The 2016 Barrymore Awards for Excellence in Theatre

The annual Barrymore Awards for Excellence in Theatre were announced on Monday in a ceremony at the Merriam Theater. Nominators (including BSR editor Wendy Rosenfield) saw 103 productions by 35 professional houses in the greater Philadelphia area; their selections were seen by 12 judges (including this writer), whose discussions led to a list of nominees for each of 20 awards and, finally, a secret weighted ballot to determine winners.

I’m most struck by the distribution of awards among different theaters. The most-awarded company was Theatre Exile, with five for Ayad Akhtar’s The Invisible Hand: Overall Production of a Play, Direction of a Play (Matt Pfeiffer), Leading Actor in a Play (Maboud Ebrahimzadeh, now starring in Akhtar’s Disgraced at McCarter Theatre), Supporting Actor in a Play (J. Paul Nicholas), and Clear Sound Award for Sound Design (Michael Kiley).

Theatre Horizon earned three, all for Black Nativity: Choreography/Movement (Jenn Rose), Music Direction (Will Brock), and Ensemble of a Musical. Five companies won two each, and five others won one each. (The total number is more than 20 because some awards are not chosen by the nominators and judges.) That’s 13 different companies.

No more domination

The 2015-16 awards were not dominated by larger theaters such as the Philadelphia Theatre Company and the Arden Theatre Company. The former took none this year, though it garnered many nominations plus artistic director Sara Garonzik’s well-deserved Lifetime Achievement Award. The Arden earned two big awards: Production of a Musical for The Secret Garden, and Director of a Musical for Matthew Decker’s The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales (his third directing Barrymore). Another typical heavy hitter, The Wilma Theater, won for Supporting Actress in a Play (Jaylene Clark Owens, in An Octoroon).

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Other significant awards won by smaller theaters include Leading Actress in a Play for E. Ashley Izard for Quintessence Theatre Group’s Happy Days, Leading Actress in a Musical for Jennifer Childs’s one-woman show I Will Not Go Gently, Original Music for Josh Totora of the Philadelphia Artists’s Collective’s He Who Gets Slapped, and New Play for Simpatico Theatre’s Time Is On Our Side by R. Eric Thomas.

What this means, I conjecture after seeing all the plays as a judge, is not that the work of larger companies has dramatically diminished. There are fewer choices among musicals, due to two major producers, the Walnut Street Theatre and the Media Theatre, withdrawing from Barrymore consideration, which allows smaller companies and productions better odds.

However, what we also learn from this is that smaller professional companies, though working with less money, fewer union actors, and tiny stages, are doing excellent work, and the Barrymore deciders (theater professionals, academics, even a few critics) recognize that size doesn’t matter.

One footnote: as often happens, design awards went to larger theaters with more resources. People’s Light and Theatre Company won for Scenic Design (Luke Hegel-Cantarella, for Auctioning the Ainsleys), and Costume Design (Marla Jurglanis, Sense and Sensibility). With costumes, particularly, the typical winner is a large-cast period piece. It’s not that I object to Jurglanis’s award, but great design can also occur with small casts and modern costumes. Ryan O’Gara’s Lighting Design award for Bristol Riverside Theater’s Man of La Mancha also fits this point.

Looking to the future

One aspect of the Barrymores I always appreciate is its encouragement of future achievement, starting with the F. Otto Haas Award for an Emerging Philadelphia Theater Artist. Each year’s five nominees are always deserving, but the selection of Bi Jean Ngo not only honors a fine actress, but a founding member of Philadelphia Asian Performing Artists, and a busy activist for theater by and about Americans of Asian descent and other minorities.

A similar award established in recent years is the June and Steve Wolfson Award for an Evolving Theater Company, given to Azuka Theatre. This award also has deserving nominees each season, and recognizes the importance of small companies. The Virginia Brown Martin Philadelphia Award, given to Simpatico’s Time Is on Our Side, honors productions that increase community awareness. Both this and the Haas Award give the other finalists cash awards, which help keep productive theater artists working in Philadelphia.

A new award, the Victory Foundation Award for Outstanding Theatre Education Program, celebrates the education and outreach programs that many companies run, which not only provide learning opportunities for students, but nurture the next generation of theatergoers. 1812 Outreach, of 1812 Productions, won last night.

One can quibble about shows that lost and artists overlooked. (When will Greg Wood finally win a Barrymore? Why can’t we have a separate award for Outstanding Children’s Theater Production? Why was one of my favorite productions, Quintessence’s Saint Joan, totally neglected? These are questions I would ask were I to quibble. But I won’t.) Nevertheless, the Barrymore Awards — called “theater prom,” sans sarcasm, by many who create theater — commemorate another successful year of Philadelphia theater. The 2016-17 season is already booming. Go see a play.