2004-5 Drama League Award Nominees Announced

The Drama League is pleased to announce the nominees for The 71st Annual Drama League Awards, which will be presented at its annual luncheon and ceremony on Friday, May 13, 2005. Hosted by previous Distinguished Performance Award recipient Cherry Jones, The 71st Annual Drama League Awards will begin at noon in the Broadway Ballroom of the Marriott Marquis Hotel (1535 Broadway at 46th Street).

For the first time in the history of The Drama League, tickets to the awards ceremony are available to the general public. Tickets are $150 each (non-table seating), which includes admission to the 2004-2005 awards ceremony, plus a one-year Drama League membership (for the 2005-2006 theater season, valued at $85). For more information and to purchase tickets, please call The Drama League at 212-244-9494 ext. 5 or visit www.dramaleague.org.

The nominees for the 2004-2005 season are as follows:

DISTINGUISHED PRODUCTION OF A PLAY Nominees
• The Day Emily Married • Death and the Ploughman • Doubt •
• A Number • Orson's Shadow • The Pillowman • Svejk

DISTINGUISHED REVIVAL OF A PLAY Nominees
• Glengarry Glen Ross • Hurlyburly • Reckless •
• Rose Rage • Twelve Angry Men • Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? •

DISTINGUISHED PRODUCTION OF A MUSICAL Nominees
• Altar Boyz • Dirty Rotten Scoundrels • The Frogs •
• Ghetto Superstar • The Light in the Piazza • The Musical of Musicals •
• Spamalot • The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee •

DISTINGUISHED REVIVAL OF A MUSICAL Nominees
• La Cage aux Folles • Pacific Overtures • Shockheaded Peter •

In addition, The Drama League will present three special awards to the following previously-announced recipients:

The Julia Hansen Award for Excellence in Directing
Presented to Mike Nichols

The Unique Contribution to the Theatre Award
Presented to The Billy Rose Theatre Collection at the NY Public Library at Lincoln Center

The Distinguished Achievement in Musical Theatre Award
Presented to The BMI Musical Theatre Workshop

Long considered the theatre season's most festive awards ceremony, The Drama League Awards pays tribute to the season's best performers by including the nominees of The Distinguished Performance Award on a dais. The 71st Annual Drama League Awards will feature headliners from the 2004-2005 season, including event co-chairs Lea Delaria, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Sutton Foster, John Lithgow, Frances Sternhagen and Leslie Uggams.

The following is a complete list of this season's Distinguished Performance Award nominees (arranged alphabetically by production):

Distinguished Performance Award Nominees
Jim Dale                         Address Unknown
Kieran Culkin                  After Ashley
Cheyenne Jackson          All Shook Up
**Ensemble                    Altar Boyz
Geraldine Hughes           Belfast Blues
T.R. Knight                     Boy
Eden Espinosa               Brooklyn
John Rubinstein              Counsellor-at-Law
Adam Rothenberg           Danny … Deep Blue Sea
Estelle Parsons              The Day Emily Married
Rachel York                    Dessa Rose
Norbert Leo Butz             Dirty Rotten Scound.
*John Lithgow                  Dirty Rotten Scound.
Sherie Rene Scott           Dirty Rotten Scound.
Judith Ivey                       Dirty Tricks
Heather Goldenhersh       Doubt
*Cherry Jones                 Doubt
Brian F. O'Byrne             Doubt
Alvin Epstein                  Endgame
Martha Plimpton             The False Servant
Jeremy Piven                  Fat Pig
Julie White                     Fiction
Cameron Folmar             Five by Tenn
Matthew Broderick          The Foreigner
Roger Bart                      The Frogs
Nathan Lane                   The Frogs
Phylicia Rashad              Gem of the Ocean
Billy Porter                      Ghetto Superstar
Jessica Lange                 The Glass Menagerie
Alan Alda                        Glengarry Glen Ross
Liev Schreiber                  Glengarry Glen Ross
Eve Ensler                       The Good Body
Lea DeLaria                      Happy Days
*Bebe Neuwirth                Here Lies Jenny
Ethan Hawke                   Hurlyburly
Eamonn Walker               Julius Caesar
Denzel Washington          Julius Caesar
Gary Beach                     La Cage aux Folles
Victoria Clark                   Light in the Piazza
Sutton Foster                   Little Women
Anthony Mackie                McReele
Heather Raffo                    Nine Parts of Desire
Dallas Roberts                  A Number
*James Earl Jones           On Golden Pond
Leslie Uggams                 On Golden Pond
**Ensemble                      Orson's Shadow
B.D. Wong                       Pacific Overtures
Jeff Goldblum                   The Pillowman
Michael Stuhlbarg            The Pillowman
*Mary Louise Parker          Reckless
Peter Dinklage                  Richard III
Larry Bryggman                Romance
**Ensemble                      Rose Rage
Billy Crystal                      700 Sundays
Laura Linney                    Sight Unseen
Judy Kaye                       Souvenir
Sara Ramirez                   Spamalot
*Frances Sternhagen        Steel Magnolias
Stephen Spinella              Svejk
Jesse Tyler Ferguson        25th Annual … Spelling Bee
Dan Fogler                       25th Annual … Spelling Bee
Fritz Weaver                     Trying
**Ensemble                      Twelve Angry Men
Julie Halston                     White Chocolate
Whoopi Goldberg              Whoopi
Bill Irwin                           Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Kathleen Turner                Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Mercedes Ruehl               Woman Before a Glass

* Denotes a previous recipient of the Distinguished Performance Award.
** Ensemble Recognition; the show's producer(s) will select two cast members to represent their acting ensemble on the Drama League dais.

"My Drama League Award is the only award that I keep with me at home here in New York," said Cherry Jones, former Distinguished Performance Award recipient and this year's awards luncheon host. "My Tony Award and other honors all stay with my Mom in Tennessee. My Drama League Award means a great deal to me, as it came at a very important time of my life. The idea of only getting the Distinguished Performance Award once in your career gives it great value. It is truly a great feeling. The luncheon is one of my favorite events because it gives us all a chance – as actors – to catch up with one another in a festive and supportive atmosphere, and hopefully celebrate some new talent too."

"The Drama League Awards Luncheon is one of the standout events of the awards season that the stars themselves love to attend," said Drama League President Patricia S. Follert. "It's casual, spontaneous and unscripted. Everyone comes and everyone has a fabulous time."

The first Drama League Award was presented to actress Katharine Cornell in 1935. Since then, the Distinguished Performance Award has been accorded to a roster of theatre legends such as Helen Hayes, Ingrid Bergman, Julie Harris, Jessica Tandy, Sir Alec Guinness, Sir John Gielgud, Rosemary Harris, Christopher Plummer, Frances Sternhagen, Sir Ian McKellen, Jeremy Irons, Bernadette Peters, James Earl Jones, John Lithgow, Stockard Channing, Glenn Close, Bebe Neuwirth, Mary Louise Parker, Liam Neeson, Harvey Fierstein and Hugh Jackman, among others.

The Drama League was founded in 1916 as an association of theatre professionals and patrons dedicated to encouraging the finest in professional theatre, and has since then developed into the theatre's premiere service organization. The Drama League provides an unparalleled training program for emerging theatre artists through The Directors Project, which encourages and trains young talents while providing much-needed exposure and essential connections to the professional theatrical community.

The Drama League is also dedicated to building strong, passionate audiences for the American theatre and provides discounted tickets for its members to the best Broadway, Off-Broadway, and regional productions across the United States while enhancing the theatergoer's understanding and experience of live theatre through its informative panels, luncheons and discussions with leading figures in the field.