When The Old Oak by Lauren Mills
Wins the 2025 First Light Prize
When the Old Oak by Lauren Mills has been named the winner of the 2025 First Light Playwriting Award, a decision determined the award’s panel of judges on September 19th, 2025. Mills and her work will be celebrated at a public reading and ceremony held on the campus of Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire on November 8th, 2025.
The First Light Playwriting Award was established to recognize original, unproduced dramatic works that demonstrate exceptional theatrical imagination, and emotional depth. Sponsored by Inkwell, the award serves as a platform for emerging voices—celebrating playwrights whose work illuminates the possibilities of live storytelling.
Mills receives the inaugural award, and as of October 31, 2025, When the Old Oak has been published as an official Acting Edition, available for purchase under ISBN 979-8-9937030-0-8.
Set “once upon a time” in a forest thick with eerie stillness, When the Old Oak follows Magdalena, a young widow who seeks to resurrect her husband with the help of the town witch and her childlike double. What begins as an act of devotion unspools into a haunting reimagining of the classic folktale—one about loss, longing, and the strange ways grief refuses to stay buried.
When the Old Oak captures the delicate intersections of grief, memory, and renewal, rendered in dialogue that is by turns charming, intimate, and transcendent. Mills’s play unfolds with lyrical restraint and remarkable control, its tone shifting with precision between the eerie and the tender.
A note from this year’s panel:
“Mills has a remarkable handle on building tone; this play is as equally eerie and unsettling as it is charming and hilarious. A wonderfully entertaining reimagining of the classic folktale.”
WINNER
LAUREN MILLS
When The Old Oak
In a cottage nestled deep in the woods, Magdalena tends her garden with quiet, lonesome devotion—dilligently nurturing her tomatoes, hydrangeas, and the aching memory of her late husband, Frederick. When her grief grows too heavy to bear, she seeks help from the craggy village witch, and what begins as a simple bargain soon blossoms into something far darker. From a handful of soil and a touch of forbidden magic, the dead begin to stir—and from her garden blooms something terrible and tender: true love reanimated, the familiar made monstrous, and a reckoning that takes root beneath the soil.
When the Old Oak is a darkly funny and hauntingly lyrical folktale about love, loss, and the stubborn things that refuse to stay buried. With the mischievous humor of a reimagined Mother Goose and the slow-burning ache of the Southern Gothic, Lauren Mills’ enchanting debut explores how even the most beautiful acts of devotion can take on a life—and death—of their own.
Lauren Mills is a poet and playwright. She is a winner of the 2025 University and College Poetry Prize sponsored by the Academy of American Poets, was a 2024 Gilbert-Chappell mentee with the North Carolina Poetry Society, and has had her plays staged at Dartmouth.
She is both a terrible gardener and mandolinist.
AWARD CELEBRATION
Saturday, November 8th, 2025 - 1:00 PM
@ Sawtooth Kitchen - Hanover, NH
A formal celebration of Mills and First Light’s shortlist honorees will take place at 1:00 PM on Saturday, November 8th, 2025 at Sawtooth Kitchen in Hanover, New Hampshire. The evening will include a live table read of the award-winning play featuring:
Sydney Kim (Dartmouth ’28) as MAGDALENA
Aleksa Sotirov (Dartmouth ’26) as DEADERICK
Alex Campbell (Dartmouth ’26) as THE WITCH
Hannah Brooks (Dartmouth ’26) as THE CHILD
Kay Alvito (Dartmouth ’29) as MOTHER
Ari Rabinowitz (Dartmouth ’28) as FATHER
RUNNER UP
MIEKE VANDERVEEN
Darkwave
Mieke Vanderveen is a writer and theater-maker pursuing a Master’s in Creative Writing at Dartmouth College. A graduate of the University of East Anglia in England, where they earned a BA with Honours in Scriptwriting and Performance, Mieke’s work blends folklore, surrealism, and emotional realism across stage and screen. Their original scripts explore themes of identity, loss, and transformation, including The Woods at Night and Phantom Limb. They have served as a director and performer with the Minotaur Theatre Company, and their creative practice extends to education and advocacy, particularly in supporting neurodivergent and underrepresented communities.
SHORTLIST
The Copy Machine
Erin Elizabeth Bennett Hodge is a writer, theater-maker, and illustrator based in Norwich, Vermont. She holds a MALS degree from Dartmouth, where she concentrated in playwriting. Her work has appeared on stages across Vermont and New Hampshire, including productions with the BarnArts Center for the Arts. She has performed in and directed numerous plays ranging from A Streetcar Named Desire to Antigone. Erin’s creative practice bridges storytelling, performance, and visual art—exploring the intersections of language, image, and live expression.
Be The Boy
Eloise Margaret Langan is a playwright, poet, and humor writer from Dartmouth College. Her work has earned the Eleanor Frost Playwriting Prize, first place in the Studio 3 NYC One-Act Play Competition, and honorable mentions for both the Sidney Cox Memorial Prize and the Mecklin Prize. At Dartmouth, she is a founding member of the Can’t Sell Culture Comedy Collective, an actor with the Rude Mechanicals Shakespeare Troupe, and a writer for The Jack-o-Lantern.
When It Rained One Million Years
Nic Rago is a writer, editor, and graduate student in creative writing at Dartmouth College. He is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of UDD3R, a multimedia magazine exploring the potential of digital storytelling, and serves as a writing fellow at the Hopkins Center for the Arts. His writing has appeared in Italian Americana, Clamantis and other publications. He is currently writing a magical realist novel about two travelers drifting across time and the American landscape.Originally from the Bay Area, Nic studied English and Political Science at UC Davis and spent a year abroad in London.
