We're delighted to be supporting the Theatre Uncut Political Playwriting Award, which is now open for submissions from until 7 October 2020.

Offering a prize of £9,500 for the winner, the Award is open to UK writers who have had no more that two plays presented as professional, full-production runs. Submitted plays must be at least sixty minutes in length, require no more than six actors, original stories (not adaptations or translations), and not have been professionally produced before. Entries will be read anonymously.

For full criteria and information, visit the Theatre Uncut website.

The winner of the Papatango New Writing Prize 2020 was announced today (13 July), with Old Bridge by Igor Memic beating out over 1,500 other entries to be crowned the winner.

Influenced by Memic’s Bosnian heritage, Old Bridge explores the true story of what befell Mostar, his hometown, during the Yugoslavian civil war. The play will be performed for the first time at the Bush Theatre, London, as part of their reopening season post the COVID-19 pandemic. It will also published by NHB at the same time, in our role as Publishing Partner of the Prize.

The other shortlisted plays were: Animal by Jon Bradfield (from a story by Jon Bradfield and Josh Hepple), Exile in North Weezy by Beru Tessema, Playfight by Julia Grogan, and Pushing on Open Doors by Sarah Connors.

See more about the announcement on the Papatango website.

£25 OF BOOKS FOR 20 BLACK ARTISTS - TERMS AND CONDITIONS

1. Twenty Black artists will each receive £25 of Nick Hern Books- published books for free. We’ll also cover delivery (within the UK).

2. This opportunity includes all titles published by Nick Hern Books, in whichever formats that title is available (including paperback, hardback, ebook and audio CD) at www.nickhernbooks.co.uk. Books by other publishers that are listed on our website, such as imports, are not included.

3. The £25 amount refers to the value of an order on our website, excluding postage, once our standard 20% online order discount has been applied. As an example, three plays with an RRP of £9.99 would each count as £7.99 towards the full amount, meaning they could all be included in your selected books.

4. If the books you have requested come to over £25, we may get in touch and ask you to make changes to your selection to bring your total to within the agreed amount. We may also need to ask you to swap some titles if the book(s) you have asked for are currently out of stock.

5. This opportunity is open to Black artists only. We won’t be asking for proof of ID or anything like that, so we ask that you please respect the spirit in which this is offered and only submit a request for books if you are eligible.

6. This opportunity will operate on a first-come, first-served basis for the first twenty eligible respondents to email their selected books and postal address to info@nickhernbooks.co.uk.

7. Please note that while we need your postal address to send you your chosen books, and may need to contact you by email to clarify any title requests or to update you on delivery, we won’t retain your personal details or add you to any mailing list without your consent.

8. To maximise the reach of this opportunity, artists who received free books in Gilbert Kyem Jnr.’s initial call-out are ineligible for this new round of requests.

If you have any further questions, please feel free to email us at info@nickhernbooks.co.uk, or reach out on social media!

We're delighted to announce that we're now inviting applications to license Nick Hern Books plays for amateur online performance.

With theatres currently closed, an online performance is the perfect way to bring your members or students together to keep sharing your passion, experience great new plays by today's most exciting writers, and stay active and connected. Whether you're looking to share a play you've always been passionate about (maybe even getting a former cast together for a revival!), test out a show you've had your eye on for a future, fully staged production, or try something completely different, we're here to support you in making that happen.

Online performance licences are available for both live-streamed performances and broadcasts of recorded productions, at a discounted rate of £75 plus VAT (or less for shorter plays) for each live performance or day that the production remains online.

For more information on how the whole process works, visit our Online Performances page.

Theatre Centre and Theatre503 have today (14 May) announced ImagiNation, a new project proudly supported by NHB. 

19 writers have created new short plays, which are available to read online. Everyone who reads these is encouraged to record themselves performing as many as they like, and submit their finished videos to Theatre Centre by 20 July for the chance to appear in a compilation film.

To help with the recording, Theatre Centre have also released free video resources with experienced tutors, sharing tips on acting, directing, recording your film, and using your voice.

The writers involved are: Jon Brittain, Ryan Calais Cameron, Alex Critoph, Zinnie Harris, Matilda Ibini, Asif Khan, Geraldine Lang, Bethan Marlow, Eoin McAndrew, Nicholas McQuillan, Nessah Muthy, Amy Ng, Chinonyerem Odimba, Lettie Precious, Leo Skilbeck, Julie Tsang, Daniel Ward, Timberlake Wertenbaker and Roy Williams.

See more about ImagiNation here.

Released today (27 April) as a published playscript and on film, Isolated But Open: Voices from Across the Shutdown is a new collection of monologues curated by regular NHB partners Papatango Theatre Company.

The ten new monologues in the collection were chosen anonymously from more than two thousand submissions. Funny, poignant, surreal and always surprising, they represent the freshest, most vital and most exciting voices from across the country at this unprecedented time. In addition, award-winning playwrights Rachel De-Lahay and Anders Lustgarten have provided two world premieres.

See more and read the collection for free here.

Theatres may be closed right now, but The NHB Playgroup is OPEN – so join us to discover and discuss fantastic contemporary drama by today's most exciting writers, available to read completely for free.

Each Wednesday during the coronavirus shutdown, we're making one play available for free for one week only, and inviting everyone who reads it to send in a question for the writer. We'll then record a Q&A with them, which we'll release the following Wednesday, along with the next free play!

Our initial line-up of writers includes Anna Jordan, James Fritz, Winsome Pinnock, Enda Walsh, Stef Smith and Ella Hickson - click here for more information.

As of Tuesday 17 March, the Nick Hern Books office is closed until further notice due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. BUT we’re still here, and our team is working remotely. We’re carrying on as normally as possible.

Please visit this page for some key information during this period. If you want to get in touch to discuss anything, please email us at info@nickhernbooks.co.uk. For now: stay safe, let's support and look out for each other, and we're not going anywhere.

Amsterdam, the acclaimed play by Maya Arad Yasur, will be broadcast online for free on Monday 27 January at 7.30pm.

Recorded at the Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond, during its run there in 2019, this strikingly original, audacious drama focuses on an Israeli violinist living in a trendy canal-side apartment in Amsterdam, who one day receives a mysterious unpaid gas bill dated from 1944. It was praised by The Stage as 'fascinating and multilayered', with Time Out calling it 'a moving excavation of the tensions surging under the city’s streets'.

Amsterdam will be broadcast on Monday 27 January, and available to view for a limited period afterwards. Visit the Orange Tree Theatre website for further information and to watch the stream, and see a trailer below.

Amsterdam also embarks on a UK tour from February to May 2020.

Following its hit, multi-award-nominated debut at Southwark Playhouse, gripping drama Shook by Samuel Bailey (Winner, Papatango New Writing Prize) is transferring to Trafalgar Studios in London's West End from April – and to celebrate, we've got an exclusive ticket offer you.

Save 10% on Tier A and Tier B tickets, for all performances from 10 April - 9 May, with code NHBOOKS when you book online here. This offer is valid until 31 January.