William Inge Theater Festival Tabs Gina Femia for New Voices Award

Playwright Gina Femia is the recipient of the 2020 William Inge Theatre Festival's Otis Guernsey New Voices in the American Theatre Award, which recognizes substantial early contributions to the contemporary American stage.

Femia will be presented with the New Voices Award at the 39th annual Inge Festival, May 14-16, at Independence Community College in Independence, Kansas. Femia will join Honoree Lynn Nottage as the Inge Festival celebrates outstanding playwriting in the hometown of the late William Inge, the Pulitzer Prize and Academy Award-winning writer. William Inge won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama (Picnic) and Oscar for Best Screenplay (Splendor in the Grass). The Inge Festival is designated by the state legislature as the Official Theater Festival of Kansas.

Femia will have work of her own presented as a reading during the festival.

"We're thrilled to recognize Gina's attuned and courageous storytelling, which examines our societal stigmas and norms through the voices of characters that often go unheard, and ultimately offers us hope," said William Inge Center for the Arts Producing Artistic Director, Hannah Joyce.

The New Voices Award is named for the late Otis L. Guernsey, respected theater critic and scholar. As editor of the annual "Best Plays" anthology, he was a champion of new plays, and a longtime attendee and advocate of the Inge Festival.

Gina Femia has written over 30 full-length plays which have been developed/produced/seen at MCC, Page 73, Playwrights Horizons, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Center Theatre Group, Rattlestick Theatre, New Georges, Powerhouse, Theatre of NOTE, Great Plains Theatre Conference, Panndora Productions and Project Y, among others.

She is a 2019-2022 Core Writer with the Playwrights Center, and a current member of both Nashville Rep's Ingram New Plays Lab and Parsnip Ship's Radio Roots Writer's group. She's an alum of EST Youngblood, Page 73's Interstate 73, Pipeline Theatre's PlayLab and New Georges' Audrey Residency.

She's received commissions from EST, Spicy Witch Productions and Retro Theatre Productions and residencies with Page 73, Powerhouse, NTI at the O'Neill, Fresh Ground Pepper and SPACE on Ryder Farm. Her play, ALLOND(R)A is included on the 2019 Kilroys List. Winner: Leah Ryan Prize and Doric Wilson Award.

She holds an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College (Lipkin Prize in Playwriting). Find out more at www.femiagina.com.

Previous Otis L. Guernsey New Voices in the American Theater Award winners are: Adam Bock; Catherine Butterfield; Brian Burgess Clark; Kara Lee Corthorn, Joe DiPietro; Mark St. Germain; Katori Hall; Lynne Kaufman; Lauren Gunderson; Mary Hanes; David Hirson; Samuel D. Hunter; David Ives; Melanie Marnich; Jason Milligan; Carlos Murillo; Dael Orlandersmith; Mary Portser; Theresa Rebeck; J.T. Rogers; Jen Silverman; Mat Smart; James Still; Catherine Trieschmann; and Dana Yeaton.

The 39th Annual William Inge Theater Festival Honoree is Lynn Nottage, who will receive the William Inge Festival's Distinguished Achievement in the American Theater Award.

The festival, May 14-16, 2020, features numerous performances and workshops. Notable is the New Play Lab, in partnership with the Kansas Creative Arts Industries Commission, in which playwrights from across the nation have a professional public reading of a script.

Additional major supporters include Independence Community College, the William Inge Festival Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts.

For more information and tickets, visit www.ingecenter.org.

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