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Final Draft Announces 2025 Big Break Screenwriting Contest Finalists
Final Draft has announced the winners and finalists of the 2025 Big Break Screenwriting Contest, its annual competition aimed at discovering emerging film and television writers.
Two writers received the competition’s top honors this year. Heather Farlinger won the Feature Grand Prize for Unshakeable, while Khalid Abdulqaadir earned the TV Grand Prize for his pilot Affection of a Tiger.
Unshakeable follows a polarizing governor racing to save her state as a catastrophic volcanic eruption approaches, while Affection of a Tiger tells the true story of a high school student who must become a government informant after his family is charged with terrorism in the aftermath of 9/11.
The Big Break competition, presented by Final Draft, awards more than $80,000 in cash and prizes and offers winners industry exposure, including meetings with agents, managers, producers, and executives.
Category Winners
In addition to the Grand Prize winners, the contest recognized scripts across multiple feature and television categories.
Feature Category Winners
Action/Adventure: Unshakeable — Heather Farlinger
Comedy/Rom-Com: Career Day — Joshua Bullock & David Kushner
Diversity: The Manatee — Abi Perpall
Drama: Breaker — Elliott Giarola
Family/Animated: Gristle — Heidi Hornbacher
Period/Historical/War: Leave Luck to Heaven — Alex Kain
Sci-Fi/Fantasy: See You See Me — Erin Galey
Thriller/Horror: Transgressions — Tim Daly
Television Category Winners
Diversity: High Strung — Lee Johnson
Half-Hour Pilot: World of Hurt — Mason Gersh
Hour-Long Pilot: Affection of a Tiger — Khalid Abdulqaadir
Short Script Winner
Devil’s Instrument — Frederik Ehrhardt
Updated: 03/13/2026
Additional Contest Info: Final Draft Big Break Screenwriting Contest
ScriptLinks
Post Your Script Here!Palo Alto Bang & Burn
When idealistic professor Will Reynolds joins a clandestine government program researching remote viewing, his faith in science and reality unravels as he discovers truths that feel ripped from science fiction.
BORDERLINE JUSTICE
Rita Fuentes, a fiery, attractive Latina social worker introduces Martin Wilkins, a law-and-order judge, to the violent, politically charged world of power, money, illegals, and life for the drug mules--like Demetria Plascentia, and his foolish new son-in-law, Antonio Borja--he condemns daily in his courtroom.
TIME OUT
A husband has willfully taken a time out from his marriage for fourteen years, is suddenly thrust back into it to save the life of an ailing son he never knew he had.
Lab Rats
An anonymous organization uses an ***AI Bot*** to moderate a Focus Group on the topic of ***Fake***.
She Curses Like a Sailor
A thought-provoking view of women and cursing is entertained at this art opening in New York.
Lady Diogenes of the Shadow
Three retired ladies candidly discuss their bizarre neighbor over morning coffee.
Perfect Beau
A Brainiac Plain Jane clones her ideal boyfriend out of her girlfriends' boyfriends' DNA for her university's senior class science project.
Cold Pepper
A law-abiding, church-going court stenographer becomes a one-woman vigilante 'offing' violent domestic abusers (and other pathetic souls) after their third offense.
Psychotic USA
A dramedy. A razor-sharp satiric view of the laughable state of modern psychiatric treatment as seen through the lens of four patients in an asylum.
Psycho-Hearts
A world-class heart transplant surgeon is an absolute magician at finding compatible hearts for wealthy clients.
