2025 Papatango Young Playwrights' Award Winners Revealed

Papatango has revealed the winners of the 2025 Papatango Young Playwrights' Award – they are Salma from Friern Barnet School, Anna from Frome Community College, and Cormack from Hammersmith & Fulham Mencap.

For the first time, the Papatango Young Playwrights' Award culminated in a professional showcase on the main stage at London's Park Theatre, held on 25 June 2025. Hosted by actor and writer Mathew Baynton (Horrible Histories, Ghosts, The Wrong Mans and the RSC's A Midsummer Night's Dream), the event showcased eight shortlisted scripts from 470 which Papatango have already produced and published over the last year, with the official reveal of the winning playwrights.

The Award celebrates the UK's most promising young writers and is open to participants in Papatango's GoWrite programme. GoWrite, which is completely free and accessible, supports hundreds of young people each year to write their own monologues. The project runs across multiple groups and organisations for young people in southern England, including state schools, pupil referral units, special educational needs (SEN) settings, and community groups for refugees, carers, and individuals receiving mental health and/or disability support.   This landmark showcase puts new work by young people on the same platform as Papatango's professional productions; the upcoming premiere of The Meat Kings! (Inc.) of Brooklyn Heights by Hannah Doran, the winner of the 2024 Papatango New Writing Prize, will debut on the same stage later this year.

Kate Ereira, Papatango's Creative Learning & Engagement Producer, said, "A huge congratulations to the 470 young people we were privileged to produce and publish through GoWrite this year, and especially to the three winners of the Papatango Young Playwrights' Award. This Award, the culmination of our completely free GoWrite programme, sees Papatango continue to live by our motto: all you need is a story. It is an amazing opportunity to present these young writers at the brilliant Park Theatre, who kindly donated their main stage so these new voices can share the same space as our next professional world premiere. We hope this will be the start of their own exciting, story-filled theatre journeys."

Kerrie Fairclough, Deputy Head of English at Friern Barnet School which is attended by one of the winners, added “The performances of all the different monologues were absolutely outstanding and it was a real joy to be part of such a wonderful celebration of young people's new writing. All of our students loved the entire event. Thanks to Papatango again for all that you do to support young people and their writing.”