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Austin Fest Names 2024 Screenplay Competition Award & Fellowship Winners

The 2024 Austin Film Festival Screenplay competition featured eighteen categories. Screenplay Award winners were selected by a distinguished panel of industry judges including, Jameel Saleem (co-executive producer/writer Bob’s Burgers; writer South Park, Disenchantment), Peter Craig (The Town, The Batman, Bad Boys for Life, parts 1 and 2 of The Hunger Games: Mockingjay), Wendy Calhoun (Empire, Prodigal Son, Nashville).

Drama Feature Screenplay Award presented by The Writers Guild of America, East
Hung Over
by Michail Eggelhoefer
Five years after getting attacked by racists, a mixed-race alcoholic is forced to attend Alcoholics Anonymous, where he ends up being sponsored by one of his attackers, who remains unaware of their connection.

Comedy Feature Screenplay Award
Love That for You
by Forrest Brown
Lifelong serial-dater Megan helps her shy best friend Hunter navigate the chaotic Brooklyn dating scene as she struggles to commit to her first serious relationship with a woman, and both are forced to wrestle with how their friendship fits into their evolving lives.

Drama Teleplay Pilot Award
The Mitfords
by Vivian Kerr
Based on a true story, the six aristocratic Mitford sisters struggle to find love and meaning in their lives as their family is torn between fascism and communism in turbulent pre-World War II Britain.

Comedy Teleplay Pilot Award
Florence Unfiltered
by Heather Osterman-Davis and Sarah Ball
STEM-obsessed Florence Nightingale is heaven-bent on shattering the stained-glass ceiling even if it means flipping the bird at her suffocating family who insist she leave medicine to men, cinch up her corset and behave like a gentlewoman already. Victorian Herstory that passes the Bechdel test.

Drama Teleplay Spec Award
The Great: A Hole In Horizon
by Rosy Lum
After Archie’s death leaves a power vacuum at court, Catherine struggles to find her power and be taken seriously as a leader, fighting off personal betrayals, murder plots, and the taunting ghost of the dead archbishop.

Comedy Teleplay Spec Award
Abbott Elementary: Has Been
by Forrest Hanson
Ava meets her match in a rising TikTok star who gives the rude principal a taste of her own medicine after Ava tries to claim credit for the girl’s success. Jacob convinces Gregory and Mr. Johnson to start a chess club.

Horror Screenplay Award presented by Vertigo Entertainment
Pound for Pound
by Benjamin R. Moody
A wannabe MMA fighter is promised a shot in the professional ring if he wins a mysterious tournament held for the super rich, but discovers that this cult-like secret society will make him question what he’s willing to sacrifice for success.

Sci-Fi Screenplay Award
Audrey
by Imogen Grace
During a transitional period in her career, a veteran Hollywood actress builds a dark and destructive bond with her AI body double, in this twisted doppelganger Sci-Fi about the pursuit of perfection at all costs.

Short Screenplay Award
The Dyson-Nüwa Project
by Joey Yu
In a future where super technologies enable humanity to harvest our sun’s energy like never before, space architect Roslin finds herself isolated in a dire situation while trying to save her kids — who are millions of miles away — from a system anomaly.

Playwriting Award
Insertion
by Sarah Groustra
A near-future love story. In the midst of natural disaster, Sam and Amil clash, lust, fight, and feast, all while defending their positions on what actually makes life worth living—or saving.

Scripted Digital Series Award
UR Killing Me
by Michael Iannconi and Sarah Moen
Three Gen Z friends band together to kill the most annoying member of their friend group.

Fiction Podcast Award presented by Realm
Saint Cassandra
by Zaity Salman
Cassandra – a living vampire ‘cured’ of her bloodthirst – desperately searches for her missing scientist father, fighting increasing suspicion from an anti-vampire Federal agent and signs that she is beginning to crave human blood.

YMH Studios Comedy Fellowship
Chasing Shadows
Tony Ferrendelli and Kim Turner
A different kind of romantic comedy about a couple who separate just shy of their 25th anniversary so they can figure out if being alone is actually less lonely than feeling alone in a relationship. Marriage is not for the faint of heart.

Big Indie Screenwriting Fellowship
X Marks the Spot
written by: Mason Greer
Three siblings, tasked with settling their grandfather’s affairs after his passing, discover shocking evidence suggesting he might be the real killer of Malcolm X. Now, they must decide together how to handle this revelation before the rest of the family arrives for the wake.

TV Comedy Fellowship sponsored by the Nickelodeon Writing Program
Screech of Betrayal
by Joshua Logan
An over-eager high school freshman trying to do his best to enjoy the experience gets embroiled in a scandal that ruins his reputation, forcing him to find out what really happened and clear his name.

Enderby Entertainment Award
Megaball
by Aaron Kozak
After playing the Megaball lottery for over a decade, a financially struggling couple’s numbers finally come up on the one day they didn’t buy a ticket. As the traumatic disappointment begins to destroy their marriage, they must find a way to repair the damage done, or risk losing it all.

Josephson Entertainment TV Fellowship
The G.Y.M.
by Dani Hanks
When a neurotic woman spends her life savings to rescue her hometown’s infamous gym, she and her eclectic employees must battle clients, love, dietary supplements, and the fancy fitness chain across the street to keep their beloved underdog gym afloat. ABBOTT ELEMENTARY in a Planet Fitness.

Josephson Entertainment TV Fellowship
Separated
by Jessica Sieff
When a Marine struggling with PTSD befriends a child whose parents have been detained by ICE, she promises to keep the child safe, but a deadly confrontation turns her into the target of a nationwide manhunt.

Updated: 10/28/2024

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