The Stage

Abbey and Druid theatres triumph at Irish Times Theatre Awards

Published Tuesday 3 March 2009 at 10:30 by Michael Quinn

Honours have been evenly shared in this year’s Irish Times Theatre Awards, with Dublin’s Abbey Theatre and the Galway-based Druid Theatre each winning three categories.

Newly transferred to London’s Riverside Studios (opening tonight) Enda Walsh’s self-directed The New Electric Ballroom was judged the year’s Best Production at the 12th annual ceremony. Mikel Murfi also picked up the Best Supporting Actor Award. Dearbhla Molloy won Best Supporting Actress for her performance in Druid’s revival of Martin McDonagh’s The Cripple of Inishmaan, a co-production with New York-based Atlantic Theatre.

The Abbey picked up both the Best Actor and Best Actress awards - for Tom Vaughan Taylor in the title role of The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui and for Dearbhle Crotty’s Masha in The Three Sisters - with Rae Smith winning Best Costume Design for An Ideal Husband.

Wexford Opera won the Best Opera category for its Irish premiere of Richard Rodney Bennett’s The Mines of Sulphur and a special award for the company’s new £34 million home - Ireland’s first purpose-built opera house - which opened in October.

Jason Byrne’s revival of Sarah Kane’s re-working of Seneca, Phaedra’s Love, for Loose Canon won Best Production, with Rupert Goold picking up the Best Director Award for his production of the late Harold Pinter’s No Man’s Land at the Gate Theatre, Dublin.

Owen McCarthaigh won the Best Set Design Award for Juno and The Paycock, a collaboration between Cork Opera House and Northern Ireland’s Association of Regional Theatres, with the award for Best Lighting Design going to Kevin Treacy for the Performance Corporation’s multimedia extravaganza, The Nose.

A Special Tribute Award was given to Lynne Parker, co-founder and artistic director of the Rough Magic Theatre Company, which celebrates its 25th anniversary in 2009.