Two Texas State grad students win national honors at Kennedy Center

Posted by Jayme Blaschke
Office of Media Relations
April 25, 2017

Two Texas State University theatre students have won their respective divisions during the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, held April 16-22 at the John F. Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.

The Texas State playwriting program outperformed all other college and university programs at the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival this year, with Yale University in second place and the Juilliard School in third.

T.J. Parker-Young, expected to earn his MFA in dramatic writing in May, won the Ken Ludwig National Scholarship for best body of work by a college playwright. He entered the week having already won the Harold and Mimi Steinberg National Student Playwriting Award for his play, No. 6. 

First-year graduate student Caitlin Turnage won the John S. Cauble Short Play Award for her one-act play, In a Dark Room, The Lord Knows.

Additionally, undergraduate acting student Cambria Denim finished runner-up in the National Undergraduate Playwriting Award.

Previously, Andrew Heinrich had been invited as one of five playwrights to attend the Kennedy Center MFA Playwrights Workshop in Washington, D.C., during the summer. Heinrich will be assigned a dramaturge, directors and professional actors to workshop his play.

In all, Texas State had five students advance to national competition, making 2017 the seventh year in a row that the university’s theatre program has produced at least four Kennedy Center finalists.

About Texas State University

Founded in 1899, Texas State University is among the largest universities in Texas with an enrollment of 38,849 students on campuses in San Marcos and Round Rock. Texas State’s 170,000-plus alumni are a powerful force in serving the economic workforce needs of Texas and throughout the world.  Designated an Emerging Research University by the State of Texas, Texas State is classified under “Doctoral Universities:  Higher Research Activity,” the second-highest designation for research institutions under the Carnegie classification system.