Dawn King
Dawn King

Dawn is an award-winning writer working in theatre, film, TV, radio and other forms. In February 2025, her play A BRILLIANT DESIGN (translated into ALLES WIE ES SEIN SOLL) premiered at the Theater Und Philharmonie, Essen.

Her play THE TRIALS had a sold-out English language premiere at the Donmar Warehouse in 2022 after a world premiere at the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus and was a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize 2021. The Trials has been translated into several langauges and produced all over the world.

Her play ADDICTIVE BEAT had a production in a converted church in Southwark Park in September 2022 (with Boundless Theatre.) Her radical reinterpretation of DER KIRSCHGARTEN for director Katie Mitchell opened at the Deutsches Schauspielhaus Hamburg in November 2022.

She is currently writing an untitled screenplay for the German theatre and film director Adrian Figueroa and has a VR documentary project in development at Millennium Centre, Cardiff. She is also adapting her play FOXFINDER for the screen with Elation Pictures and Film Four.

 



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A Brilliant Design

by Dawn King

Ok, let’s say for a minute that I agreed with you, which I don’t! And the world is ending.

Out of that old world… people… We… will make a new one, a better one.

Osara and Nico are figuring out what they want to be.

Amber doesn’t want to face life without her Mum.

Nate thinks that we are all doomed.

Zarah’s pregnant, but how can she bring a baby into such a hard world?

Heidi’s time is running out. How will she ever be ready to leave her family?

Different generations of the same family battle with their fears for the future in this powerful and enthralling play about finding your hope, and the cycle of life and death.

A Brilliant Design, translated into German as Alles Wie Es Sein Soll received its world première at the Theater und Philharmonie Essen, in Feb 2025

Directed by Adrian Figueroa.

Translated by Henning Bochert.

Photos by Thomas Rabsch.

“Dawn King meets us exactly where we are: facing profound global anxieties, the rise of the right wing, autocracy, war, and the climate crisis – the characters’ fears are also the audience’s. The play unfolds the cycle of life, recounting birth and death, and, with a well-balanced blend of wisdom, down-to-earth realism, humor, and optimism, explores the question of life’s meaning.”
— nachtkritik.de
“Hats off, that works exceptionally well. Five professional actors and five up-and-coming talents are on stage together. And this encounter between people of different generations and times fits perfectly with the profound content of the drama.”
— waz.de
 
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Der Kirschgarten

By anton chekhov with texts by Dawn King

Look, Mummy, your wonderful orchard! Smell that air.

It’s sweet. It’s getting warmer already. The birds are singing.

A multimedia theatrical experiment encompassing live film, radio play, video installation, performance, and concert, this production made the trees the protagonists of Chekhov’s classic play.

Deutsches Schauspielhaus, Hamburg. Premiere 26 November 2022

Director: Katie Mitchell

Photos: Stephen Cummiskey

“How do you put nature on stage? It’s a question that Mitchell and her collaborators grapple with, creating an experiment that asks us to reconsider our own ideas about the natural world we so often take for granted. ★★★★ ”
— The Guardian
“Plump fruit, winter frost flakes: Finally, the titular cherry orchard is really the protagonist, while the people mainly contribute to the idyll with used beer cans. Because Katie Mitchell turns the Chekhov classic into a consistent evening about our destruction of nature.”
— Nachtkritik.de
 
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The Trials

by Dawn King

It’s easy for you to accuse me now but you don’t understand. Everyone lived like we did!

Well maybe not everyone, everyone. But…I wasn’t any worse than anyone else.

The near future.

The climate crisis is unfolding and our generation is being judged. 

The jurors? Children. But are they delivering justice, or serving revenge?



The Trials received its world première at the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus in January 2022 directed by Adrian Figueroa and a sold out English Language premiere at the Donmar Warehouse directed by Natalie Abrahami in August 2022. It has been translated into several languages and produced all over the world. Next production: The Tron, Glasgow, Fri 6 — Sat 14 Mar 2026.

