The Yale Drama Series Prize awarded to Barbara Seyda for her play “Celia, A Slave: 26 Characters Testify.” April 2015.

“Celia, A Slave: 26 Characters Testify” is based on the trial manuscripts and court records from the State of Missouri vs. Celia, a Slave, file #4496, Callaway County Court, 1855, Fulton, Missouri. At age 19, Celia, the female slave, was accused, convicted, and hanged for killing her 66-year-old master, a prosperous Missouri landowner. The play is a tableau of interviews with the dead. “I’m thrilled to chose Barbara Seyda’s play for the 2105 Yale Drama Series,” says Wright. “My reason for rating the play so highly was the thick lump of pain that it placed in my chest and that I carried around with me for days afterwards. I had a completely primitive and intuitive reaction to the tragedy of the story and the whole life, in a way.”