Talene Monahon Named 2026 Winner of The Horton Foote Prize for MEET THE CARTOZIANS

The 2026 Horton Foote Prize has been awarded to Talene Monahon for her play Meet the Cartozians. Ms. Monahon will be honored at a private celebration on Monday, October 19th at New York’s Lotos Club. Tony Award-winning director David Cromer will present the $50,000 prize and a limited edition of Keith Carter’s iconic photograph of Horton Foote, which is found in the permanent collection of the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C.

Meet the Cartozians was nominated by Second Stage Theater. The play, directed by David Cromer and starring Andrea Martin and Will Brill, premiered Off-Broadway in November 2025 at Second Stage’s Irene Diamond Stage at the Pershing Square Signature Center Theater. Meet the Cartozians was later named a 2026 Pulitzer Prize finalist for Drama. See photos from the production!

Part riveting historical drama, part scorching satire, Talene Monahon's Meet the Cartozians reopens a startling chapter of American history. In the 1920s, an Armenian American man fights for legal recognition. A century later, a new generation embraces pop culture’s appetite for influence and fame. Layered, surprising, and wildly imaginative, Meet the Cartozians asks how we decide who gets to belong — and at what price.

This year's Artistic Judges Panel included Celia Keenan-Bolger, Tony Award-winning actor and the Prize's Honorary Chair; Ian Belknap, Artistic Director of New York Stage and Film; Taylor Reynolds, Obie Award-winning director; Lizzie Stern, Creative Executive at Seaview and former Literary Director of Playwrights Horizons; and Jiyoun Chang, Tony-nominated lighting and set designer.

Regarding Ms. Monahon’s play, Judge Chair Celia Keenan-Bolger commented, “The process of selecting Meet the Cartozians for the Horton Foote Prize was especially thrilling because there were so many exceptional plays submitted this year. However, Talene’s play was a unanimous favorite with the judges. Its ambition and execution are exemplary. It’s a play that asks us to think about family and colorism and displacement and identity while holding ache and humor and tenderness at its center. We are thrilled to award Talene Monahon the 2026 Horton Foote Prize for excellence in American Theater.”

Also to be presented at this year’s ceremony will be the Horton Foote Prize Gratitude Gift, awarded each prize year to a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that endeavors to have a positive impact through the work and art of theater, as chosen by the Honorary Chair. This year's $10,000 gift will be awarded to Waterwell at the direction of Ms. Keenan-Bolger, who received the 2025 Isabelle Stevenson Tony Award for her advocacy work through the arts.

About Talene Monahon

Talene Monahon is a playwright, performer and docu-theater maker based in Brooklyn. Her play Meet the Cartozians was a 2026 Pulitzer Prize Finalist for Drama and also received the Outer Critic’s Circle Award for Best New Off Broadway Play and a Drama Desk Award nomination. Other plays include The Good John Proctor  (Bedlam, The New Yorker’s “Top 10 Best Plays of 2023”), Eat Me (Southcoast Rep), Jane Anger  (The New Ohio, 2022 Off-Broadway Alliance Best New Play Nominee), and the docu-theater piece How to Load a Musket (59E59, TheaterMania's "Best Theater of 2020.") Upcoming productions include Wonder! A Woman Keeps a Secret, premiering at Classic Stage Company in May 2027, and Meet the Cartozians at the Huntington Theater and Berkeley Rep. Talene is currently commissioned with Second Stage, Manhattan Theater Club, and Studio Theater and is the Sun Valley Playwright's 2026 Resident. She teaches Playwriting at the Sewanee Writers’ Conference. B.A. Dartmouth College

Previous recipients of the Horton Foote Prize include Lynn Nottage for Ruined, Will Eno for Middletown, David Lindsay-Abaire for Good People, Naomi Wallace for The Liquid Plain,  Dan O’Brien for The Body of an American, Suzan-Lori Parks for Father Comes Home from the Wars (Parts 1, 2, & 3), Jordan Harrison for Marjorie Prime, Zayd Dohrn for The Profane,  Lauren Yee for Cambodian Rock Band, Jaclyn Backhaus for India Pale Ale, Lloyd Suh for The Chinese Lady, Christina Anderson for the ripple, the wave that carried me home, and Jocelyn Bioh for Jaja’s African Hair Braiding.