Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Honors for teens
The Cappies Awards Gala returns Tuesday.
It’s the Tony Awards for teens.
The 15th annual Cappies Awards Gala, which honors high school theater productions, returns Tuesday to the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale.
The name has two origins, says Lori Sessions, the program director: “It is the Critic and Awards Program, so part of it is that it’s an acronym … and it was started in Washington, D.C., so it was in the capital.”
Like the Tony Awards, the Cappies will feature musical performances and scenes from the top-nominated shows. It also will recognize the best in high school theater in the past school year, with 42 categories for performers, designers, technicians and critics. This 15th anniversary production, which has always been staged at the Broward Center, will include past winners as presenters.
In its first year, the event included five schools and was held in the 590-seat Amaturo Theater at the Broward Center. But the second year, school participation grew by about 300 percent, and the program was moved to the center’s 2,658-seat Au-Rene Theater. Since then, about 28 schools in South Florida have participated.
“When you think about it, I think that in life in general, recognition by your peers is the most sought-after recognition of all,” says Kelley Shanley, the CEO and president of the Broward Center. “The Cappies is such a great program for high school drama participants..”
The winners are voted on by students in a weighted peer-review process.
“Teen critics watch the show and write reviews, which are edited and submitted to the media,” Sessions explains. “Those student critics vote at the end of the year for the nominations and the awards. It’s sort of a peer review. They don’t vote for their own school shows.”
Sessions says the reviews are published in the Sun Sentinel’s Forum Publishing Group newspapers and at FloridaTheaterOnStage.com.
Shanley says the students’ developing critical abilities is integral to the region’s cultural-arts scene.
“It’s easy to look at it as just an award ceremony,” Shanley says. “[But] they become better critics and learn what are the elements of a great theater production. How it can be done well and how it cannot be done well. These are really important skills.”