The shortlists for the Whatsonstage.com Awards 2013 were announced today (7 December), with a number of NHB authors and plays among the nominees.

Howard Brenton’s historical drama 55 Days is nominated for Best New Play. Set in December 1648, it depicts the political struggle that followed the English Civil War, as a group of Parliamentarians try to determine the nation’s future and decide what to do with their imprisoned monarch. 55 Days premiered at Hampstead Theatre in October. Mark Gatiss is also nominated for Best Supporting Actor in a Play for his role as King Charles II.

NSFW, a biting satire set in the world of print media by Lucy Kirkwood, is shortlisted for the Time Out Award for Best New Comedy. Praised by the Telegraph as a ‘dramatically gripping… richly absorbing and inventive play’, it premiered at the Royal Court in October. Lucy has also written plays for the National Theatre, Bush Theatre, Gate Theatre and pioneering companies Headlong and Clean Break.

Also nominated for Best New Comedy is The Last of the Haussmans, the debut play by Stephen Beresford. A funny, touching and at times savage family drama, the play examines the fate of the revolutionary 1960s generation through an enthralling domestic story. The Last of the Haussmans premiered at the National Theatre in June. The production is also recognised in two other categories: Best Actress in a Play (Julie Walters) and Best Supporting Actress in a Play (Helen McCrory).

Gbolahan Obisesan’s Mad About the Boy is shortlisted for the Boom Ents Award for Best Off-West End Production. An urgent, razor-sharp drama exploring the growing generational divide, Mad About the Boy premiered at Underbelly as part of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2011, where it won a Fringe First Award before going on to tour the UK in 2012. Gbolahan also won the 2009 Jerwood Directors’ Award at the Young Vic.

A number of other plays published by Nick Hern Books have also been shortlisted in various categories. They include: Sweeney Todd by Stephen Sondheim (five nominations including Best Musical Revival), the Eugene O’Neill plays Long Day’s Journey into Night (three nominations including Best Play Revival) and Desire Under the Elms (Best Off-West End Production) and Enda Walsh’s Misterman (Best Solo Performance).

Other NHB authors have also been recognised for their work in various categories this year. Andy Nyman, author of The Golden Rules of Acting, is nominated for Best Supporting Actor in a Play for Abigail’s Party. Mark Rylance, author of I Am Shakespeare, is nominated for Best Actor in a Play for his roles in Twelfth Night and Richard III. Simon Callow, author of My Life in Pieces, picks up a nomination for Best Solo Performance for A Christmas Carol, and Greg Doran, author of Shakespeare’s Lost Play, gets a nod for Best Director for the RSC’s Julius Caesar.

The Whatsonstage.com Awards are voted for by the public, with the winners announced on 17 February at an Awards Concert at the Palace Theatre. Voting is now open and remains so until 31 January – click here to pick your winners.

Christmas is fast approaching, but being an impatient lot here at Nick Hern Books we’ve decided to start the gift-giving early. So throughout December, we’re going to be making 12 books available at half price on 12 specific days. We’re calling it our NHB Advent Calendar.

Every weekday from Monday 3rd December to Tuesday 18th December we’re going to be making one selected book available at 50% off through our website. This is the best price you'll be able to find for our books anywhere, but the discount will run for that day only, so you’ll have to make sure you keep an eye out for that day’s gift!

The books are a selection of titles from across the year, a great mix of insightful practical guides, fascinating theatre books and top-notch plays. The titles will be announced via our social media channels on Facebook and Twitter. They’ll be the only places to find out which book is on discount that day, so sign up now to take advantage of our great offer.

HOW TO CLAIM YOUR DISCOUNT:

1. Keep an eye on our Facebook and Twitter pages. We’ll be announcing the titles daily.
2. The day’s title will be available at 50% off the RRP from 00:00 GMT to 23:59 GMT. Each discount is only valid for that day.
3. When placing your order through our website, just enter the promotional code NHBADVENT at checkout. Your 50% discount will be automatically applied.

THE NHB ADVENT TITLES

Here's a list of the titles so far...

