2020 Virginia Screenwriting Competition Winners

• LaKesa Cox

  Unforgivable

  Can true love make you forgive the unforgivable? A woman’s love story turns tragic when her fiancé accidentally shoots and kills her son.

• Jeremiah Lewis

  Atticus

  A soldier suffering from PTSD from war and childhood trauma must confront his demons at a rehab facility while trying to prove that his best friend was a victim of friendly fire in Afghanistan.

• Kirk Richardson

  Time Engine

  TIME ENGINE takes us to the near future when people are paid to travel through time — but payment depends on what’s worth living for.

Finalists

• Eric Carlson

  Eighteen Holes

  To save his kidnapped daughter Emily, Billy Jackson – a washed-up pro golfer desperate to make a comeback – must finish as the leader in a tournament’s first round, while FBI agent Linda Gilbert – estranged from her own daughter Mary – struggles to find the kidnappers before Jackson finishes his round.

• Gary Smith

  Gub (pilot Episode)

  When podcasts were still a new art form two fast friends help found a successful award-winning show but are betrayed and discarded by their partners. Picking up the pieces they both struggle until getting back into the business, one seeking money and the other seeking love, both seeking revenge.

• Virginia Shepherd

  The Blue Bench

  When a sniper’s bullet rips across the handsome face of a famous British sculptor-turned-soldier in World War I, not even an exquisitely crafted mask can hide the shattered monster he has become. When the soldier’s sweetheart arrives at his bedside, the promise of love presents itself—if only they can summon the courage and heart to believe it.

• Dee Parker

  Going Native

  On the brink of wrecking his marriage and career, a burnt-out painter flees to Martha’s Vineyard. As he gradually engages with the diverse Island community, he must face the consequences of his past and decide which future to embrace.

   

• Brendan Cassidy

  Spirits In The Night

  A sleep-deprived law student discovers malicious spirits hiding in our world when she sees horrific hallucinations in a mental state between sleep and wakefulness.

• Jennifer Vance

  Felony Therapy

  When economic despair, grief, and small-town corruption threaten to destroy Skylar’s world, the teenager goes to unscrupulous lengths to save her family from themselves.

• Amanda Hobbs

  Edith

  After President Woodrow Wilson suffers a stroke that leaves him paralyzed on his left side, an unlikely leader steps up to assume the duties of the President of the United States: the First Lady, Edith Wilson.

• Ramona Taylor

  Stone's Compass

  After learning that he has an incurable disease, a lawyer, whose life was close to rock bottom, is forced to re-evaluate himself and his relationships as he prepares for the case of his life.