanding New Work. In 2010 Chris and his wife co-founded Zoetic Stage in Miami, Florida.

DRY POWDER playwright Sarah Burgess was a writer for The Tenant (Woodshed Collective) and "Naked Radio," Naked Angels' monthly podcast series. She has been a writer-in-residence at the Cape Code Theatre Project and at SPACE on Ryder Farm in Brewster, NY. She is a member of the WP Playwrights Lab; and is an Ars Nova Play Group alum.

Barrington Stage Company (BSC), an award-winning theatre located in the Berkshires (MA), was founded in 1995 by Artistic Director Julianne Boyd. BSC's mission is three-fold: to present top-notch, compelling work; to develop new plays and musicals; and to find fresh, bold ways of bringing new audiences into the theatre-especially young people. In 2004, BSC garnered national attention when it produced William Finn and Rachel Sheinkin's musical The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, which later transferred to Broadway and won two Tony Awards. In 2009, BSC premiered Mark St. Germain's Freud's Last Session, which later moved Off-Broadway and played for two years. Most recently, BSC originated the hit Broadway revival of On the Town, directed by John Rando and choreographed by Josh Bergasse. For more, visit www.barringtonstageco.org.

As the nation's foremost theatrical producer of Shakespeare and new work, The Public Theater is dedicated to developing an American theater that is accessible and relevant to all people through artistically excellent productions of challenging new plays, musicals and innovative stagings of the classics. Guided by a philosophy of inclusion, The Public is dedicated to embracing the complexities of our diverse local and global communities, and has consistently broken new ground through high-quality productions that tackle the contemporary issues, provoking dialogues otherwise overlooked in the mainstream arena. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Oskar Eustis and Executive Director Patrick Willingham, The Public offers a comprehensive scope of community engagement and artistic development programs each year at its landmark downtown home at Astor Place, and at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park.