Popcorn Writing Award’s Shortlist
Popcorn Writing Awards’ shortlist has been announced, celebrating bold new voices at the Edinburgh Fringe.
Popcorn Group, a film, television and theatre production company founded by filmmaker Charlotte Colbert, has once again joined forces with ten renowned Edinburgh theatre venues to spotlight the best new writing at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Edinburgh Fringe-goers are in for a treat as the highly anticipated shortlist for the 2025 Popcorn Writing Award is unveiled, showcasing 26 diverse and compelling plays, each a testament to the power of storytelling.
In this years’ selection, identity and expression take centre stage, with characters fighting for agency in unexpected ways: from the empowering drag persona in KING to the vibrant dual heritage tensions of LEI-LDN and In The Black’s satirical exploration of race, capitalism and the cost of success in corporate America. Joining them is Ohio: The Bengsons, a true story from a real-life folk duo, exploring what it means to live joyfully in the face of loss. Migration and memory echo through in The Land of Eagles, a lyrical reflection on Albanian identity, while Refuse portrays a Ukrainian neighbourhood on the brink of war through the eyes of the local bin man. Consumed brings four generations of Northern Irish women together to clear out the skeletons in the closet. These are stories that honour the weight of the past while questioning who gets to carry it forward.
Inequality features sharply across the list, including Trouble, Struggle, Bubble and Squeak, which highlights housing inequality through a comedic retelling of a community’s journey to stage a historical reenactment. Meanwhile, Brainsluts offers a hilarious yet quiet critique of what lengths we take to find stability in today’s landscape of financial precarity. And in true Fringe tradition, some pieces gloriously refuse to be boxed in: HOLE! turns cult dogma into an apocalyptic musical romp through queer discovery, and Hot Mess stages the climate disaster as a messy, millennia-long breakup musical between Earth and Humanity.
Unpredictable, political and deeply human, this year's shortlist is a thrilling snapshot of writers redefining what theatre can do.
Popcorn Group’s founder and filmmaker Charlotte Colbert comments, The shortlist this year is exhilarating in its breadth and bravery. These plays interrogate power, challenge societal blind spots, and do so with extraordinary craft and humour. This award has always been about giving writers the space to be unapologetically bold.