Photos from: Donmar Warehouse Production 2022, Nottingham Playhouse production 2024, Teatro Filodrammatici di Milano production 2023.

Main photo by: Helen Murray

AWARDS

NOMINATED

Susan Smith Blackburn Prize 2021 (shortlisted)

“Both convincing and urgent… a compelling production… haunting and thought-provoking – this is the best play about our climate emergency ★★★★ ”
— The Arts Desk
“I found ‘The Trials’ gripping, both as an urgent imagining of how our generation will be viewed by our kids, but also a smart imagining of revolution generally. These sensitive young adults, inheriting a ruined world and given vast, destructive powers bring to mind the Cultural Revolution or the Reign of Terror. ★★★★ ”
— Time Out
“Passionately thought-provoking narrative on intertwining societal and environmental issues. It begs the question of whether anyone, irrespective of generation, is truly innocent. ★★★★ ”
— Everything Theatre
“Ultimately this is a play that demands self-reflection and soul-searching beyond the auditorium. It leaves us thinking about how we live, what we are doing for the welfare of the globe, and whether these angry desolate children of the near future would find us guilty of climate crimes. ”
— The Guardian
SHOP
 
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Addictive Beat

by Dawn King

People came up to me after the gig. That was awesome, you were great. I’d never really felt like that before.

Like I had something good I could do, that I was good. And I knew. This was it. Music was going to be my life.

Music formed a close bond between childhood best friends and ‘insufferable muso twats’ Alex and Robbi.

They always talked about being true to their creative impulses and not chasing money or fame. Now they’re all grown up, it’s not so simple. Their lives are way off track.

When they make a beat that’s gloriously euphoric and wickedly addictive they know it could change their lives, and maybe the world, forever. But would being worshipped by millions quiet their demons? What is the high they are really chasing and is the come down worth it?

With original new music from Anikdote and original score by Dom Coyote. An immersive production from Boundless Theatre starring Fionn Whitehead and Boadicea Ricketts, 21 September - 7 October 2022 at Dilston Gallery, Southwark Park.

Director: Rob Drummer

Photos: Harry Elletson

To read this script or any of Dawn’s unpublished works contact her agent

 
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Foxfinder

by Dawn King

We’ve yet to find so much as a single paw print on your farm. There are no prints, no sign of a den or hiding place, no droppings...

But you could say that the absence of the fox is another sign of his presence and is to be expected.

England is in crisis. Fields are flooded, food is scarce and fear grips the land. A foxfinder arrives at a farm to investigate a suspected fox infestation. Trained from childhood, he is fixated on his mission to unearth the animals that must be to blame for the farms' woes. But as the hunt progresses, he finds more questions than answers…

Foxfinder won the Papatango new writing competition in 2011 and was produced by Papatango at the Finborough Theatre, in a sell-out production directed by Blanche McIntyre.

The play was revived in the West End by producer Bill Kenwright in September 2018 with a cast including Olivier Award winner Iwan Rheon, directed by Rachel O’Riordan.

Foxfinder has been translated into several languages and produced all over the world and is now in development as a feature film project with Elation Films and Film Four.

Main photos: Bill Kenwright Ltd production at the Ambassadors, 2018, Pamela Raith.

Photo gallery: Theatre De Poche Brussels production 2025, Lara Herbinia

★★★★★ WhatsOnStage
★★★★ Telegraph
★★★★ Guardian
★★★★ Independent
★★★★ Evening Standard
★★★★ Time Out

“It’s a script which lays out her vividly imagined plot so subtly that you don’t notice King is trying to make you think something until you’ve already thought it.”
— the telegraph

awards

winner

“An arresting and individual work that haunts the mind long after you’ve seen it… the most compelling new work I have seen this year.”
— The Guardian

  • Royal National Theatre Foundation Playwright Award 2013

  • Most Promising Playwright, Off West End Awards 2012

  • One of The Independent’s Top Five Plays of 2011

nominated

“Rich, rare and deeply unsettling.”
— Time Out
  • Susan Smith Blackburn Prize 2012 (shortlisted)
  • James Tait Black drama prize 2011/2012 (shortlisted)
  • Off West End Awards 2012 Best New Play (shortlisted)
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SHOP
 
 
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Dystopia987

A collaboration with Skepta

I have been watching you here tonight, and I think you are ready,

I think you are ready to ascend to the next level. I think WE are ready to ascend to the next level.

