Radha Blank Receives 2011 Helen Merrill Award For Playwrights

Playwright Radha Blank, currently represented Off-Broadway with the Classical Theatre of Harlem/Hip-Hop Theater Festival's production of SEED, was presented with the 2011 Helen Merrill Award in Playwrighting.

The award, presented in a ceremony at the Algonquin Hotel in New York City on September 26, 2011, is from the Helen Merrill Fund in The New York Community Trust, which was established by Helen Merrill, a theatrical agent who devoted her life to nurturing the careers of playwrights. By the Merrill passed away in 1997, she had spent little of the money she had earned from her career as a photographer & theatrical agent, leaving the bulk of her estate to create the Helen Merrill Fund.

Radha Blank's other plays include American Schemes, HappyFlowerNail, nannyland, Reverb, Kenya & Casket Sharp & have been developed &/or presented at Arena Stage, The Lark, The Public Theater, Dixon Place, Penumbra Theatre, The City Parks Foundation/Central Park SummerStage, Here, Voice & Vision, Hedgebrook Women's Playwright Festival, WICA & ACT Theatre. Her awards & fellowships include New York Foundation for the Arts Artist Fellowship, The Nickelodeon Writer's Fellowship, The Public Theater's inaugural Emerging Writer's Group & now, the 2011 Helen Merrill Award in Playwriting.

SEED, currently running at the National Black Theatre, explores themes of abandonment, poverty, class differences & byproducts of the crack epidemic that swept through Harlem in the 1980s & ‘90s. It tells the story in a vibrant & exciting style, infused with rhythm & verse integral to hip-hop culture. As a compelling new drama that examines class & cultural fault lines in one of America's most prominent Black communities, SEED begs the question: How far are you willing to go to protect the future of a community & its children?

SEED is running at the National Black Theatre, 2031 Fifth Avenue @ 125th through October 9th, with performances Wednesday - Sunday.

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