Harvardwood Writers Competition |
2023
The Harvardwood Writers Competition was founded to recognize superior work by Harvard writers and give them the chance to gain industry exposure.
Placement
Genre
Format
Representation Status
Winners
Winner
Feature
· Drama
· 107 Pages
When a washed-up referee exploits a loophole to redo his senior year, he sets out to honor his late father by leading a ragtag high school wrestling team to glory while chasing a state title of his own…as a full-grown adult.
A heartwarming sports dramedy.
SCHOOL OF ROCK's fun age-gap dynamic & camaraderie meets the heightened world of COBRA KAI....
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Somerville, MA
Anthony “Z” Zonfrelli is a neurodivergent, Harvard-educated comedy writer from Somerville, MA. He peaked as a toddler winning the MA Baby America Pageant, growing older and uglier ever since. Refusing to let his neurodivergence win, Z used comedy to connect with others, writing scripts rich in heart and exemplifying his smart and darkly weird sense ...
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Finalists
45th Parallel: "8 miles"
Private
Finalist
TV Script
· Drama
· 53 Pages
A corrupt FBI agent and a newbie Mohawk agent scorned as privileged within his own insular community are forced into a combative partnership fighting crime on a reservation straddling the Canadian border.
Santa Monica, CA
Phoebe Eaton is an award-winning published playwright-screenwriter-investigative journalist. She has been a 2020-21 two-time Harvardwood Jeff Sagansky Television Writing program selectee; a 2019 Writers Guild of America East Writers Room finalist; a 2018-19 ScreenCraft Stage Play Award finalist for her play “A Field Guide to the Amazon” (included i...
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Finalist
Feature
· Historical
· 99 Pages
In 1911, when brothers Emery and Ellsworth take a motion picture camera down 1,200 miles of unrelenting river to make the world's first outdoor adventure film, they are met with more adventure than they bargained for, realizing the biggest obstacles lie not in the wilderness, but in each other.
Santa Monica, CA
Madi Stine is an award-winning filmmaker and recovering valley girl. Her work explores isolation and unexpected community. Madi graduated from Harvard, Columbia (Film MFA), and is a Fulbright Scholar. Her shorts have screened at Palm Springs ShortFest, Nantucket, and American Cinemathéque’s PROOF Film Festival. She’s won the Harvardwood Writers Comp...
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Finalist
TV Script
· Drama
· 57 Pages
A limited series set between the Hollywood Hills and Skid Row, FUCKBOI tells the story of three unlikely heroes from totally different walks of life -- and one unyielding mother -- who must band together to triumph over one man’s deadly abuse of power and take down the unjust systems that enabled him. Inspired by true events.
West Hollywood, CA
Warner James Wood was raised in the Appalachian Mountains before receiving his undergraduate degree in Human Evolutionary Biology from Harvard University. After, he took an MFA in poetry from the Helen Zell Writers’ Program, worked on Wall Street as a structured derivatives trader, and finally moved to Los Angeles to complete a graduate screenwritin...
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Finalist
TV Script
· Comedy
· 35 Pages
Sick and tired of being overlooked and exploited, two aging ladies-of-the-night start cross-dressing as highwaymen (flamboyant carriage robbers in 18th-century London), upending the power structure by shaking down their wealthy male oppressors at gunpoint.
London, London, GB
Through humor, my work explores performativity, queerness, and fantasy, investigating characters who seek refuge in their imaginations. My shorts have been awarded at festivals internationally, including best fiction film at Watersprite International Film Festival (BIFA-qualifying). I am a Marshall scholar and an alumnus of Harvard, Cambridge, the R...
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Finalist
Feature
· Historical
· 113 Pages
While secretly battling manic depression, a tenacious early 20th-century industrialist risks his riches, reputation, and nearly his life, in a fevered push to save natural treasures from annihilation by establishing an American conservation triumph: the U.S. National Park Service. Inspired by the remarkable, untold true story of Stephen Tyng Mather....
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Denver, CO
Born to phys-ed and astronomy teachers, Kevin notably has no aptitude for sports or science, but compensates by being first in line for sports or science fiction films. He's a lifelong creative with a passion for endeavors that inspire and uplift the human spirit and, since placing in recent writing contests, is eager to elevate his craft and break ...
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Half-Alive
Private
Finalist
TV Script
· Comedy
· 38 Pages
A virus ravages the country, leaving behind a community of zombies who must now face a new threat: humans who are determined to “cure” them.
Victoria Gong
No bio available.
Finalist
Feature
· Comedy
· 102 Pages
When a childless woman with an aching desire to fit in with her mommy friends kidnaps a mysterious child, she discovers just how far she’ll go to be one of the girls.
Beverly Hills, CA
No bio available.
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Finalist
TV Script
· Drama
· 52 Pages
At a crossroads in her life, the ambitious Black attorney general of Louisiana must confront the demons that have literally haunted her family since slavery.
Riverdale, MD
Victor A. Kwansa, Esq. is a Ghanaian-American writer and attorney from Prince George's County, Maryland. He was a participant in the 2023 Harvardwood Feature Writing Intensive, and he was also a finalist in the 2023 Harvardwood Writers Competition. Victor received a B.A. in Political Science from Yale University in 2008, and he graduated from Harvar...
