The Neukom Institute for Computational Science at Dartmouth has selected “The Age of Mary” by New York playwright Avery Deutsch as the winner of its 2025 Literary Arts Award for Playwriting, according to the institute.
Deutsch’s play explores how digital technology can collapse the linear experience of aging and reality itself, following a 70-year-old actress named Mary who plays a teenager in a big-budget motion-capture film. The work examines how Mary and three other characters struggle to reconcile their real selves with their roles on a physical movie set dedicated to producing digital entertainment.
“I’m absolutely thrilled to receive the Neukom Literary Arts Award for Playwriting,” Deutsch said in a statement. “I am so looking forward to working on my play with Northern Stage and Dartmouth. I feel honored that The Age of Mary was selected and can’t wait to get to work.”
The annual award, established in 2018, considers plays and other full-length theatrical works that address what it means to be human in a computerized world, according to the Neukom Institute. The program operates as a partnership between the Neukom Institute, Dartmouth’s Department of Theater, and Northern Stage, the professional theater company based in White River Junction, Vermont.
Deutsch’s play was selected from a record-breaking 161 submissions through a blind submission process, according to the institute. Three other works received honorable mentions: “Headless Nebraska” by Chandler Hubbard, “Howard Waffleman’s Love Life” by Scooter Pietsch, and “Smart” by Mary Hamilton.
The winning play recently also received a Terrance McNally New Works Incubator award from Rattlestick Theater in New York City, according to the announcement.
Dan Rockmore, director of the Neukom Institute and professor of mathematics and computer science who created the award program, praised the collaborative effort behind the prize.
“I continue to be staggered by and grateful for our collaborative effort, and the volume of extraordinary work that we have been able to surface with our prize,” Rockmore said.
Rockmore described Deutsch’s work as examining complicated tensions between digital and physical existence.
“Deutsch’s play shines a bright light on the complicated dissonances that exist between digital and material lives, and the complexities inherent in trying to live simultaneously in both of them,” he said. “Anyone alive today will relate to the intensity and peculiarity of life caught between the concrete and the contrived.”
Sarah Wansley, associate artistic director at Northern Stage, highlighted the play’s focus on motion-capture filming technology.
“The Age of Mary explores the uncanny world of motion-capture filming, an art form where the line between the human and the digital worlds is very thin,” Wansley said. “This unique setup not only offers thrilling theatrical possibilities, but also serves as an imaginative jumping-off point for all of the ways technology mediates our experiences of aging, relationships, and our own bodies.”
Tony-nominated director Anne Kauffman will prepare the play for public readings at both Dartmouth and Northern Stage in April, according to the announcement.
The Neukom Award includes a $5,000 prize and a weeklong workshop at Dartmouth and Northern Stage that concludes with two public readings. The first reading will take place at 2 p.m. on Saturday, April 25, in Filene Auditorium in Moore Hall on the Dartmouth campus. Northern Stage will host the second reading at 2 p.m. on Sunday, April 26, at the Byrne Theatre in the Barrette Center for the Arts.
The Neukom Institute champions computational innovation across Dartmouth’s academic programs, with the Literary Arts Award for Playwriting exemplifying its mission to examine how computational thinking shapes cultural and social experiences.
