news | Monday December 17, 2012

Many Congrats, Chantal!

Chantal Bilodeau‘s award-winning play, Sila, has been named one of ten finalists for the Woodward International Playwriting Prize, to be awarded by the University of New Hampshire in February 2013.

The play is the first of her Arctic Cycle, and follows the story of seven characters — a climate scientist, an Inuit activist and her daughter, two Canadian Coast Guard officers, an Inuit hunter, and a polar bear — who see their values challenged as their lives become intricately intertwined. Equal parts Inuit myth and contemporary Arctic policy, Sila mixes puppetry, projection, spoken word poetry and three different languages (English, French & Inuktitut). The play was originally commissioned by Mo`olelo Performing Arts Company in San Diego. Sila has already been awarded First Prize in the 2012 Earth Matters on Stage Ecodrama Festival and the 2011 Uprising National Playwriting Competition.