With his award-winning play Kill Climate Deniers, Finnigan wants to reinvigorate the climate change ‘debate’.

David Finnigan has been announced as the recipient of this year’s Griffin Award for his provocative and timely political satire Kill Climate Deniers. Now in its 20th year, the Award recognises an outstanding play or performance text that demonstrates an authentic, inventive, and contemporary Australian voice, with the winner receiving a $10,000 prize. A writer, theatre-maker and pharmacy assistant from Canberra, Finnigan is a Churchill Fellow and an Australia Council Early Career Fellow.

Finnigan’s winning play Kill Climate Deniers tells the story of a group of eco-terrorists who take the Australian government hostage, threatening their execution unless the environment minister ends global warming by the end of the night. This is the second time in recent history that climate change denialism has been the subject of a Griffin Award winning play, with Stephen Carleton’s The Turquoise Elephant taking out top honours in 2015.

Finnigan’s play attracted the ire of climate change deniers and conservative pundits when it was announced that he had receiving funding from Arts ACT for its development. Among its critics were conservative commentator Andrew Bolt, climate sceptic Don Aitkin, ACT shadow arts...