Playwright Kim Su-hee Wins 19th Cha Beom-seok Playwriting Award for Trilogy on Vanishing Places and Women
Creatrip Team
3 months ago
Kim Su-hee (pen name Guduri), a playwright-director and leader of the theater company Miin, received the 19th Cha Beom-seok Playwriting Award in the full-length play category on Dec. 10 in Gwanghwamun, Seoul. She accepted the prize tearfully, saying the award feels like a generous supporter behind her that will push her forward and give her strength. The winning work is a three-part cycle titled “Places That Disappear and Women,” comprising “Geumseong Guesthouse,” “Suseong Café” and “Hwaseong-gol Girls.” Based on her direct encounters with a 50-year-old guesthouse in Inje, a redevelopment-threatened café in Euljiro, and a provincial sex work area, the plays focus on vanishing locales and marginalized women. Judges praised the trilogy for stepping out of abstraction into the lived world with calm but powerful questions. The Cha Beom-seok Award honors the legacy of Cha Beom-seok, a major figure in Korean realist theater; this year no musical book prize was awarded. At the ceremony, organizers and notable theater figures honored Kim’s work and recalled her roots: her pen name Guduri comes from her grandmother, who cared for her while she wrote in their hometown (Gyeongnam Geoje’s Chilcheon-do).
