Photos: Inside Theatre Roundtable's CENTRAL OHIO THEATRE ROUNDTABLE ANNUAL CELEBRATION

Shadowbox Live was the host venue for the Central Ohio Theatre Roundtable (DBA Theatre Roundtable) Annual Celebration. The celebration took place on May 15, 2022 at 7 PM. Theatre Roundtable is a Columbus-based consortium of community, educational, and professional theatre companies that exists to further the performing arts in Ohio. "After a one-year hiatus, Theatre Roundtable is excited to provide an opportunity for the community to come together and celebrate the artists, organizations, productions, and theatrical initiatives that were produced in 2020 and 2021," Theatre Roundtable President Joe Bishara said.

In lieu of Production awards, Theatre Roundtable presented four (4) citations, one (1) Fellowship and one (1) Award:

Theatre Educator Citation: An individual or organization who has made a significant contribution to theatre education opportunities available to students K-12 within a school system or in after-school programs or activities.

Emerging Leader Citation: An individual who has had a significant, positive effect in helping theatre flourish through leadership, innovation, creativity, and/or investment.

Collaboration Citation: A for-profit or non-profit business or entity that has offered current, creative, and innovative support to one or more arts organizations.

Theatre Innovation Citation: An award presented to an innovative arts and cultural project or initiative that helped provide relief to others in the community.

Theatre Roundtable Fellowship: Offers financial support to graduating high school seniors from Central Ohio who are looking to pursue the next steps in their theatrical endeavors, whether inside the classroom or beyond, onstage or off.

Harold Award: Presented to an individual or entity for significant individual or organizational achievement.

The recipients are as follows:

Emerging Leader Citation: Shane Davis. Shane has changed the way theatre artists look and interact with Worthington Community Theatre (WCT). Previously known for more traditional, wholesome family programming, Davis brought about the creation of the "After Dark" Series - a subset of WCT's season that is performed at MadLab theatre in downtown Columbus. The mission of the After Dark Series is to provide different, edgy, material that provokes meaningful dialogue.

Innovation Citation: Community Family Players for their December 2021 production of "A Christmas Carol 2021." This production was the premier of an original script adapting Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" for the recently renovated Victorian era Woodward Opera House in Mount Vernon, Ohio. In addition to the success of the show in connecting youth to the community through the performing arts, the community's businesses and individuals raised more than $50,000 for the Winter Sanctuary, an emergency shelter for the homeless.

Roundtable Fellowship: Zuri Clarno. A STEM student, Zuri was fortunate to discover the arts and now dreams of one day running a non-profit organization that brings short plays and accessible theatre experiences to schools in urban areas. As she stated in her application, "when we expand who has an impact on the arts, we can expand the power that art has in impacting people".

Theatre Education Citation: Andrew Protopapas. Under Andrew's leadership as Interim Education Director, CATCO found ways to continue its educational offerings throughout the pandemic. Andrew developed asynchronous content, spearheaded the transition of CATCO's summer camps to virtual Zoom camps, and adapted CATCO's in-school residency programs into virtual Zoom programs.

Collaboration Citation: Greater Columbus Arts Council. GCAC developed new grant opportunities, such as the Big Ideas grant that awarded 22 individual grants in 2021 to uplift artist ideas and projects that bring all art forms out into the community. A total of $7,623,493 was awarded for grants, fellowships, and awards in 2021 alone. GCAC programs continue to provide and address the needs of the theatre community and serve to help this community's continued success.

Harold Award: Abbey Theater of Dublin - Virtual Theatre Project. Beginning in April 2020 and wrapping up at the end of October 2021, the Abbey Theater of Dublin produced Twenty-Eight (28) virtual projects including: - Eight (8) regional-premiere productions featuring youth artists (ages 8-16) - Three (3) virtual concerts - Nine (9) world-premiere, one-person productions. The Virtual Theatre project brought Musicians and Theatre artists into the Abbey Theater to record their original, inclusive stories using multiple cameras to allow patrons to feel as if they were sitting in a theater bearing witness to a live production. As word of mouth began to spread about this initiative, other organizations (Dublin Jerome High School, Evolution Theatre Company, Karrer Middle School, Mine 4God Productions, Original Productions Theatre, Otterbein University, Stage Right Theatrics) and Theatre Festivals (Atlanta Fringe Festival, Conservative Theatre Festival, Columbus Black Theatre Festival, East to Edinburg Virtual Theatre Festival) The Red Curtain Good Theater Festival, and the South Asian Theatre Festival) came onboard to collaborate with the Abbey.

Check out the first look below!

Photo Credit: Jerri Shafer

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