Notes on a Script: a.k. payne Breaks Down Their Blackburn Prize-Winning FURLOUGH'S PARADISE

As BroadwayWorld previously reported, the 2025 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize was recently given to U.S. playwright a.k. payne for their play Furlough's Paradise- a lyrical journey about grief, home, and survival. Awarded annually since 1978, the prestigious international Prize is the largest and oldest award recognizing women+ who have written works of outstanding quality for the English-speaking theatre. 

“I am so grateful to receive this award and join a list of some of my favorite writers whose plays have shaken how I understand the world and who have made it possible," said payne."Through their words transcending space and time and/or their caring and abundant mentorship—for me to write: Katori Hall, Julia Cho, Lynn Nottage, Sarah Ruhl, Benedict Lombe and Paula Vogel to name a very select few.”

Furlough's Paradise tells the story of two cousins and their intertwined yet wildly divergent lives. Sade and Mina, raised like sisters, return to their childhood town for the funeral of their mother and aunt. While Sade is on a three-day furlough from prison and Mina experiences a brief reprieve from her career and life on the West Coast, the two try to make sense of grief, home, love, and kinship. But traumas and resentments from the past, both real and surreal, threaten to pull them apart, all as time ticks towards the correctional officer's arrival.

In this video, watch as payne breaks down their words in the newest episode of BroadwayWorld's Notes on a Script.