WhatsOnStage just announced a playwriting competition.

The brief is to write a brand new 60-90 minute play responding to the current quarantines for a cast of no more than 6.

The prize is £500 and a one-night performance when theatres re-open. [1/5]

£500. To write a brand new, full-length play. In seven weeks.

This is less than 7% of the Independent Theatre Council's recommended fee for a play of that length.

Hundreds, thousands, of writers will enter cos we're desperate. [2/5]

People will be putting huge pressure on themselves to create something brand new that can beat out the huge competition there will be.

[3/5]

People who aren't able to meet the deadline for the whole myriad of reasons there are to miss a deadline (esp right now) will feel like they've failed, that they're lazy.

Everyone who does enter but doesn't win will feel shit(ter).
[4/5]

And for what? £500 and a one-night run.

Jesus wept, this industry. Is it any wonder writers aren't valued, and theatre is left to rot, when this tomfoolery is rife? [5/5]