 

An immersive rave experience for a thousand people a night, set in an imagined future in which people have forgotten how to socialise and an AI is running the party.

Dystopia987 was a collaboration with Skepta for Manchester Internaional Festival 2019 and featured a life set by him, plus guest appearances from hand-picked performers and DJs, a wealth of new technology and a cast of characters inhabiting a hidden futuristic netherworld.

Director: Matthew Dunster

Creative Studio: TEM

★★★★★ Manchester Evening News

“It was billed as a waking dream that presents a vision of the future; deep, dark, radical and riveting, Dystopia987 delivered everything and more.”
— DazedDigital
“True to its illegal rave theme, it was hosted in an industrial warehouse and the location was kept secret, only revealed via text message on the day. Inside, the team created a unique take on what entertainment would look like at the end of the world, mixing poetry, fashion, music, and technology – the latter of which made it one of the more ambitious live performances this year....The crowd filters into the damp street, having had one of the nights of their lives.”
— BBC
 
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The Kármán Line

by Dawn King

STORY BY OSCAR SHARP

In about ten weeks you’ll reach 12000 feet. Then we’ll need to give you oxygen. After that, with higher altitudes, you’ll need insulation and

careful nutrition and then... In a few months, at 100 kilometers, you’ll cross the Kármán line. That’s the boundary of space.

 

One morning, Sarah is struck by an unusual illness. She and her family try to cope with what’s happening to her.

A short film which screened at over 18 festivals including Palm Springs, Hamptons, New York and London. Screened in cinemas in the UK and Internationally as part of the BAFTA Shorts programme. Broadcast on PBS TV in the US.

Director: Oscar Sharp

Producers: Tiernan Hanby, Max McGill and Campbell Beaton

“This heartbreaking metaphorical dissection of terminal illness is calibrated and paced to perfection, capturing all the right notes and pushing the concept to a satisfying conclusion.”
— Little White Lies
“A fascinatingly surreal and also moving fantasy-parable on the theme of death and bereavement – and also, mysteriously, on what it feels like to die.”
— The Guardian
“Watching it, you feel the love and sorrow familiar from actual loss, unburdened by the details of straight realism, or of real life.”
— the new yorker

AWARDS

Nominated:

  • Best Short, BAFTA

Winner:

  • Best Short, British Independent Film Awards
  • Best Short, Savannah Film Fest
  • Ellen Award for Originality and Best Comedy, Aspen Shortsfest
  • Best Narrative Short, Oklahoma Deadcentre Fest
  • Best Short Drama, New Hampshire Film Fest
  • Best Short Drama, San Jose Film Fest
  • Grand Prix Short, Xining Film Fest China
  • Best Short, UK Film Fest
  • Grand Prize and Best Foreign Film, Alhambra Film Fest
  • Best Narrative Short, Riverrun Film Fest
  • Zarathoustra Best Film Award, Eidôlon Philosophical Film Festival
  • Grand Prix, Prix France Télévisions and Prix Collège, Court Métrange Fest and Audience Favourite, Shortsup Festival Romania
 
 
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Brave New World

an adaptation by Dawn King

I don’t want comfort. I want danger. I want freedom. I want sin.

 

Adapted from Aldous Huxley’s startlingly prescient science fiction novel.

