This year’s 2020 Sarah Awards was like no other. We had been planning to meet together at Sarah Lawrence for this year’s ceremony and partner with PodTales leading up to the big event. When it became clear that holding an in-person festival this year would be impossible, we had doubts that there would be a Sarah Awards or PodTales. But we knew that the audio fiction community was too important. So we came together to re-envision PodTales and The Sarah Awards as a virtual event, providing live remote programming throughout the month of November that culminated into our Sarah Awards virtual ceremony. Kaitlin Prest of Mermaid Palace and her sister Natalie created a wonderful performance and we were so happy to be able to celebrate this year’s winners. If you missed it, don’t worry. You can watch it here on Youtube.

This year’s Sarah Awards had an incredible number of submissions, nearly 250 submissions from all over the world. We are so grateful for our inestimable judges, Paul Bae, Morgan Givens, and Elena Fernandez Collins, who had to choose winners from such a large pool of amazing audio fiction stories. Thank you to all who submitted. Your stories, all of them, have been such a salve during this time.

And now, we present the winners of the 2020 Sarah Awards!

Best New Artist

Audio Block

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Childish: The Podcast Musical is by Rye Dorsey and Zachary Goldberg of Whale Bus. Childish: The Podcast Musical is a 5-episode original series. Dante, a college student in NYC, becomes an RA in order to follow in the footsteps of his hero, Childish Gambino. While he hopes this will be the next step toward becoming a famous rapper, his delusions of grandeur are shattered when he realizes his dweebish co-workers are hellbent on making his life miserable.Childish: The Podcast Musical

Honorable Mention

White Tuesday is a short play written by British-US playwright Eve Leigh. In the play White Tuesday Jasmine and Bianca have been arrested after some environmental direct action goes south. At least they think they've been arrested. They've not had their rights read to them. They're just stuck in this room until someone decides to get them out. And they're beginning to suspect that it might take quite a long time.

White Tuesday was directed by British-German director Lily McLeish, and performed by Jennifer Jackson and Evelyn Miller. The sound design is by Julian Starr and is part of the Fizzy Sherbet Podcast. Fizzy Sherbet produces short plays by female writers from across the world. The Fizzy Sherbet Podcast is proud to connect artists globally in this new digital era we face as theatre makers. We introduce playwrights to directors and actors from different cultural backgrounds to encourage dialogue and an exchange of ideas in creating new audio drama.

Third Place

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An astronaut goes to space. He can’t sleep. He can’t tell anyone. He can’t go home. He’s lonely. He doesn’t want to leave. He’s in trouble. NIGHTNIGHT written by Lucas Hnath and produced by Alex Barron takes the audience into mission control and into outer space to overhear ordinary workplace conflict in an extraordinary environment.

NIGHTNIGHT is part of the Soundstage podcast, a new, free streaming program, produced by Playwrights Horizons. Soundstage is a groundbreaking production that provides our adventurous artists with enhanced digital means to reach curious audiences.

Second Place

Inspired by "River Baptism Study", a painting by acclaimed African-American artist Benny Andrews, Take Me To The Water by T.H. Ponders and Keisha TK Dutes is a story of generations, faith, and traditions. We hear the story of a river baptism from the perspective of the young woman being baptized, while hearing the congregation and minister sing around her. The piece ends with an older version of herself reflecting on the tradition, and how much she valued being baptized. Music from three generations of baptismal practice was used, and performed live in a full cast recording, by an impromptu choir of neighbors, creators, and friends, at Bondfire Studio in Brooklyn, New York.

First Place

Paradise by Axel Kacoutié is a story about a man's journey home, which interweaves with the discovery of a lesser-known truth about hope. First broadcast as part of a series of miniature 'Between the Ears' on BBC Radio 3 - a slot for adventurous feature-making - which featured new work by five different audio artists made in response to Emily Dickinson's poem 'Hope is the Thing with Feathers'.

