The Stage

Sheffield Theatres leads again in TMA nominations

Published Tuesday 19 September 2006 at 10:40 by Nuala Calvi

Sheffield Theatres looks set to repeat its success at last year’s Theatrical Management Association Theatre Awards, with four nominations in 2006.

Ray Panthaki has been nominated for Gladiator Games at the Crucible and Tom Brooke for The Long and the Short and the Tall at the Lyceum, both in the best supporting performance in a play category.

Also at the Crucible, the company of Assassins are in the running for best performance in a musical and Robert Innes Hopkins’ design for Promises, Promises is up for best design.

Sheffield Theatres, under the artistic directorship of Sam West, scooped a hat-trick of awards at last year’s ceremony.

Belfast’s Lyric Theatre has two nominations, one in the best supporting performance in a play category for Michael Harding in Hamlet and one in the best supporting performance in a musical category for Rachel Tucker in Merry Christmas Betty Ford.

Meanwhile Greg Hicks, Jenny Ogilvie and Daniel Weyman will battle it out for the best performance in a play accolade and Lucy Pitman-Wallace, Nina Raine and Gregory Thompson for best director.

The TMA Theatre Awards were established in 1990 and reward excellence in all aspects of regional theatre.

Winners will be announced at a ceremony on October 15 at Hampstead Theatre, hosted by Kwame Kwei-Armah.

The full list of nominees is as follows:

Best Performance in a Play: Greg Hicks - Tamburlaine at Bristol Old Vic, Jenny Ogilvie - What Every Woman Knows for the Royal Exchange Theatre Company, Daniel Weyman - Nicholas Nickleby at Chichester Festival Theatre.

Best Supporting Performance in a Play: Tom Brooke - The Long and the Short and the Tall at the Sheffield Lyceum, Michael Harding - Hamlet at Belfast Lyric, Ray Panthaki - Gladiator Games at the Sheffield Crucible.

Best Performance in a Musical: The Company - Assassins at Sheffield Crucible, Junix Inocian - Pacific Overtures at Leicester Haymarket, Ria Jones - Anything Goes on tour

Best Supporting Performance in a Musical: Nicole Faraday - Bad Girls the Musical at West Yorkshire Playhouse, Harriet Thorpe - Sweeney Todd on tour, Rachel Tucker - Merry Christmas Betty Ford at Belfast Lyric.

Best Director: Lucy Pitman-Wallace - The Burial at Thebes at Nottingham Playhouse, Nina Raine - Unprotected at Liverpool Everyman, Gregory Thompson - Molly Sweeney at Glasgow Citizens’ Theatre.

Best Touring Production: ATC’s A Brief History of Helen of Troy, Jerry Springer - The Opera, Kneehigh Theatre’s Tristan and Yseult.

Best new play: Dying City by Christopher Shinn at the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs at the Royal Court, The Rubenstein Kiss by James Phillips at Hampstead Theatre, Up On Roof by Richard Bean at Hull Truck.

Best Musical: Hot Mikado at the Watermill Theatre, Newbury, Into the Woods at Derby Playhouse, Road To Nowhere at the Lyric Hammersmith.

Best Design: Laura Hopkins for Jerusalem at West Yorkshire Playhouse, Robert Innes Hopkins for Promises, Promises at Sheffield Crucible, Matthew Wright for the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Speaking Like Magpies.

Best Show For Children and Young People: Katie Morag Stories at Mull Theatre, Birmingham Stage Company’s Kensuke’s Kingdom on tour, National Theatre of Scotland’s Wolves in the Walls on tour.

Achievement in Opera: Richard Farnes for his musical leadership of Opera North, Glyndebourne Productions for exceptionally strong revivals of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Fidelio and Giulio Cesare, Welsh National Opera’s Mazeppa.

Achievement in Dance: Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo, Birmingham Royal Ballet’s The Firebird, Paco Peña’s A Compas!