FCC theater instructor and playwright, Chuck Erven, won third place in the David Mark Cohen Award category at the Kennedy Center for his Spring 2011 play, “The Ballad Of Chet.”

The national award is given to three winners for new plays written by working playwrights and were produced at a college or a university.

“When we produce a new play we always enter the production and the script for consideration,” said Erven. He added that when the theater department produces a new play written by a student, those are also entered into the competition.

For this competition, the Kennedy Center divides the country into eight regions with California being in region eight with Arizona, Nevada, Hawaii, and Utah. Although many plays are submitted at the regional level, only two from each region are allowed to be submitted at the national level.

According to Erven, the plays submitted by each region at the national level are entered in a blind submission; “names of the authors are not on the title page,” he said.

“It’s really great for everyone involved in developing the play when it is recognized,” said Erven; production companies and college theaters are more interested in producing plays that have placed in the top three of the David Mark Cohen Award.

Currently, Erven is working on a play he describes as being based on “the war in Iraq in which a wounded veteran with PTSD returns home to Great Falls, Montana.” He says a workshop production of the script might be done in a year or so.

Erven said he is pleased about the recognition. “I hoped the play would place in the top three of the award, but I’m perfectly aware that there are many wonderful new plays written each year.”