SUPERMEN Takes Top Prize at DUTF

Supermen, written by Brooklyn-based Adam Esquenazi Douglas, won Best Play at the 13th Annual Season of the Downtown Urban Theater Festival (DUTF). The festival ran from May 13-30, 2015 at HERE Mainstage in SoHo, NYC and featured 17 plays written by some of America's best emerging writers and theatrical visionaries from California to New York.

The complete list of honored plays include:

BEST PLAY CATEGORY

Winner - Supermen by Adam Esquenazi Douglas

Performed by David Jenkins, Jonathan Minton, Nathan Brisby, Alexandra Perlwitz and Ilana Seagull

Directed by Alan Winner

Second Place - Distortive Ascent by Nikolai Mishler

Third Place - Black Sheep by Darian Dauchan

BEST SHORT CATEGORY

Winner - Between a Hot Dog and A Hard Place by Mel Nieves

Second Place - Spades by J. E. Robinson

Third Place - Blackout03 by Kate Bell

AUDIENCE AWARD

Winner (Tie) - Blackout03 by Kate Bell and Bed Bugs and Hot Pockets by Shonali Bhowmik

Supermen is a biopic play that takes place during World War II in Cleveland, Ohio where two young, Jewish comic book creators, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, create Superman and change the world forever. The play reveals the real, bloody story behind the birth of the Man of Steel and the tragedy for its creators.

Adam Esquenazi Douglas has written plays that have been produced across the country, from Los Angeles to New York City, as well as internationally in Canada and Japan. He has been a featured playwright at the Great Plains Theatre Conference, Texas State University's Black and Latino Playwrights Festival, MetLife Nuestras Voices Playwriting Competition, Pregones Theater Asuncion Playwrights Project, Piney Fork Press Theater Festival, The Landing Theatre Company's 2013 New American Voices Play Reading Series, Simian Showcase, Amios Productions Shotz Series, Horse & Cart Theater Company's PlayOffs Series, Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, LA Sci-Fest, Austin Frontera Fest, Oh Dragon Theatre Company and others.

In 2001, DUTF was founded with the purpose to build a repertoire of new American theatre that echoes the true spirit of urban life and speaks to a whole new generation whose lives defy categorizing along conventional lines. That purpose has been realized many times over, as more than 100 writers have created and refined their work for the stage and thousands of inspired audience members have applauded their performances. DUTF inaugurated the festival in 2002 at HERE in SoHo to help revitalize the NYC downtown arts scene, which, at the time, was experiencing a severe downturn due to the WTC disaster. It has been recognized as "one of the world's best festivals for new works" and described as "not only prestigious, but a slice of heaven for playwrights who want the chance to freely express themselves." (Lisa Mulcahy, Theater Festivals, Allworth Press, 2005)

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