Kara Nissly and Hannah Slobozien love to write. The recent Donegal High School graduates also love theater, and they put their passion for both subjects together when they entered plays they wrote in the Apollo Awards competition for high school theater students. Both girls earned nominations in this year's Outstanding Playwright category.

Kara's play, "The Unhappy Beginnings of Happy Endings," told the story of an author in the 1950s who was struggling to get his novel published because it lacked a happy ending. Hannah's play, "Writer's Block," was also about an author facing a challenge: coming up with an idea for a play.

"Her husband tells her to write about her own life, but she thinks that's too boring," Hannah said. "In the end, she realizes, 'I do have a story to tell, and my story is important.'"

Kara's play also has a positive message. "He decides to write a happy ending," she shared. "He realizes that this particular story can have a happy ending even if it doesn't mean his entire story has a happy ending."

To be entered in the Apollo Awards competition, each play must be written to be performed within 30 minutes as a one-act show, and it must include stage directions and sets that could realistically be created. The winning play is performed in a live reading in Hershey.

Hannah has written a play for the Apollo Awards all four years of high school, earning nominations her freshman and sophomore years in addition to this year. Kara earned an honorable mention nomination for a play she wrote last year as well as the nomination this year.

Hannah entered the competition as a freshman after receiving encouragement from Donegal teacher Audra Brackbill.

"She told me about this competition and I was like, 'Oh, give me extra work to do!'" she said with a laugh. "I love to write, but I'd never written a play, but I liked theater, so I thought this would be cool to do something related to theater and writing."

Kara entered the competition last year after encouragement from Hannah.

"She said, 'You should write a play,'" Kara recalled. "I liked writing other genres, mostly poetry and fiction, but then I wrote a play my junior year, and I thought it was fun."

Kara said she was especially happy that she and Hannah both received nominations this year. "I didn't want to be competing against Hannah," she said. "I was going to feel really bad if I got nominated and she didn't."

The girls know a bit about friendly competition. They have been friends throughout high school, participating in several theater productions, and they took top honors in the Class of 2024. Hannah was named valedictorian and Kara earned the title of salutatorian.

Although neither girl won this year's Outstanding Playwright award, they were happy to enter the competition and earn nominations together. They each said they may continue to write plays in the future. Hannah will attend Schreyer Honors College at Penn State University and Kara will attend William & Mary.

Offering advice to other students who may want to try playwriting, Hannah said, "Be authentic when you write. It gives you an opportunity to really become the characters more so than any other form of writing. You have to think about what would this character say in every situation."

Kara agreed, adding, "Read plays and watch plays. That helps you to know and understand how they work. And then just go for it. I didn't think I'd get into playwriting, but now we're both into it."