2020 Edition of the RFI Theater Prize: Ready, go, write!

Text by: Pascal Paradou

As there is no better antidote to fear and confinement than writing, we declare open the call for candidates for the seventh edition of the RFI Theater Prize. French-speaking theater authors, we invite you to send your texts to RFI before April 26, 2020 at midnight, to the address: prix.theatre@rfi.fr.

Publicity

In these times when more than two billion humans are confined, where no country can escape the contamination of Covid-19, looking to the future is an imperative of survival. It should also be remembered that it was in quarantine at Stratford-upon-Avon, during the plague, that Shakespeare wrote his masterpiece, King Lear .

Also, the times should be favorable for this new call for writing for French-speaking authors from the South. Usually almost two hundred texts arrive each year and it is each time a wonder to know that from all the cities of the world, women and men write the world, their society, the angers and their emotions in theatrical forms, that is to say in an address to the public.

With the Avignon Festival read cycle Ca va, ça va le monde! and with the Theater Prize, RFI has been engaged for several years in the discovery and highlighting of new talents in dramatic writing. And it is clear that the winners of this award had many opportunities and made many meetings that allowed them to be more heard, more played and to be supported in their writing.

Thanks to its partners and the talent of the recipients, this award has become a benchmark and the mere fact of being in the preselection has enabled certain authors to be identified, to obtain residences or public readings. With the desire to prevail, but especially that of being read, each and everyone can or must therefore refine their lines, cut the lengths or refine a situation and send their piece.

In 2019, Lebanese author Valérie Cachard won with a monologue that evokes the buried memory of her country. The suspense is whole for this year. Comedy, tragedy, drama, monologue ... Everything is possible, but the writings will be chosen according to their dramaturgical quality, so it cannot be a poem, a story or a short story of a few pages.

As usual, the award is open to authors and living in Africa, the Caribbean, the Indian Ocean or the Middle East. To take into account local political situations, the call for writing is also open to nationals of the countries of the aforementioned areas, living in France for less than four years and holding a resident card or a political refugee status.

You have until Sunday April 26 midnight to send us your text. To participate, the authors must be between 18 and 46 and send a text in French with a minimum of 15 numbered pages (which is much easier for the reading committee to read).

Prize calendar

To be able to be selected, the texts must be received before Sunday, April 26, 2020, at midnight, the date of the email as proof, to the following address: prix.theatre@rfi.fr. It is imperative that you complete and attach to your application the registration form (on page 10 of the regulations) .

The reading committee will select a maximum of twelve or thirteen texts which will be submitted to a jury. This is in the process of being composed, but it will include, as every year, representatives of the partners, but also qualified personalities, actors, directors, writers or publishers, and will meet in early September. The RFI Theater Prize will be awarded in Limoges, as part of the Zebrures d'automne festival, organized by Les Francophonies - Descritures à la scène.

Following this award ceremony, the year will be busy for the lucky winner with several writing residencies and for the first time this year a residency at Villa Ndar in Saint-Louis, Senegal, which comes on top of that funded by the Institut Français. But the first stage of this marathon takes place at the CDN in Rouen where, after two to three weeks of work with actors and a director, the text is given to hear in a sketch of staging during the Festival of French Languages which is held in the spring.

All this under the benevolent and passionate eye of the SACD which makes a financial contribution to the author and the attentive and relevant look of the Open Theater which accompanies the winner throughout the year in his dramaturgical work. Another stage, that of the Avignon Festival where the text is read in the magnificent garden on rue de Mons and recorded in public for broadcast on RFI in the cycle C'est va, ça va le monde! .

Who will succeed Julien Mabiala Bissila, Hala Moughanie, Hakim Bah, Edouard Elvis Bvouma, Sedjro Giovanni Houansou and Valérie Cachard? The games are open, but to date, nothing and no one can say who will win. Some were shortlisted several times before winning the prize, others won the first time. In all cases, they were beautiful texts and the rest revealed that their authors were all great and generous personalities. Roll on number 7!

The RFI Theater Prize is organized in partnership with the French Institute, Villa Ndar in Saint-Louis, the Center dramatique national de Normandie-Rouen, SACD, Les Francophonies - Descritures à la scène and the Open Theater, Center national des contemporary dramaturgies.

► You can find more information and details on the conditions of the RFI Theater Prize and the awards on the rules and the registration form (on page 10 of the rules) by clicking here .

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