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Semi-Finalists
Semi-Finalist
TV Script
· Comedy
· 33 Pages
Two aspiring children's television producers get an offer on their passion project when the C.I.A tries to buy it for a covert propaganda PSYOP.
Los Angeles, California
No bio available.
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Semi-Finalist
TV Script
· Comedy
· 36 Pages
A struggling teacher finds success in reselling clothes but could lose herself in the process.
Born and raised in a two-stoplight town near the border between Georgia and Alabama, Verdell Walker is a devotee of the written word. Her work is centered on elevating marginalized voices, particularly those of Black women. Writing about family ties in all their messy, complex, and strained glory is her thematic obsession.
Semi-Finalist
TV Script
· Drama
· 60 Pages
A Korean American taxi driver desperate to get out of her dead-end Alaskan town suffers a huge setback when she winds up in the middle of a murder investigation.
Ria Tobaccowala is an award-winning writer-director born and raised in Chicago. As a first-generation American, she explores racial identity, womanhood, immigration, and multiculturalism in her films. Her short film, Shadows, premiered at Tribeca Film Festival and is now streaming on HBO Max. She received her MFA from the Graduate Film Program at NY...
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Semi-Finalist
TV Script
· Comedy
· 60 Pages
Former Yale Admissions secretary starts a college consulting empire, juggling ethics, global elites, jaw-dropping schemes and adversaries. Inspired by true events.
It's WORKING GIRL meets SUITS with a hint of GOSSIP GIRL
West Newton, MA
Laurie McKinsey is a Harvard MBA and Boston-based entrepreneur-turned-screenwriter who has lived all across the US, Europe and Asia. Drawing from her experience as an Ivy League mom and volunteer college advisor to disadvantaged students, she exposes the uneven playing field in higher ed.
She loves to write badass female protagonists. Some would ...
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Let's Say I Let You Go
Private
Semi-Finalist
TV Script
· Drama
· 54 Pages
After his sibling survives a near-fatal suicide attempt, an unusually kind but slowly-shattering older brother must restructure his life to support his sibling and family, continue his education, and maintain his friendships while his own mental health begins to deteriorate.
Connor is currently a rising junior at Harvard pursuing a degree in History and Literature and Film. In addition to being a budding screenwriter, Connor is also an award-winning actor.
Marge and Deborah's Haunted Halloween Hayride
Private
Semi-Finalist
Feature
· Comedy
· 107 Pages
Two middle aged best friends run a struggling Halloween hayride. But after the arrival of Deborah's teen niece, the women unintentionally open a portal to hell, leading to big success and maybe the end of the world.
No bio available.
Oligarch: "Wild Western"
Private
Semi-Finalist
TV Script
· Drama
· 62 Pages
A self-made Black man is roped into working for a Russian crime family as he chases the American Dream down Wall Street.
Santa Monica, CA
Phoebe Eaton is an award-winning published playwright-screenwriter-investigative journalist. She has been a 2020-21 two-time Harvardwood Jeff Sagansky Television Writing program selectee; a 2019 Writers Guild of America East Writers Room finalist; a 2018-19 ScreenCraft Stage Play Award finalist for her play “A Field Guide to the Amazon” (included i...
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Semi-Finalist
TV Script
· Comedy
· 34 Pages
After a depressing and lonely two-year quarantine at her parents’ home in Wisconsin, a single woman returns to LA ready to embrace life and party it up…only to discover that her best friends have settled down and moved on.
www.talisafriedman.com
Quacks
Private
Semi-Finalist
TV Script
· Comedy
· 26 Pages
A conflict-avoidant physician's life is turned upside-down when he sets up a practice in the buffoonish Victorian-era town of Lesser Longwitton, coming into conflict with its previous (and pompous) "doctor".
New York, NY
James had a really funny bio but he deleted it so how about you just imagine it in this gap? [ ] Hahaha yeah that sure is funny, huh!
Study Abroad
Private
Semi-Finalist
TV Script
· Thriller
· 57 Pages
An American exchange student and a Swedish student-life leader must team up to solve a string of murders claiming the lives of young women at the Stockholm School of Economics.
Santa Monica, CA
Carrington Walsh is a genre writer from Los Angeles, CA, but based in Paris, France. She collected a myriad of stories from a short stint as a saleswoman for a cultish German tech startup and even more eclectic tales from a longer stint as the Deputy Chief of Staff for the Democratic party in Washington, DC. A Harvard graduate, Carrington has a part...
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The Pirate Queen
Private
Semi-Finalist
Feature
· Drama
· 114 Pages
Set in 1992, The Pirate Queen tells the story of Caitlin Quinn, a third generation Boston cop, who gets drawn into a seedy missing persons case by grade school acquaintance and walking disaster, Ruth Ann O’Malley. At first a reluctant team, Quinn and Ruth Ann ultimately push through violence, police corruption and betrayal to a new experience of fam...
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Lizzy Bentley
No bio available.
Walden Breezes
Private
Semi-Finalist
TV Script
· Other
· 39 Pages
Walden Breezes tells the story of the unlikely friendship between two 14 year olds, Mason, an eccentric outsider, and Vita, one of the only Black people living in their historic New England suburb of Concord, Massachusetts. At its heart, Walden Breezes is a story of unrequited love: the love of two teenagers for the world, and a world that just does...
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Lizzy Bentley
No bio available.
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