Page 2 of 4
Artistic differences between BareBones and the PAC scuttled a third edition of City Stage at Spirit Square, but there was still plenty of theater electricity during the summer. CPCC Summer Theatre staged their first season at the stately Halton -- best sampled in The Wizard of Oz and CL's Best Musical, 42nd Street.
Meanwhile, BareBones eased on down the road to Theatre Charlotte and served up a wondrously varied slate of events called What the F#&%$TIVAL?! Golden oldies (The Last 5 Years), timely readings (Wendy Wasserstein), and effervescent fun (Attack of the 24-Hour Play Project) were all stirred into the stew. The spicy summertime flavoring at the Queen Road barn certainly helped soften the transition when Charlotte's venerable community theater introduced Stage 501 in the fall -- and such edgy fare as Yellowman and Waiting for Godot.
Opening its groovy doors to Pi Productions and Epic Arts Repertory, Actor's Theatre quietly played a significant role in cultivating fringe theater amid a hostile corporate/political environment. Artistically, they returned to the top of the heap with CL's pick for Best Drama, The Goat, and our Show of the Year, I Am My Own Wife.
So while professional theater in Charlotte continues to gasp for air -- losing many of the people and much of the funding that sustained it just two short years ago -- the quality endures, still worthy of exponentially larger support from a donor community way too proud of its generosity.
Now, without further ado, here are CL's 20th Annual Charlotte Theatre Awards:
THEATREPERSONS OF THE YEAR
Onstage or behind the scenes, Elise Wilkinson brought excellence to everything she touched -- if not infallible judgment. No, the Tavern Shakespeare at Ri-Ra's, soaked in suds and buried in noise, was not always as enjoyable as it was audacious. But the talent behind the guerilla daring began to emerge in a brilliantly modulated portrayal of the wronged wife in Orange Flower Water, BareBones opening salvo at Spirit Square. Now established in the local firmament, Wilkinson and her Collaborative Arts proceeded to engineer two of the year's pre-eminent happenings: the jubilant reinvention of The Green, our Theatre Event of the Year, and a wonderfully concepted and directed production of Bad Dates -- in a condo suite in the heart of Dilworth. Brava!
After grabbing our attention late in 2005 with his Charlotte debut in Bug at Actor's Theatre, Scott Ripley drifted off to the edge of our radar screen until late last summer when the visiting professor at Davidson College led a company of student actors on a trip of a lifetime. They performed 15 shows at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the world's most massive theater orgy. Closer to home, Ripley returned to Stonewall Street and starred in a one-man production of I Am My Own Wife that -- believe it or not -- eclipsed the Tony Award version I'd seen on Broadway. Ripley finished off the year with a fine directorial flourish, directing the revitalized revival of The Santaland Diaries. That fortified Ripley's creds, but when you're the show in CL's Show of the Year, you've already made a solid claim on our Theatreperson title.
DIRECTOR OF THE YEAR
Ditto for Dennis Delamar. If Ripley was leaving Jefferson Mays' celebrated My Own Wife performance in the dust, it was largely because Delamar was outdoing Broadway director Moisés Kaufman. Delamar was surely instrumental in Ripley's ability to understand the complexities of Charlotte von Mahlsdorf's outlaw life and character -- and effectively communicate them to us without sugarcoating. Delamar was equally deft in one of the most monumental, technically sophisticated productions of the year, The Wizard of Oz at Halton Theatre. Problems that plagued later CP efforts at Halton only served to underscore Delamar's mastery.
ACTRESS OF THE YEAR
The thousands who saw Zillah Glory as Barbara de Marco in Shear Madness no doubt have a good grasp of the vitality, allure, and quick-wittedness that drive up the voltage when she's onstage. But the full package was even more evident earlier in the year at Carolina Actors Studio Theatre when Glory was the pure luminescence at the heart of Generations Theatre Group's On the Verge. Those same qualities of energy and spontaneity abounded when she tackled Alexandra Cafuffle -- in a brainy Eric Overmyer script teeming with verbal minefields.
ACTOR OF THE YEAR
Billy Ensley takes the title for the second time on the strength of two polar-opposite musical exploits. First, he absolutely scorched the Halton stage with his portrayal of Judas in Jesus Christ Superstar. Then the victimizer turned victim as he gave us the wrongly convicted, pardoned, and ultimately lynched Leo Frank in CPCC Summer Theatre's production of Parade. Sadly, Ensley was victimized by the production itself, flimsily designed with a wayward sound system to match. His quiet dignity under these doubly trying circumstances was a marvel, helping to make the sorry evening bearable.
