And, so another 12 months has gone by and another meeting of the SVSTA panel has taken place. This year I’m told brought very strong feelings and divided the group, making it exciting to select honorees albeit difficult to agree on them. This is I think a good thing. The work the groups are doing is spurring conversation as art should do and the resulting list is wonderfully diverse. Some groups that have not been honorees before were among the first to be called out as strong contenders. Some of the most awarded groups in the past, didn’t make the list this year. This was indeed an interesting and surprising mix and I think it represents the mass appeal and in some cases enormous potential our local small theaters have.
As always, I would like to thank the panel for their time, patronage and commitment to compiling these awards. This is the 8th year of these awards and despite many changes professionally and personally each year, many of the original panel members still remain dedicated to giving praise and encouragement to our amazing small theater organizations. Hours of being an audience member, hundreds if not thousands of dollars of their own money, driving year round from Gilroy to Pacifica and coordinating logistics shows a passion for the arts and is really an award in and of itself. Remember, you are all nominated and that too is an honor.
In the interest in improvement, the panel has asked me to collect some feedback with regard to the timing of these awards. While there were a lot of factors that went into originally choosing this August date for announcement, the panel is interested in being as helpful and relevant as possible for your marketing purposes and if there’s a better time to announce, they are perfectly willing to shift this next awards period to accommodate that.
Please feel free to email me or leave a comment on this post if you have any feedback on changing (or keeping) the August date. I should also remind you that any shows that fall in the July/August month that the panel has not seen by the time they meet as a group to decide honorees, ARE eligible for the next years awards. No show is ever excluded from consideration.
Finally, congratulations to our entire thriving arts scene here in the Silicon Valley. I myself am proud to be a member of such a community and to be able to provide an electronic space for these well deserved accolades to reside. And so…
2012-2013 HONOREES ARE (in no particular order):
Standout Musical Production
Reefer Madness– San Jose Stage Company
Avenue Q – Stage 1 Theatre
25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee – Los Altos Stage Company (Formerly Bus Barn Stage Company
Standout Classical Production
All My Sons – Douglas Morrison Theatre
King Lear – Shady Shakespeare Company
Fiddler on the Roof – South Valley Civic Theatre
Standout Dramatic Production
Les Liaisons Dangereuses– Dragon Productions Theatre Company
Trying – The Tabard Theatre Company
The Fragrance of Freedom – Tabia African-American Theatre Ensemble
Standout Comedy Production
Boom – Renegade Theatre Experiment
I Hate Hamlet – Broadway West Theatre Company
Harvey– Santa Clara Players
Standout Adult Contemporary Productions
Dinner With Friends – Northside Theatre Company
Race – San Jose Stage Company
Eurydice- Douglas Morrison Theatre
Standout New Works
Hanging Georgia – The Pear Avenue Theatre
Bench Project 2 – The 06 Ensemble
Persuasion – San Jose Stage Company
Standout Kids and Family-Friendly Production
The Time Machine – California Theatre Center
Disney’s The Little Mermaid Junior– Los Alto Youth Theatre
The Wizard of Oz– Sunnyvale Community Players
Technical Standout Production
Ragtime (Costumes) – Hillbarn Theatre
Funny Girl (Costumes)– South Bay Musical Theatre
Spacebar: A Broadway Play by Kyle Sugarman (Lights, Set, Props, Costumes, Sound) – City Lights Theatre Company
Curse of the Starving Class (Set and Props) – Stanford Summer Theatre
Artists/Theaters to Watch for Next Season: Adrienne Walters, Jessica Afonso, Christi Marie Wallace, Scott G. Hartman, Kereli Sengstack, Paz Pardo, Keith Marshall, Brandon Jackson, Limelight Actor’s Theatre (Gilroy), Theatre in the Mountains (Los Gatos)
**Guidelines for the selection process for the Silicon Valley Small Venue Theatre Awards can be found HERE.
Artsalot 
Why have these awards? Seriously, what’s the point? It’s art. How can you say one thing is better than another?
That’s a good point, and the panel was very specific to not label these awards as BEST production and not to award “winners”. These are standout productions and they are honorees. Many of the smaller venues are overlooked for official reviews, grants and other awards. These awards were created to recognize some of the outstanding work being done in theaters under 300 seats in the geographic areas that are sometimes overlooked by media and potential audiences. Being an honoree is an additional credit to add to websites, marketing material and grant applications.
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