The 2024 Yale Drama Series Prize has been awarded to Keegon Schuett, selected by playwright Jeremy O. Harris. Schuett's play this dry spell was chosen out of more than 2,000 plays from 55 countries.
Schuett will be honored at an October 25 reception at Yale Schwarzman Center. They will receive the $10,000 David Charles Horn Prize, and a staged reading of this dry spell will be presented in conjunction with the Yale Schwarzman Center and New Haven’s Long Wharf Theatre as part of The Artistic Congress. The play will also be published by Yale University Press.
"As a queer, gender non-conforming playwright, it is an incredible honor to be recognized by the David Charles Horn Foundation and Yale Drama Series for this dry spell," Schuett said in a statement. "The play is deeply personal to me. It celebrates trans identity at a time when many places would like to erase us. I wrote this play to help myself believe that the world could be a safe place for me. I hid myself for years because it did not feel that way. It is validating for my work to be recognized on this level. There are many other people like me performing as drag artists, surviving as servers, and hesitating by the doors of public restrooms. Their stories matter. I hope this play nourishes them too.”
“In this time of immense political and social upheaval when it feels as though hopelessness is a cloud that hangs heavy over all our interactions, this dry spell hit me like a cleansing rain," added Harris. "With its simple yet deeply poetic love story I found myself swept up in ways plays once did for me as I was first discovering the dramas that made me want to act and write for the theatre. It also felt like a brazenly assured work in a season that brought to me some of the most accomplished new plays I’ve read since taking on this post.”
“I'm not surprised that Jeremy O. Harris selected this dry spell by Keegon Schuett as the winner of the 17th Yale Drama Series competition," added Francine Horn, director of the David Charles Horn Foundation. "Jeremy's choices have always sent us clear messages of life’s challenges either trapped in history or disguised in fantasy. Keegon’s this dry spell is an imaginative portrayal of alienation, isolation, conflicted love, metamorphosis, hope, and beauty. I read it twice and agree with Jeremy that it is an uplifting poetic piece in this cloudy uncertain world of today, and that it merited the Yale Drama Series prize. Welcome, Keegon, to our amazing family of winners!”
Shortlisted playwrights for the prize included Jess Edwards, Gina Femia, Duncan Gates, Ayvaunn Penn, Reid Pope, Michael Quinn, TyLie Shider, Kayla Stokes, and Zachary Wilcox.
