2026 THA Comedy Award Finalists
Cleo by Makram Ayache (ON)
You think you know the story of Egypt’s favorite queen, Cleopatra? Cleo is an 18-year-old Egyptian transfer student at Actium High, a private school in North America. Enemies are made, alliances are tested, and the battle between Cleo and Octavia for Student Union President becomes an all-out war in this dramedy about the struggle for love and power.
Makram Ayache is a Governor General Literary Award finalist, Lambda Literary Award winner, and Dora award-winning playwright, performer, director, and producer based in Toronto. His writing centres queer Arab voices, connecting political realities with personal stories. Named a Canadian culture maker who defined 2025 by CBC and the recipient of New York City’s Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ Drama, Ayache’s work continues to gain national acclaim. His play, The Hooves Belonged to the Deer, was recognized as one of Ontario’s top 10 productions in 2023 by the Globe and Mail and won the Elizabeth Sterling Haynes Award for Outstanding Independent Production. The Green Line earned two Betty Mitchell Awards, including Outstanding New Play. His recent adaptation, A Witch in Algiers, received the Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding New Play in 2025. Learn more at www.makramayache.com.
Agency by Nathaniel Hanula-James (ON)
Viola is a queer-owned, boutique advertising agency focused on the local and the public good. When the agency’s creative director dies in hilarious circumstances, the remaining staff clash over their latest assignment: a pride campaign for a meal kit company.
Nathaniel Hanula-James (he/they) is a theatre maker who collaborates on new work as a playwright, dramaturg, administrator, and performer. Recent projects include Tiff’ny of Athens (Shakespeare in the Ruff, 2025), co-adapted with Christine Horne; Flux in the City, a participatory theatre piece co-created with Wesley Reibeling and the Major Matt Mason Theatre Collective, about the wonderful world of municipal consultation (High Performance Rodeo, 2025); and White Taffeta Silk (Talk is Free Theatre, 2024), a short horror-comedy in which two teenagers unearth a buried wedding dress and a vengeful spirit. Nathaniel co-leads outdoor theatre company Shakespeare in the Ruff. They are a staff writer for Intermission Magazine, a facilitator of the Page Turn emerging arts writers program, and the lead facilitator of Tarragon Theatre’s Local Young Playwrights Unit.
Holiday in Zurich by Colleen Murphy (ON)
It’s June 2009 and Frank and Clementine Pelletier, are packing for a trip to Zurich, Switzerland. Frank, a retired high school history teacher, is suffering from terminal cancer. He has made a date with Dignitas. Clementine, who worked as a receptionist most of her life, is the forte to Frank’s pianissimo. She loudly sings tunes by Celine Dion. Married for 37 years but still in love, Clementine has supported Frank’s decision from the start. They’ve planned to holiday in Zürich before his procedure – stay at a nice hotel, see the alps, indulge in Swiss cuisine. Everything is arranged. They’re ready to go until Clementine accidentally discovers the gift Frank planned to leave for her to find when she returns next week without him. This unexpected discovery ignites in her the realization that she will not let him go…and so begins Frank and Clementine’s collision with death and life.
Colleen Murphy was born in Rouyn-Noranda, Quebec and raised in Northern Ontario. She won the 2016 and 2007 Governor General’s Literary Award for Drama for her plays Pig Girl and The December Man / L’homme de décembre respectively. Both plays also won the Carol Bolt Award for Outstanding Play. Selected works include Jupiter, The Breathing Hole (nominated for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize in the U.S. and the Carol Bolt Award), The Society For The Destitute Presents Titus Bouffonius (winner of six Jessie Richardson Awards including Outstanding Production, and three Elizabeth Sterling Awards including Outstanding Production), Armstrong’s War, The Goodnight Bird, The Piper, and Beating Heart Cadaver (nominated for a Governor General’s Literary Award for Drama). She is also a librettist, an award-winning filmmaker, and has been Writer-in-Residence at seven Canadian universities. She is a member of the Order of Canada.
Special thanks to Comedy Award Peer Assessment Panelists: Jivesh Parasram (Chair), Norman Yeung, Laura Teasdale.