Austin Fest Names 2025 Screenwriting Contest Winners

Winners in all cateogories have been announced for 32nd Annual Austin Film Festival Script Competition.

Drama Screenplay Award presented by The Writers Guild of America, East
The Other Side of 25
by Becca Hurd
A stand-up comedian with commitment issues reluctantly becomes the gestational surrogate for her older sister. But after a dangerous accident, she is faced with the frightening reality of raising the child on her own.

Comedy Feature Screenplay Award
Lauren Lindsay Can Go To Hell
by Kate Beacom & Lacey Jeka
Lauren Lindsay was the most popular girl in school… until she died. Now a ghost, she must reconcile with the girl she bullied to earn redemption. As the two navigate unfinished business and unexpected feelings, forgiveness starts to look a lot like falling in love.

Big Indie Pictures Fellowship
Roots of Conflict
by Ari Mostow
After a big oak tree crashes onto his house, a hapless stay-at-home dad is thrust into a feud with eccentric neighbors, and must step up as mounting chaos threatens to unravel his marriage, his family, and the suburban idyll he’s desperate to protect.

The Donners’ Company Award
Believe/Bерим
by Ryan Werner
Based on a true story, Soviet hockey star Vladimir Konstantinov risks everything to join the Detroit Red Wings. After their 1997 Stanley Cup triumph, a life-altering tragedy tests the power of resilience, loyalty, and brotherhood in a moving portrait of courage against all odds.

Enderby Entertainment Award
The Other Side of 25
by Becca Hurd
A stand-up comedian with commitment issues reluctantly becomes the gestational surrogate for her older sister. But after a dangerous accident, she is faced with the frightening reality of raising the child on her own.

Josephson Entertainment Screenwriting Award
Black Silk
by Patrick Michael
When a magnetic but dangerous father re-enters his son’s life, the bond they form is as sacred as it is ruinous, forcing the boy to choose between the myth of manhood or a truth of his own design.

Horror Screenplay Award
SHIFT
by Danny Salemme
When a woman’s postpartum delusions turn deadly, she must uncover the truth behind her adopted daughter’s mysterious origins to survive.

Sci-Fi Screenplay Award
On the Other Side
by Lanre Olabisi
When your mirror image from another universe has the NASA career you’ve always dreamed of, you got two choices: wallow in self-pity or commit interdimensional identity theft. A bitter physics professor and her husband opt for the latter. Unfortunately, karma works in all directions.

Wonder Project | Stand Together Fellowship
27 Cows
by Christopher Holt
When a big-hearted Yorkshire farmer can’t face sending his beloved herd of 27 cows to slaughter, he grabs a map and a backpack and walks them 100 miles, cross-country to an animal sanctuary — sparking ridicule, resistance, and unexpected fame along the way.

YMH Studios Fellowship
Follow The Money
by Patrick Franklin
When a fiasco with a stubborn parking gate leaves a man ruined, his only shot at redemption comes from chasing a wild conspiracy theory championed by his estranged uncle.

Drama Teleplay Pilot
Dr. Nash
by Cassidy Nash Davis
DR. NASH is a one hour medical drama, Grey’s Anatomy meets The Knick, about Dorothy Nash, the world’s first female neurosurgeon, as she overcomes adversity, misogyny, and what it means to be a woman in 1930s Pittsburgh.

AMC One-Hour Pilot Award
Courier Girl
by Anna Zabel
Courier Girl follows Kasia as her already dangerous life in the Jewish ghetto of 1940 Warsaw becomes even more perilous when she takes on her greatest acting challenge yet: dyeing her hair blonde and enlisting as one of the Aryan-looking “courier girl” spies.

Comedy Teleplay Pilot
Crapshoot
by Drew McInturff
When LA’s most feared food critic watches his career implode from a Crohn’s disease diagnosis, he turns to the brilliant but unstable ex his reviews publicly destroyed to salvage his dream and chase redemption in the city that chews you up and shits you out.

Adult Comedy Animated Series Fellowship Presented by Starburns Industries
Time Traveling Cum Cops
by Austin Schauer
In a near future where sperm banks send special agents back in time to collect samples from history’s VIPs — “Very Important Papas” — a loose-cannon and her rookie, by-the-book partner struggle to finish their job to completion.

Josephson Entertainment Teleplay Award
Lady Em
by Cristina Pippa
A teenage descendant of Macbeth must navigate high school and family secrets when she discovers she has the power to fight demons and change the fate of her politically divided state.

TV Comedy Fellowship Sponsored by the Nickelodeon Writing Program
Medusa: An Animated Series
by Ruby Mainieri
At the IRIS Center for mythological misfits, Medusa takes a job as a therapist to outrun her past, but between city politics, backstabbing coworkers, and five bickering emotional support snakes, healing others might be her hardest curse yet.

Drama Teleplay Spec
Yellowjackets: Thicker than Water
by Cynthia He
Desperate to feed herself and her unborn child, Shauna discovers a taste for her own blood. Wracked with shame, she resists—until Lottie presents a brimming bowl of blood, freely given by her followers, luring Shauna toward the seductive power of the Wilderness.

Comedy Teleplay Spec
Abbott Elementary: Skip Skampi’s
by Scott Olsen
When a seafood chain with a reputation for sponsoring local schools opens a new restaurant up the block, the Abbott faculty realize just how far they’ll push themselves in the name of class supplies, building repairs… and half-off drinks for teachers after 6:00pm.

Short Screenplay
Did you have a Good Time?
by Kevin Talley
When an aimless college grad accepts her grandfather’s offer to bankroll any outing as long as he can tag along, their nights out transform into an unexpected education in fulfillment, purpose, and the importance of having a good time.

Stage Play
Shepherd
by Gregory Paul
After America’s second civil war, a single mother takes in a former insurrectionist through a government program run by an AI, only to discover that healing a broken nation may destroy her family.

Scripted Digital Series
String City
by Suemedha Sood
When a Broadway star winds up dead in a hotel room, there’s only one man for the case and that man is a bear: Ace McKay, Bear Private Detective.

Fiction Podcast
Dial it Up
by Philip Thorne & Oystein Brager
When a stranger calls from his girlfriend’s stolen phone, Doug finds himself trapped in a deadly game of manipulation, forced to complete increasingly absurd tasks to save his girlfriend’s life – all while confined to a single, harrowing phone conversation.

Updated: 10/26/2025

Additional Contest Info: Austin Film Festival Script Competition