Dylan Van Den Berg

A Palawa playwright and dramaturg from the northeast of lutruwita/Tasmania, Dylan’s work explores Blak identities by pivoting narratives that are already part of our national consciousness to embolden Indigenous perspectives.

Dylan is currently under commission at the Canberra Street Theatre and the National Theatre of Paramatta. He is a 2021 Studio Artist at Griffin Theatre Company and his play Whitefella Yella Tree premiered as part of Griffin’s 2022 season and has gone on to be nominated for the Victorian Premier’s Award for Drama and win the NSW Premier’s Award for Playwrighting. It also won the AWGIE award for Stage – Original and the David Williamson Prize. His play Ngadjung for Belco Arts Centre which he also directed premiered the same week and won the AWGIE award for Community and Youth Theatre. He is a member of Sydney Theatre Company’s Emerging Writers Group and with ILBIJERRI Theatre Company, Dylan trained as a dramaturg through the BlackWrights Program with Kamarra Bell-Wykes.

Dylan has written five episodes of Playschool in the last couple of years and is set to write more. He also wrote two episodes of ABC’s Reef School.

In 2021, his play Milk premiered at The Street Theatre and won NSW Premiers Award Nick Enright Prize for Playwriting, the Victorian Premiers Award for Drama, the Canberra Critic’s Circle Award and the 2022 Kate Challis RAKA Award. The play was described as “a new and powerful development in Australian First Peoples’ theatre” (Canberra Critics’ Circle). Milk is published by Currency Press. 

In 2020, his gothic revenge drama Way Back When won both the Griffin Award and the Rodney Seaborn Playwrights Award, was runner up for Shane & Cathryn Brennan Prize for Playwriting, highly commended for the Max Afford Award, and shortlisted for the Queensland Premiers Drama Award and the Patrick White Playwrights Award. In 2022 it was shortlisted for the prestigious Bruntwood Prize in the UK. It was developed through Darlinghurst Theatre Company’s ‘Next in Line’ program with dramaturgy from Shari Sebbens and a cast including Ursula Yovich and Megan Wilding.