Mon 3rd: Sweet William: Twenty Thousand Hours With Shakespeare by Michael Pennington
Tues 4th: How Musicals Work - And How to Write Your Own by Julian Woolford
Wed 5th: Love and Information by Caryl Churchill
Thurs 6th: The Golden Rules of Acting by Andy Nyman
Fri 7th: I Am Shakespeare by Mark Rylance
Mon 10th: So You Want To Be In Musicals? by Ruthie Henshall with Daniel Bowling
Tues 11th: Shakespeare's Lost Play: In Search of Cardenio by Gregory Doran
Wed 12th: The Last of the Haussmans by Stephen Beresford
Thurs 13th: Getting Directions by Russ Hope
Fri 14th: Shakespeare on Theatre by Nick de Somogyi
Mon 17th: 55 Days by Howard Brenton
Tues 18th: Shakespeare Monologues for Young Men and Young Women by Luke Dixon

Nick Hern Books has joined forces with Salisbury Playhouse, Out of Joint, the BBC Writersroom and the National Association of Youth Theatres to launch A Play for the Nation’s Youth, a new competition to discover the next great play for young people.

The chosen playwright will win £1000 seed commission and will be given support including dramaturgy, mentoring, theatre workshops and a public staged reading with professional actors and young people. There is also the possibility that a successful development period could lead to a production and publication.

Each writer is asked to submit at least 25 pages of a new and unperformed piece for young people aged 11-19 years which can either be an original play or an adaptation of a copyright free text. There should be roles for at least 20 young people but adult roles may also feature.

Award-winning playwright and NHB author Fin Kennedy, who has frequently worked in collaboration with school children, says:

‘Youth theatre is where I started out, and where many of the playwrights, actors and directors of tomorrow still try out their skills. It's a sector we should rightly be nurturing so it's great to see such an imaginative professional partnership coming together to do just that. I wish them all the best and will be watching the results with interest!'

For more information, including instructions on how to submit your play, click here.

Nick Hern Books has a strong tradition of publishing plays for young people, including works by leading playwrights such as Fin Kennedy and Stuart Paterson. Recent publications include Ali Taylor’s adaptation of Robert Westall’s Carnegie medal-winning novel The Machine Gunners, Mike Kenny’s dramatisation of Kenneth Grahame’s classic tale The Wind in the Willows, and Helen Edmundson and Neil Hannon’s version of Arthur Ransome’s Swallows and Amazons, which was nominated for the Ned Sherrin Award for Best Musical at the Evening Standard Awards 2012.

The winners of the Theatre Awards UK 2012 were announced yesterday (October 28^th), in a lunchtime ceremony hosted by the Theatrical Management Association. Several NHB authors were among the recipients.

In the Next Room, Sarah Ruhl’s magnetic, nostalgic and gloriously imaginative comedy drama set in an 1800s New York spa town, won Best New Play. It received its UK premiere at the Theatre Royal Bath Ustinov Studio in May.

The award for Best Touring Production was given to English Touring Theatre’s production of Anne Boleyn, Howard Brenton’s engaging historical drama about the wife of Henry VIII. The play originally premiered at Shakespeare’s Globe in 2010. The award was the first ever decided by public vote, with the winner chosen by audiences across the UK.

Howard Brenton’s new play, 55 Days starring Mark Gatiss as Charles I and Douglas Henshall as Oliver Cromwell, is currently showing at Hampstead Theatre.

Also honoured at the ceremony were actors Timothy West and Prunella Scales, who received The Stage Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Theatre ‘in recognition of their longstanding commitment to theatre outside London.’ Their book, So You Want To Be An Actor?, is published by Nick Hern Books.

We currently have signed copies of Mark Rylance's amusing and intriguing first play, in stock and available through the NHB website. Signed stock of this title is limited, so don't miss the opportunity to purchase your copy.

I Am Shakespeare is a fascinating, witty and characteristically exuberant dramatic exploration of the Shakespeare authorship debate. Mark Rylance won the 2010 Olivier Award for Best Actor for his role in Jez Butterworth's global smash hit Jerusalem, and returns to the West End in November with his acclaimed performances in Richard III and Twelfth Night.

Signed copies are available to purchase, at no extra cost, through this website ­– just order as usual, entering 'signed copy' in the box for special instructions at checkout. Click here to place your order now.