This genetically engineered ‘Brave New World’ has no family, religion or war. Lust and pleasure have replaced love and art. People are safe, healthy and not afraid of death. They get what they want, and they never want what they can’t have. Everyone is happy now.

When this stability is threatened, one young woman learns the pain of love and one young man gives in to the love of pain.

Brave New World featured original music composed by These New Puritans. A co-production between The Royal and Derngate, Northampton and The Touring Consortium, Brave New World premiered in Northampton at the Royal and Derngate in September 2015 before a major national tour.

Directed by James Dacre

To read this adaptation, please contact Dawn’s agent Julia Mills. Rights available for short non professional runs, and by negotiation with the Huxley estate for longer or professional runs.

★★★★ Independent
★★★★ Telegraph
★★★★ Daily Mail
★★★★ The Scotsman
★★★★ Mail on SundaY
★★★★ Independent on Sunday
★★★★ Northampton Herald

“King remains broadly faithful to the novel’s take of the future but she artfully tweaks it at points to emphasise how its prescience trains light on our own current fears about techno-addiction and mind-control. This harrowing story of an anti-tragic utopia is heartily recommended”
— the independent
“The human story feels more than ever like a progression from mordant intellectual satire to piercing tragedy.”
— independent on sunday
“In this zombified, zoned-out, plasticated political system, the arts are shunted into a siding by an elite that does not want the great unwashed to get ideas above its station. It’s modern Britain! That is the brilliant success of this production: it hammers home how much Huxley got right.”
— Daily Mail
“A filmic quality, spectacular design and a powerful cast”
— The SCOTSMAN
 
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Ciphers

by Dawn King

I’ve been trying to find out everything I can but I keep running up against brick walls.

I still have no idea what she did all day, not really. Sometimes I imagine her, doing... I don’t know… Spy things

A young woman is found dead. Her sister sets out to find out what happened - and stumbles into a world of secrets and subterfuge that makes her question who Justine really was. How well can you ever know someone who lies for a living? A smart and provocative thriller about spies, double agents, and the opaqueness of the human soul.

The world premiere production of Ciphers at the Bush in London was a co-production between Out of Joint, The Bush and Exeter Nothcott theatre. The month long run at The Bush sold out and it toured across the UK from October 2012 - February 2013. It has subsequently been produced internationally.

Director: Blanche McIntyre

Dawn’s screen adaptation of Ciphers for Cowboy Films made the Brit List of the best ‘yet to shoot’ screenplays as selected by the UK film industry in 2016.

Main photos: Bush Theatre, 2014.

Photo gallery: Landestheater Schwaben, 2025. Photos by Karl Forster

★★★★ Guardian
★★★★ Evening Standard
★★★★ The Scotsman

Awards

Nominated:

  • James Tait Black drama prize 2014 (longlisted)
“ An ingenious thriller about spies, surveillance and doubleness”
— The Guardian
“An impressively fluent and dynamic piece of theatre… a play that relentlessly exposes the extent to which life itself – identity, personality, family, love, hate, desire, even work – becomes increasingly meaningless, when people… gradually lose all contact with the sharp and beautiful tang of truth.”
— The Scotsman
“The plot’s subtle permutations lingered in my mind long after, leaving unsettled feelings about our era of constant surveillance and terrorist threats. Ciphers succeeds as a thriller, but is also disturbingly perceptive about modern fears.”
— philadelphia city paper
 
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Salt

by Dawn King

Why don’t you JOIN US on the FOREIGN APPRENTICESHIP SCHEME

and TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR FUTURE!

A new government initiative comes into place offering young people the chance to train and learn skills overseas. Droves of teens jump at the chance to secure their future. Once on board the transport ship, the promises of the glossy advert seem a far cry from what lies ahead.

A National Theatre Connections play for young performers, Salt was performed by young companies around the UK and beyond in 2019.

Dimensions Performance Academy were chosen to bring their production for a performance at the National Theatre for the Connections Festival 2019.

Uploaded by National Theatre on 2018-12-03.
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