Playwrights Lynn Nottage and Gina Femia will be honored at the 39th annual Inge Festival, which runs May 13–16 at Independence Community College in Independence, Kansas.

Pulitzer Prize winner Nottage (Sweat, Ruined, Intimate Apparel) will receive the Festival’s Distinguished Achievement in the American Theater Award, while Femia will be honored with the Otis Guernsey New Voices in the American Theatre Award, which recognizes substantial early contributions to the contemporary American stage.

Femia, who will have work of her own presented as a reading during the festival, has written over 30 full-length plays, which have been developed, produced, or seen at MCC, Page 73, Playwrights Horizons, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Center Theatre Group, Rattlestick Theatre, New Georges, Powerhouse, Theatre of NOTE, Great Plains Theatre Conference, Panndora Productions and Project Y.

“We’re thrilled to recognize Gina’s attuned and courageous storytelling, which examines our societal stigmas and norms through the voices of characters that often go unheard, and ultimately offers us hope,” said William Inge Center for the Arts Producing Artistic Director Hannah Joyce.

The Inge Festival celebrates outstanding playwriting in the hometown of the late William Inge, the Pulitzer Prize and Academy Award-winning writer. Inge won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for Picnic and the Oscar for Best Screenplay for Splendor in the Grass.