Roy Williams and Matilda Feyiṣayọ Ibini awarded Windham-Campbell Prizes for drama
Playwrights Roy Williams and Matilda Feyiṣayọ Ibini have both been awarded Windham-Campbell Prizes for drama and will each receive $175,000 to support their work.
More than $1.4 million was awarded in total to eight writers as part of the prestigious award, which celebrates literary achievement in drama, poetry, fiction and non-fiction.
Williams, whose body of work includes the Death of England trilogy, was praised by the anonymous selection committee for his “nuanced, multi-vocal portrayals of race and class”, which “lay bare uncomfortable truths about British identity, creating an essential and complex theatre of contemporary life”.
Meanwhile self-described “bionic, queer playwright” and screenwriter Feyiṣayọ Ibini was honoured for their “exuberant” plays, including the recent Olivier award-winner Sleepova.
Feyiṣayọ Ibini’s plays “barrel on to the stage with joyful abandon, loosening the knots in the fabric of our socio-political lives with forensic attention to reveal new, hopeful ways of remaking the world”, the selection committee said.
Continues...
Read More
Commenting on their Windham-Campbell award, Feyiṣayọ Ibini said: “I am over the moon and currently hurtling through space somewhere near Jupiter... just marvelling at all of this; the past, the present and the crystallising future.
“I am eternally grateful to my ancestors and everyone who has helped me get this far, and so appreciative to everyone involved at the Windham-Campbell Prize for this thoughtful injection into my career.”
Feyiṣayọ Ibini told The Stage they were already writing their next work, which has “a lot to say about the adult social care system”.
Williams called the prize “an unexpected delight”, noting that he was “truly speechless – I am thrilled as well as honoured”.
He said the prize money would give him the support to finish fledgling plays and work on ideas that had been “in his bottom drawer”, as well as reworking an existing play altogether.
Both writers have won $175,000 to create their work “independent of financial concerns” as part of the global prize.
The winners of the fiction prize were writers Anne Enright and Sigrid Nunez, with Patricia J Williams and Rana Dasgupta scooping the non-fiction prizes. The poetry awards were given to Anthony V Capildeo and Tongo Eisen-Martin.
The prizes are administered by Yale University’s Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Most Read
Across The Stage this weekYour subscription helps ensure our journalism can continue
Invest in The Stage today with a subscription starting at just £7.99
© Copyright The Stage Media Company Limited 2025