This Award is made possible by the generous support of the Davin Polk Fund for the Arts.
When The Old Oak by Lauren Mills
Wins the 2025 First Light Prize
Winner
When The Old Oak by Lauren Mills
Runner Up
Darkwave by Mieke Vanderveen
Shortlist
The Copy Machine by Erin Bennett
Be The Boy by Eloise Margaret Langan
When It Rained One Million Years by Nic Rago
When the Old Oak by Lauren Mills has been named the winner of the 2025 First Light Playwriting Award, a decision determined the award’s panel of judges on September 19th, 2025. Mills and her work will be celebrated at a public reading and ceremony held on the campus of Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire on November 8th, 2025.
The First Light Playwriting Award was established to recognize original, unproduced dramatic works that demonstrate exceptional theatrical imagination, and emotional depth. Sponsored by Inkwell, the award serves as a platform for emerging voices—celebrating playwrights whose work illuminates the possibilities of live storytelling.
Mills receives the inaugural award, and as of October 31, 2025, When the Old Oak has been published as an official Acting Edition, available for purchase under ISBN 979-8-9937030-0-8.
Set “once upon a time” in a forest thick with eerie stillness, When the Old Oak follows Magdalena, a young widow who seeks to resurrect her husband with the help of the town witch and her childlike double. What begins as an act of devotion unspools into a haunting reimagining of the classic folktale—one about loss, longing, and the strange ways grief refuses to stay buried.
When the Old Oak captures the delicate intersections of grief, memory, and renewal, rendered in dialogue that is by turns charming, intimate, and transcendent. Mills’s play unfolds with lyrical restraint and remarkable control, its tone shifting with precision between the eerie and the tender.
A note from this year’s panel:
“Mills has a remarkable handle on building tone; this play is as equally eerie and unsettling as it is charming and hilarious. A wonderfully entertaining reimagining of the classic folktale.”
AWARD CELEBRATION
Saturday, November 8th, 2025
1:00 PM
Featuring
Sydney Kim (Dartmouth ’28) as MAGDALENA
Aleksa Sotirov (Dartmouth ’26) as DEADERICK
Alex Campbell (Dartmouth ’26) as THE WITCH
Hannah Brooks (Dartmouth ’26) as THE CHILD
Kay Alvito (Dartmouth ’29) as MOTHER
&Ari Rabinowitz (Dartmouth ’28) as FATHER
WINNER
LAUREN MILLS
In a cottage nestled deep in the woods, Magdalena tends her garden with quiet, lonesome devotion—dilligently nurturing her tomatoes, hydrangeas, and the aching memory of her late husband, Frederick. When her grief grows too heavy to bear, she seeks help from the craggy village witch, and what begins as a simple bargain soon blossoms into something far darker. From a handful of soil and a touch of forbidden magic, the dead begin to stir—and from her garden blooms something terrible and tender: true love reanimated, the familiar made monstrous, and a reckoning that takes root beneath the soil.
When the Old Oak is a darkly funny and hauntingly lyrical folktale about love, loss, and the stubborn things that refuse to stay buried. With the mischievous humor of a reimagined Mother Goose and the slow-burning ache of the Southern Gothic, Lauren Mills’ enchanting debut explores how even the most beautiful acts of devotion can take on a life—and death—of their own.
Lauren Mills is a poet and playwright. She is a winner of the 2025 University and College Poetry Prize sponsored by the Academy of American Poets, was a 2024 Gilbert-Chappell mentee with the North Carolina Poetry Society, and has had her plays staged at Dartmouth.
She is both a terrible gardener and mandolinist.
RUNNER UP
MIEKE VANDERVEEN
Darkwave
Mieke Vanderveen is a writer and theater-maker pursuing a Master’s in Creative Writing at Dartmouth College. A graduate of the University of East Anglia in England, where they earned a BA with Honours in Scriptwriting and Performance, Mieke’s work blends folklore, surrealism, and emotional realism across stage and screen. Their original scripts explore themes of identity, loss, and transformation, including The Woods at Night and Phantom Limb. They have served as a director and performer with the Minotaur Theatre Company, and their creative practice extends to education and advocacy, particularly in supporting neurodivergent and underrepresented communities.
SHORTLIST
The Copy Machine
Erin Elizabeth Bennett Hodge is a writer, theater-maker, and illustrator based in Norwich, Vermont. She holds a MALS degree from Dartmouth, where she concentrated in playwriting. Her work has appeared on stages across Vermont and New Hampshire, including productions with the BarnArts Center for the Arts. She has performed in and directed numerous plays ranging from A Streetcar Named Desire to Antigone. Erin’s creative practice bridges storytelling, performance, and visual art—exploring the intersections of language, image, and live expression.
Be The Boy
Eloise Margaret Langan is a playwright, poet, and humor writer from Dartmouth College. Her work has earned the Eleanor Frost Playwriting Prize, first place in the Studio 3 NYC One-Act Play Competition, and honorable mentions for both the Sidney Cox Memorial Prize and the Mecklin Prize. At Dartmouth, she is a founding member of the Can’t Sell Culture Comedy Collective, an actor with the Rude Mechanicals Shakespeare Troupe, and a writer for The Jack-o-Lantern.
When It Rained One Million Years
Nic Rago is a writer, editor, and graduate student in creative writing at Dartmouth College. He is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of UDD3R, a multimedia magazine exploring the potential of digital storytelling, and served as a special projects fellow at the Hopkins Center for the Arts. His writing has appeared in Italian Americana, Clamantis and other publications. He is currently writing a magical realist novel about two travelers drifting across time and the American landscape. Originally from the Bay Area, Nic studied English and Political Science at UC Davis and spent a year abroad in London.