This year’s 2020 Sarah Awards was like no other. We had been planning to meet together at Sarah Lawrence for this year’s ceremony and partner with PodTales leading up to the big event. When it became clear that holding an in-person festival this year would be impossible, we had doubts that there would be a Sarah Awards or PodTales. But we knew that the audio fiction community was too important. So we came together to re-envision PodTales and The Sarah Awards as a virtual event, providing live remote programming throughout the month of November that culminated into our Sarah Awards virtual ceremony. Kaitlin Prest of Mermaid Palace and her sister Natalie created a wonderful performance and we were so happy to be able to celebrate this year’s winners. If you missed it, don’t worry. You can watch it here on Youtube.

This year’s Sarah Awards had an incredible number of submissions, nearly 250 submissions from all over the world. We are so grateful for our inestimable judges, Paul Bae, Morgan Givens, and Elena Fernandez Collins, who had to choose winners from such a large pool of amazing audio fiction stories. Thank you to all who submitted. Your stories, all of them, have been such a salve during this time.

And now, we present the winners of the 2020 Sarah Awards!

Best New Artist

Audio Block

Double-click here to upload or link to a .mp3. Learn more

Childish: The Podcast Musical is by Rye Dorsey and Zachary Goldberg of Whale Bus. Childish: The Podcast Musical is a 5-episode original series. Dante, a college student in NYC, becomes an RA in order to follow in the footsteps of his hero, Childish Gambino. While he hopes this will be the next step toward becoming a famous rapper, his delusions of grandeur are shattered when he realizes his dweebish co-workers are hellbent on making his life miserable.Childish: The Podcast Musical

Honorable Mention

White Tuesday is a short play written by British-US playwright Eve Leigh. In the play White Tuesday Jasmine and Bianca have been arrested after some environmental direct action goes south. At least they think they've been arrested. They've not had their rights read to them. They're just stuck in this room until someone decides to get them out. And they're beginning to suspect that it might take quite a long time.

White Tuesday was directed by British-German director Lily McLeish, and performed by Jennifer Jackson and Evelyn Miller. The sound design is by Julian Starr and is part of the Fizzy Sherbet Podcast. Fizzy Sherbet produces short plays by female writers from across the world. The Fizzy Sherbet Podcast is proud to connect artists globally in this new digital era we face as theatre makers. We introduce playwrights to directors and actors from different cultural backgrounds to encourage dialogue and an exchange of ideas in creating new audio drama.

Third Place

Audio Block

Double-click here to upload or link to a .mp3. Learn more

An astronaut goes to space. He can’t sleep. He can’t tell anyone. He can’t go home. He’s lonely. He doesn’t want to leave. He’s in trouble. NIGHTNIGHT written by Lucas Hnath and produced by Alex Barron takes the audience into mission control and into outer space to overhear ordinary workplace conflict in an extraordinary environment.

NIGHTNIGHT is part of the Soundstage podcast, a new, free streaming program, produced by Playwrights Horizons. Soundstage is a groundbreaking production that provides our adventurous artists with enhanced digital means to reach curious audiences.

Second Place

Inspired by "River Baptism Study", a painting by acclaimed African-American artist Benny Andrews, Take Me To The Water by T.H. Ponders and Keisha TK Dutes is a story of generations, faith, and traditions. We hear the story of a river baptism from the perspective of the young woman being baptized, while hearing the congregation and minister sing around her. The piece ends with an older version of herself reflecting on the tradition, and how much she valued being baptized. Music from three generations of baptismal practice was used, and performed live in a full cast recording, by an impromptu choir of neighbors, creators, and friends, at Bondfire Studio in Brooklyn, New York.

First Place

Paradise by Axel Kacoutié is a story about a man's journey home, which interweaves with the discovery of a lesser-known truth about hope. First broadcast as part of a series of miniature 'Between the Ears' on BBC Radio 3 - a slot for adventurous feature-making - which featured new work by five different audio artists made in response to Emily Dickinson's poem 'Hope is the Thing with Feathers'.