Members Win at the 2025 Merritt Awards

Sending our congratulations to members Dan Bray & Catherine Banks for their big wins at Theatre Nova Scotia’s 2025 Robert Merritt Awards in the writing categories!

Dan won Outstanding New Nova Scotian Play for his play Deepwater and Catherine won Outstanding New Nova Scotian Adaptation for her adaptation The Mountain and the Valley.

About the Plays ~

Deepwater tells the story of Questa Edgett, a police officer from rural Nova Scotia who interrogates May Fitzgerald: a reclusive marine biologist whose daughter has disappeared. As Questa investigates the mysterious scientist, she learns that there is more happening underneath the surface than she could ever hope to understand.

The Mountain and the Valley is set in the Annapolis Valley between the Great Wars and David Canaan, beloved grandson, son, brother and twin to Anna is on the cusp of manhood. Brilliant, sensitive, observant and the pride of his community his future shines with promise. And yet at 33 he stands alone at the top of the South Mountain looking back at the miscommunications and the misunderstandings that have derailed his dreams.

About the Playwrights ~

Dan Bray (he/him) is a multidisciplinary artist currently residing in beautiful Punamu’kwati’jk (Dartmouth). As founder and artistic director of The Villains Theatre, he has written, directed, and adapted many shows including Deepwater, Shakespeare’s Time Machine, Hänsel und Gretel in der Garten von Edible Horrors, Observatory Mansions, International Waters, and Zomblet. He is a 9-time Robert Merritt Award nominee and 2-time Robert Merritt Award winner. He has taught Playwriting at Theatre Antigonish, and his work has been performed across the Maritimes, as well as in British Columbia and Ontario.

Plays by Catherine Banks have been performed across Canada and include: Miss N’ Me; It Is Solved By Walking; Bone Cage; Three Storey, Ocean View; and Bitter Rose, which aired on Bravo! Canada. Bone Cage premiered in 2007, and went on to win the Governor General’s Literary Award for Drama in 2008. It Is Solved By Walking won the Governor General’s Literary Award in 2012, was translated into Catalan by Tant per Tant, and presented in Catalonia in 2012.