EMOS 2025-26
Winners!

EMOS ECODRAMA PLAYWRIGHTS FESTIVAL

HOSTED IN 2025-26 BY THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY

Paitton and Josh Lewis,  EMOS 2025-26 Co-chairs

 

THE VOTES ARE IN!  We’re excited to announce the awardees of the 2025-26 EMOS Ecodrama Playwrights’ Festival!! ACUTE EXPOSURE, by August Hakvaag (1st place) and THE PLUME, by Maggie Kearnan (second place/first runner up).

 

Celebrating 20 years, the EMOS Ecodrama Playwrights’ Festival uplifts new plays that celebrate  ecological interdependency, call for environmental justice, and inspire climate action.

The next EMOS Festival will be hosted by The Ohio State University.

 

Over 75 submitted plays were read and ranked in light of the EMOS Guidelines. Five finalists were then read by a panel of eleven nationally recognized judges who ranked the plays. This year our panel included award-winning dramatist Octavio Solis (Mother Road, Lydia, Santos & Santos), award-winning dramaturg Ken Cerniglia (Hades Town, The Starcatcher, Redwood), and artist/activist Chantal Bilodeau (EMOS 2012 winner for Sila; Climate Change Theatre Action), as well as previous EMOS chairpersons, directors, and scholars from across the country.  Big thanks to our awesome panel!

 

FIRST PLACE

ACUTE EXPOSURE, by August Hakvaag

Synopsis:  In the small town of Loving, New Mexico, Dell has a mission: to tell the people of the far-flung future that there is a dangerous store of nuclear waste hidden below the ground. Her neighbor and morbidly curious classmate, Mara, comes along for the ride after they're assigned to work on a project together for English class. As they grow closer, and the enormity of what's buried in their backyards sinks in, they find that their relationship is changing them: for better, for worse, forever. When Dell's path out of town becomes uncertain, the two will have to choose what they bring with them into their futures, and what they leave behind.

 

About the author….

August Hakvaag (they/them) is a butch theatre artist currently based in Philadelphia. They received a BA in Theatre, and are currently pursuing a Graduate Certificate in Gender, Sexuality, and Women's Studies, from Temple University. They have worked internationally as an actor, director, and playwright. They are a Princess Grace Fellowship Award semi-finalist, a Susan Smith Blackburn Prize nominee, and a proud member of the Ring of Keys Collective. Highlights include working with Moxie Arts NY, The Palace Collective, Philadelphia Young Playwrights, The Twenty Sided Tavern, Impulse Control Freaks, Richmond Triangle Players, Tokyo International Players, and Aporia Artists Collective, of which they are a founding member. Most recently, their immersive piece A Seance for Mae West enjoyed a sold out run at the Hot Bed Art Studio in Philadelphia. Currently, they can be heard on the award-winning podcast Wing Women as Nino. They are finishing their second year of the PlayPenn Foundry program, where they are working on a play about superconductive electricity.

 

SECOND PLACE:

THE PLUME, by Maggie Kearnan

Synopsis: Hollow and Percy Newbury’s mother has kidnapped them to celebrate The Plume, the annual arrival of a traveling mile-long noxious cloud of consolidated pollutants. The Newbury’s hermetically sealed Boston brownstone is the safest place on Earth to wait out the deadly man-made weather system and celebrate the morbid holiday traditions around it. This year, The Plume is no longer a threat, but if Virginia Newbury knew that, she would undoubtedly interfere with her children's lives outside. Hollow and Percy agree to keep the truth from their sheltered mother, but the ghosts in their home really think it's time the members of this family started being honest with each other.

 

About the author….

Maggie Kearnan (she/her) is a Boston-based playwright, currently completing the MFA playwriting program at Boston University. Her capstone production How to Not Save the World with Mr. Bezos ran in the Boston Playwrights' Theatre Fall Rep Festival in November 2024, and will open the summer season at Great Barrington Public Theater in June 2025. Her plays have been produced at Boston College, Newton Theater Company, and the Boston Theater Marathon. Maggie is also a director, performer, educator, and scenic artist with a small TikTok following, sharing set painting tips for theater educators with limited resources.

 

A complete list of our 2025-26 National Panel:

 

Octavio Solis, award-winning playwright/director (Mother Road, Lydia, Santos & Santos and Man of the Flesh); Distinguished Achievement in the American Theater Award by the William Inge Center for the Arts.

Ken Cerniglia, dramaturg for Disney Theatrical Productions; dramaturg for Broadway hits Hades Town (8 Tony Awards, including Best Musical) and Peter and the Starcatcher (5 Tony Awards), among others; past president of Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas.

Chantal Bilodeau, playwright & director of the Arctic Cycle, past EMOS winner (Sila, 2012); Artistic Director, Arts & Climate Initiative’ Co-organizer, Climate Change Theatre Action.

Wendy Arons, Professor of dramaturgy, Carnegie Mellon Univ. EMOS 2012 chair.

Weston Twardowski, Associate Director, Center for Environmental Studies, & Eco Studio, Rice University.

LaDonna Forsgren, Assoc. Professor & playwright/dramaturg, Notre Dame University; author of Sistuhs in the Struggle: An Oral History of the Black Arts Movement Theatre and Performance (2020).

Damond Morris, Executive Director for the Lincoln Theatre Center Foundation in Mount Vernon, WA. EMOS 2009-10 artistic associate.

Courtney B. Ryan, Assit. Professor of Theatre, Lafayette University; Eco-Performance, Art, and Spatial Justice in the US (2023).

Theresa J. May, Professor of theatre, U of Oregon, EMOS co-founder and 2009 chair; author of Earth Matters on Stage: Ecology, Environment and American Theatre (2021).

Larry K. Fried, director, EMOS co-founder and 2004 chair; co-author of Greening Up Our Houses: A Guide to a more Ecological Theatre (1994).

Josh & Paitton Lewis, EMOS co-chairs for 2025-26 OSU.