Playwrights around the world (with or without representation) are encouraged to submit their plays and musicals each season for consideration for the Maxim Mazumdar New Play Award. The winning play receives a guaranteed cash prize and a full production in an upcoming subscription season.
The next round of submissions for full-length, unproduced new works will open in late spring/early summer 2024. The 2023 round closed on July 25, 2023 and received 953 submissions. Reading and evaluation is now underway and semi-finalists, finalists, and winner will be contacted (we hope) by December 31, 2023.
While there are no requirements for style or content, Alleyway seeks plays that are wholly original, uniquely theatrical, and completely authentic. Winning plays will be production-ready, and must not have had a professional production (workshops, readings, or educational productions excluded).
Inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1954 book The Natural House, THE NATURAL HORSE is a daringly wild play about a family of ex-Soviet immigrants in suburban Wisconsin. When eldest daughter Masha brings home a feral horse named Goodboy to live under mom and dad’s roof, the play explodes with strange silliness and magical beauty. An incredibly theatrical look at how we search for people and spaces to call home, THE NATURAL HORSE is a breathtakingly ambitious and subversively hilarious exploration of human connection.
“I'm so thrilled to receive the Mazumdar Award and I'm ecstatic to be able to share THE NATURAL HORSE at the Alleyway,” says Adamson. “This play is a big, wacky, heartfelt comedy that somehow blends classic Russian literature, architectural theory, and zany puppetry into a contemporary folktale about family, growing up, and building a home.”
T. ADAMSON is a Texas-raised writer and theater artist of Anglo/Mexican ancestry. T. has developed new work with Vineyard Theatre, Playwrights Horizons, Great Plains Theater Commons, Clubbed Thumb, JACK, Cutting Ball, The Mercury Store, and many others. Plays include NO NOTHING (GPTC), THE STRAIGHTS (JACK, Bay Area Playwrights Festival finalist), and USUS (Clubbed Thumb Winterworks). He is an alumnus of Fresh Ground Pepper's Playground Playgroup, Exquisite Corpse Company's Fall Writers' Lab, and Clubbed Thumb's Early Career Writers' Group. Awards include Irv Zarkower Award, Rita and Burton Goldberg Playwriting Prize, a Falco/Steinman Commission from Playwrights Horizons, and the 2022-23 Paula Vogel Playwriting Award from Vineyard Theatre. MFA: Hunter College.
30 Seconds
by Jayne Deely
The Death of Hayden Waverly, the Most Popular Person in the World
by Lauren Wimmer
*No award was presented in 2021 due to the hiatus caused by the Covid pandemic. At this time, the digital and one-act categories have been paused and entries for the 2023 award will only be accepted in the full-length category.
In 2020, the competition added a digital category, and the winner GOAT SONG by Matt Harmon, premiered live via Facebook and Instagram in Fall 2020 as part of Alleyway’s pivot and commitment to live theatre during the pandemic.
2020 Full Length Winner and Finalists
THE ALEPH COMPLEX by Deborah Yarchun
HURTSONG by Caridad Svich
SAPIENCE by Diana Burbano
UNNAMED BABY PLAY by TJ Young
2020 One Act Winner and Finalists
EL ÁRBOL by Josie Nericcio
CROC OF by Seanan Palmero Waugh
LIFT by Heidi Kraay
THE YELLOW WALLPAPER by Eliza Randall and Sam Norman
A History of the Full Length Winning Plays
Alleyway Theatre is a member of the National New Play Network, Theatre Communications Group, Theatre District Association of Western New York, and Theatre Alliance of Buffalo.
1 Curtain Up Alley, Buffalo, NY 14202 | 716-852-2600
Alleyway Theatre, Inc. is a 501c3 organization. EIN: 22-2779994
