Griffin Theatre Company is home to the Lysicrates Prize. Each year it’s awarded to a play assessed on its first 20 pages. As a previous judge of the award I can say it was an initially daunting process: what if the pages following the first 20 were rubbish – or marvellous? What if the playwright was really good at a quick sprint but didn’t have the wherewithal for the long haul?

As the process went on and many 20-pages were read, something else became apparent: if a writer couldn’t grab attention with those pages, there was little point going on. Happily, the 2017 winner of the Lysicrates Prize proves the point. The opening scenes of Melissa Bubnic’s Ghosting the Party are scintillating, hilarious, unpredictable and shocking. And what follows – across an 80-minute running time – is rarely less than that.

Amy Hack, Belinda Giblin and Jillian O’Dowd in Ghosting the Party at Griffin Theatre Company, May 2022. Photo © Clare Hawley.

The intention of the Lysicrates is to assist...