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ScreenCraft
ScreenCraft Stage Play Competition
2021
Coverfly-exclusive
Reads in Coverfly
Active Since 2018
Grand Prize Winner will be mentored by Tony Award-winning & Academy Award-nominated playwright Jeffrey Whitty (Avenue Q). Past winners have signed with CAA, WME, A3 Artists, and more!
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About

Stage has offered some of the greatest films adapted to screen. ScreenCraft’s Stage Play Competition is a great opportunity to have your work considered by influential writers and industry professionals. Drawing on a long history of playwrights transitioning to screenwriting, this competition seeks to celebrate excellent plays that have great film or TV adaptation potential. 

ScreenCraft’s past winners have gone on to sell their scripts to major studios and have been hired by companies like Universal, Netflix, Amazon, Millennium, CBS and many more. ScreenCraft’s winners are also highly sought after by literary managers and agents who are open to signing to new writer clients. Over 100 ScreenCraft writers have signed with top management companies and agencies like 3 Arts, Anonymous Content, CAA, WME, UTA, Paradigm, Lit Entertainment, and many more. 

Benefits

THE JUDGES

Get in front of theater professionals and award-winning playwrights


Jeffrey Whitty

Tony Award-Winning Playwright, Academy-Award Nominated Screenwriter

Jeffrey Whiity is the author of Tony Award-winning musical AVENUE Q. Other musicals include BRING IT ON, score by Lin-Manuel Miranda and Amanda Green, Armistead Maupin’s TALES OF THE CITY with music by Scissor Sisters, and more.  His screenplay adaptation of CAN YOU EVER FORGIVE ME?, co-written with Nicole Holofcener, garnered Writers Guild of America and Independent Spirit Awards, and BAFTA and Academy Award nominations. 


Donald Margulies

Pulitzer Prize-Winning Playwright

Playwright Donald Margulies won the Pulitzer Prize for Dinner with Friends, and was a finalist for Sight Unseen and Collected Stories. His plays have been produced worldwide, including Tony Award-nominated Time Stands Still and Obie Award-winning The Model Apartment. Awards include the Sidney Kingsley Award for Achievement in the Theatre, membership in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and more. His screenplay THE END OF THE TOUR premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. 


Elena Araoz

Director of Theater, Opera, and Virtual Performance, Professor

Elena Araoz Directs Theater, Opera, and Virtual Performance, recent theater works include Original Sound (Cherry Lane Theatre), Mud and Conduct of Life (Boundless Theatre Company), Prospect (Boundless Theatre Company) and more. Opera: La traviata (New York City Opera), Falstaff (Brooklyn Philharmonic at BAM’s Howard Gilman Opera House), and more. She is a faculty member at Princeton University.


Olivier Sultan

Theatre Agent, CAA

Olivier Sultan is a Theater Agent at Creative Artists Agency (CAA) representing writers, directors, composers and designers including Academy Award winners Florian Zeller, Christopher Hampton and Alex Dinelaris, Pulitzer Prize winning playwrights Lynn Nottage, Suzan-Lori Parks and Martyna Majok, Tony winners Stephen Daldry, Duncan Sheik, Steven Sater, Bill T. Jones, and more. 


Tim J. Lord

Playwright with Disability Focus

The recipient of the inaugural Apothetae-Lark Fellowship, 2017-18 Jerome Fellow at The Playwrights’ Center in Minneapolis, and 2019 Reg E. Cathey Writer-in-Residence at the Orchard Project, Tim J. Lord is a playwright and member of the disability community.  His work has been performed at The Public Theater, The Lark, The Kennedy Center, Circle Rep, The Cutout Theatre, The Vagrancy, The Working Theater and more.


THE PRIZES

On top of all top scripts being read by this incredible jury, the winners will receive prizes and industry outreach. Dozens of ScreenCraft winners have signed with managers, sold their scripts, option projects, been staffed, or been hired for open writing assignments. Check out some of the success stories here.


Grand Prize Winner 

The grand prize winner will be welcomed to the ScreenCraft Development Program and receive personal introductions and phone calls with one or more industry professionals who are looking for talented emerging writers.

The winning project info and log lines will be circulated and recommended to our network of managers, agents, producers and development executives.

ScreenCraft has a proven track record for getting writers signed with managers, agents, and staffed in writing rooms.

  • Personal Introduction to top literary managers

  • Accepted into the ScreenCraft Writer Development Program

  • $1,000 Cash

  • Complimentary Badge for the 2022 ScreenCraft Virtual Summit 

  • Lifetime subscription to Arc Studio Pro

Runner-Up

  • $500 cash award

  • Accepted into ScreenCraft Development Program

  • 50% off 2022 ScreenCraft Virtual Summit

  • Lifetime subscription to Arc Studio Pro

Writer Success

2024 Winners on Coverfly

See Other Placements

Announcements

Oct 27th
Semifinalists
Dec 1st
Finalists
Jan 19th
Winners

Rules

At the program's request, Coverfly will automatically remove your title page for you if you include one when submitting to this program.

  1. Submissions are accepted via electronic submission only, between May 31, 2021 and August 31, 2021.
  2. Entry fee for each screenplay is $49.50 until the early deadline on June 30, 2021, then $69.50 until the regular deadline on July 31, 2021, then $79.50 until the final deadline on August 31, 2021.
  3. Any play script submission longer than 120 pages will incur a $1 per page overage fee for each page over 120. The maximum page limit is 150 pages. 
  4. Optional feedback from a professional reader may be requested at the time of entry. Requests for feedback after an entry is submitted will not be accepted.
  5. There is no limit to the number of projects you may submit.
  6. Entries must be received on or before the deadline dates by 11:59PM Pacific Time, and submission fee payment must be made in full at time of the submission. All entry fees are non-refundable.
  7. All submitted material must be original, and all rights must be wholly owned by the writer(s).
  8. Material must be submitted by the writer. Material written by writing teams must be submitted by one of the writers, with consent of the other(s). All writers must be credited on the title page.
  9. If a writing team is chosen as a winner, prizes will be given to the person who submits the project. Each team is responsible for dividing or sharing the prize money.
  10. Substitutions of either corrected pages or new drafts of the entered material will be allowed for a limited time with a $5 reentry fee through Coverfly. Please proofread your play carefully before submitting.
  11. It is recommended that original material be registered with the WGA or The Library of Congress before submitting to any competition, however we do not require registration.
  12. Contact info may be included on the cover page of the play, however it is not required.
  13. ScreenCraft claims no ownership nor option on your work. All ownership and rights to the play submitted to this contest remains with the original rights holders.