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 German production 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 an immersive 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 adapting THE TRIALS for the screen with Firebird Pictures and is also working on feature film PIG CHILD for Delaval Film and adapting her play FOXFINDER for the screen with Elation Pictures and Film Four.

 



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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 and a sold out English Language premiere at the Donmar Warehouse directed by Natalie Abrahami in August 2022.

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
 
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Addictive Beat

by Dawn King

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 from Dom Coyote. The show is directed by Rob Drummer with movement direction by Ira Mandela Siobhan, in an incredible immersive production from Boundless Theatre. Starring Fionn Whitehead and Boadicea Ricketts.

21 September - 7 October at Dilston Gallery, Southwark Park

Buy tickets on DICE

Photo: Harry Elletson

 
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Foxfinder

by Dawn King

“Rich, rare and deeply unsettling.”
— Time Out

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…

“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.”
— Michael Billington, Guardian

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

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.

 

PRESS

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★★★★★ 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

  • 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

  • Susan Smith Blackburn Prize 2012 (shortlisted)
  • James Tait Black drama prize 2011/2012 (shortlisted)
  • Off West End Awards 2012 Best New Play (shortlisted)
You can buy the text for this and Ciphers from Nick Hern books.

You can buy the text for this and Ciphers from Nick Hern books.

 
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Dystopia987

by Dawn King

 
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“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

An immersive dystopian rave experience featuring a live set from Skepta, guest appearances from hand-picked performers and DJs, a wealth of new technology and a cast inhabiting a hidden futuristic netherworld.

Directed by Matthew Dunster

Creative Studio: TEM

★★★★★ Manchester Evening News

“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

 
“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
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Director and Story: Oscar Sharp

Producers: Tiernan Hanby, Max McGill and Campbell Beaton

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.

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PRESS

“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
“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
 

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

by Dawn King

 
“The human story feels more than ever like a progression from mordant intellectual satire to piercing tragedy.”
— independent on sunday
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Adapted from the novel by Aldous Huxley

Directed by James Dacre

A co-production between The Royal and Derngate, Northampton and The Touring Consortium

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

Adapted from Aldous Huxley’s startlingly prescient science fiction novel about a genetically engineered future society, Brave New World featured original music composed by These New Puritans.

Brave New World premiered in Northampton at the Royal and Derngate in September 2015 before a major national tour. 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.

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Press

“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
“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
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Ciphers

by Dawn King

 
“ An ingenious thriller about spies, surveillance and doubleness”
— The Guardian

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.

 

Directed by Blanche McIntyre

A co-production between Out of Joint, the Bush and Exeter Northcott Theatre

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

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The month long run of Ciphers at the Bush in London sold out and it toured across the UK. It has subsequently been produced around the world.

Ciphers is now in development as a feature film project with Cowboy Films, adaptation by Dawn King. Ciphers made the Brit List of the best ‘yet to shoot’ screenplays as selected by the UK film industry in 2016.

You can buy the text for this and Foxfinder from Nick Hern books.

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PRESS

“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

Awards

Nominated:

  • James Tait Black drama prize 2014 (longlisted)
 
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Salt

by Dawn King

 
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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.

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