SSP@50 Fellowship Awardees Revealed

The Scottish Society of Playwrights has announced the recipients of the SSP@50 Fellowship Awards, its 50th anniversary programme designed to support brand new writer-led projects that celebrate theatre and playwriting the length and breadth of Scotland. 

Supported by The National Lottery through Creative Scotland, each Fellowship has been awarded to exceptional projects that foster new writing in and with local communities, honour and record the history of playwriting in Scotland, and celebrate the vital role theatre plays in Scotland’s life and culture.

Each Fellowship is supported by a local arts organisation or venue, and each is rooted firmly in Scotland’s communities and languages, covering a vast diversity of themes and interests.

The SSP@50 Fellowship Awards recipients and partner organisations are: 

• Jack Dickson (Springburn Winter Gardens Trust): development of a new piece of community theatre, celebrating Springburn’s 200-year history of heavy industry.
•  Fergus Morgan, (Traverse Theatre/Bespoken Media): a six-part podcast series exploring 400 years of theatre and playwriting in Scotland.
• Jack MacGregor, (Eden Court Theatre): a research project and audio-visual installation celebrating notable contemporary plays from the highlands.
• Rachael McGill, (Stromness Drama Club): a competition and mini-festival for new plays by local writers, inspired by Orkney’s legendary Stromness Debating Club.
• Kathy McKean, (Stellar Quines): a major archive project to research and document the texts of women playwrights – making the invisible visible.
• Michael John O’Neill, (The Macrobert): development of a new piece of verbatim theatre based around the closure of Grangemouth Oil Refinery.
• May Sumbwanyambe, (Tron Theatre): development of a new play focused on increasing the visibility of Black Scots, centred around James McCune Smith.
• Martin Travers, (Braw Clan): development of a new play in Scots, celebrating the life, poetry, politics and sexuality of major and forgotten Scottish poet, Robert Fergusson. 
• Elspeth Turner, (Taigh Chearsabhagh, Berneray): development of a radical, contemporary Gaelic-language adaptation of Checkhov’s The Cherry Orchard.
• Morna Young, (Aberdeen Arts Centre): development of a new play, inspired by local women’s 1973 storming of the Grill Bar to protest its ‘men only’ policy.

Linda Duncan McLaughlin, Co-chair of the Scottish Society of Playwrights said:

" Our hope is that SSP@50 will foster and strengthen the bonds between playwrights, theatres, and their communities, and establish a legacy that will endure for the next 50 years and beyond.."

Each Fellow receives a £4000 bursary, supplementary production budget, and individual additional support from their partner organisation to complete their project, with the aim that the project will contribute to the growth and enrichment of the theatre community.

After fifty years of championing new writing in Scottish theatre, the SSP@50 Fellowship Awards stand as a testament to the SSP’s commitment to supporting playwriting in Scotland and ensuring a vibrant and dynamic future for the world of Scottish Theatre.

For more information about individual projects, visit http://www.scottishsocietyofplaywrights.co.uk/fellows.html

The SSP@50 Fellowship Awards are supported by the National Lottery through Creative Scotland. £88,100 was granted in October 2023 through the National Lottery Open Fund for Organisations.

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