Tom Wells' play, The Kitchen Sink, which premiered at The Bush Theatre in London in November last year, has been shortlisted for the Writers' Guild Award for Best Theatre Play.

The play, a comedy set in Withernsea, Yorkshire, was described by Charles Spencer in the Daily Telegraph as 'one of the best new plays I have seen anywhere this year, and I cannot recommend it too highly.' It went on to win the George Devine Award, as well as seeing its author named Most Promising Playwright at the Critics Circle Awards. The play is revived by Hull Truck in November this year.

The other plays shortlisted for the Writers' Guild Award are Grief by Mike Leigh and The Westbridge by Rachel De-lahay. The winner will be announced on Wednesday 14th November at the Tabernacle in Notting Hill.

Caryl Churchill's extraordinary new play, Love and Information, a fast-moving kaleidoscope in which more than a hundred characters try to make sense of what they know, is published this week, with early copies available from today (4th September) via this website.

As formally inventive and thrillingly allusive as anything she has written, the play premieres at the Royal Court Theatre from 6th September in a production directed by James MacDonald.

In an exciting move the Royal Court has announced that a second new play by Churchill, Ding Dong the Wicked, will premiere in the theatre's current season. The thirty minute play will be directed by Royal Court Artistic Director, Dominic Cooke, and take place around the evening’s performance of Love and Information, with matinee and late night showings on certain days. It will be published alongside its premiere by Nick Hern Books.

At the same time, Royal Holloway, part of the University of London, has announced that it's naming its new £3million theatre in honour of Churchill. Due to open early in 2013, the Caryl Churchill Theatre will offer an "intimate and flexible space for 21st century artists and scholars to further enrich the exploration of theatre and performance".

Clybourne Park, Bruce Norris's stingingly satirical play about race relations in a Chicago neighbourhood, was named Best Play at the Tony Awards last night (10 June) at the star-studded ceremony at the Beacon Theatre in New York.

The play, which was published by Nick Hern Books alongside its UK premiere at the Royal Court Theatre in London in September 2010, has already picked up a plethora of awards including the Critics Circle Award and Olivier Award for Best New Play, and the Evening Standard Award for Best Play.

The Tony Award for Best Musical was awarded to Once, the new musical written by NHB playwright Enda Walsh, which was the runaway success of the night, picking up a total of eight awards. It is now tipped for West End transfer.

Success at the Tony Awards caps a brilliant few weeks for NHB playwrights in the US after Nina Raine's Tribes won the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Foreign Play as well as Best Play at the Drama Desk Awards.

The 2012 George Devine Award for Most Promising Playwright has been won by Tom Wells for his play The Kitchen Sink, it was announced today (29 May) at the Royal Court Theatre.

The play, which premiered at the Bush Theatre, London, in November 2011, has already won its author the Critics' Circle Award for Most Promising Playwright. The Kitchen Sink was described by Charles Spencer of the Daily Telegraph as 'one of the best new plays I have seen anywhere this year, and I cannot recommend it too highly.'

The George Devine award is an annual award for new writing in theatre. Coming with a prize of £10,000, it is open to any playwright in the UK for an original stage play, which need not have been produced. It was set up in 1966 as a memorial to the life and talent of the founding Artistic Director of the Royal Court, George Devine.

Previous winners of the George Devine Award include Edward Bond, Mike Leigh, Hanif Kureishi, Martin McDonagh, Conor McPherson, Enda Walsh, Gary Mitchell, Richard Bean, Mark O’Rowe, Lucy Prebble, Alexandra Wood and Vivenne Franzmann.

random, debbie tucker green's poetic film about youth violence for Channel 4, adapted from her Royal Court play of the same name, took the Bafta for single drama at the British Academy Television Awards last night. The playscript is published by Nick Hern Books.

The Bafta for Best Drama Series went to The Fades, written by Jack Thorne, who also picked up a Bafta for Best Mini Series for This Is England '88, co-written by Thorne and Shane Meadows. Jack Thorne's plays, including Bunny, 2nd May 1997 and When You Cure Me, are all published by Nick Hern Books.