2012 LA Stage Alliance Ovation Award Nominees Announced

2012 LA STAGE ALLIANCE OVATION AWARD
NOMINEES ANNOUNCED
CENTER THEATRE GROUP LEADS WITH 29,
CELEBRATION THEATRE & MUSICAL THEATRE WEST
FOLLOW WITH 16 EACH,
GEFFEN PLAYHOUSE GETS 11,
COLONY THEATRE & TROUBADOUR THEATER COMPANY
TIE WITH 9 EACH

2012 Ovation Awards Nominees for the 2012 LA STAGE Alliance Ovation Awards were announced on the evening of Tuesday, September 11 at the Renberg Theatre inside the Gay and Lesbian Center in Los Angeles. The nominations were revealed by 2011 Ovation Award-winners Beth Kennedy, Matt Walker, Oanh Nguyen, Henry Dittman, Cate Caplin, Brian Danner, and Elina de Santos, along with LA STAGE Alliance Chief Executive Officer Terence McFarland.

Center Theatre Group received the most nominations (29), followed by Celebration Theatre and Musical Theatre West (16 each), Geffen Playhouse (11), and Colony Theatre Company and Troubadour Theater Company (9 each). Center Theatre Group garnered nominations for The Convert at the Kirk Douglas Theatre (11), Waiting for Godot at the Mark Taper Forum (8), American Night: The Ballad of Juan Jose (4) at KDT, Poor Behavior (1) and Red at MTF (1), The Night Watcher (1) at KDT, and Follies (1) and War Horse (1) at the Ahmanson Theatre, and for Best Season. Celebration Theatre’s nominations are for The Color Purple: A Musical (13), and What’s Wrong With Angry? (3), and the Musical Theatre West nominations are for Forbidden Broadway: Greatest Hits, Volume 2 (9), Hairspray (3), Man of La Mancha (2), Spamalot (1), along with Best Season.

Nominated productions for the Geffen Playhouse are Good People (8), The Jacksonian (1), and The Pianist of Willesden Lane (1), along with Best Season. The Colony Theatre Company is nominated for The Savannah Disputation (5), Old Wicked Songs (2), and Dames at Sea (1), along with Best Season. Troubadour Theater Company’s nominations are for Two Gentlemen of Chicago (6), and A Christmas Westside Story (3). The fifth Best Season nomination goes to La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts (The 39 Steps, Noises Off, Miss Saigon, Life Could Be A Dream, Peter Pan). Miss Saigon also received four nominations.

Ovation Honors, which recognize outstanding achievement in areas that are not among the standard list of nomination categories, have been awarded to Sacred Fools Theatre (Composition for a Play, Stoneface: The Fall and Rise of Buster Keaton), Theatre of Note (Fight Choreography, Hearts Like Fists), Theatre @ Boston Court (Puppet Design, The Children), and Center Theatre Group/Kirk Douglas Theatre (Video Design, American Night: The Ballad of Juan Jose).

Founded in 1989, the LA STAGE Alliance Ovation Awards are the only peer-judged theater awards in Los Angeles. For the 2011-2012 voting season, there are a grand total of 191 nominations for 77 productions, presented by 50 companies. There were 400 total productions registered from 173 companies. Of those productions registered, 79 were Ovation Recommended, identified during their runs as scoring in the top quarter of all productions in the Overall Production categories. [CLICK HERE FOR A COMPLETE LIST OF NOMINEES.]

Voters are Los Angeles theatre professionals who are chosen each season by the Ovation Awards Review Committee (through an application process). The list of nominees is determined by a tabulation of scores conducted by the entertainment accounting firm Green Hasson Janks. This year’s Ovation Award eligibility period ran from September 1, 2011 through August 28, 2012.

LA STAGE Alliance is dedicated to building awareness, appreciation and support for the performing arts in Greater Los Angeles through community building, collaborative marketing/audience development, professional development to strengthen the sector, and advocacy. Providing access to the performing arts for patrons and access to information and resources for organizations has been the mission of the Alliance for over 35 years. The Alliance connects artists and arts administrators from over 500 groups annually in a six county region with opportunities to engage, inspire, educate and entertain over four million households that engage with the arts in our community. The Alliance engenders a stronger and more connected creative Los Angeles.

LA STAGE Alliance programs are sponsored, in part, by Actors Equity, The Angell Foundation, Arts Council for Long Beach, The Biller Family Foundation, California Arts Council, California Community Foundation, City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, City of Pasadena Cultural Affairs Division, City of Santa Monica Cultural Affairs Division, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Goldstar, James Irvine Foundation, Andrew Mellon Foundation, Los Angeles County Supervisors through the LA County Arts Commission, MusiCares/Grammy Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, Ralph M. Parsons Foundation, SDC, The Shubert Foundation, and Sony Pictures Entertainment.

The 2012 Ovation Awards ceremony will take place on Monday, November 12, at the historic Los Angeles Theatre, 615 South Broadway, in downtown Los Angeles. The curtain will rise at 7:30pm.

For more information, visit www.LASTAGEOvations.com.

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09-11-12