16th ANNUAL SOUTH FLORIDA CAPPIES Nominations Announced

The Critics' Awards Program, or Cappies for short, will celebrate outstanding achievement in high school theater when students from 24 public and private schools throughout Broward and Palm Beach counties vie for top honors in the 16th Annual South Florida Cappies Awards Gala on Tuesday, May 22 at 7 p.m. in the Au-Rene Theater at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts.

Modeled after Broadway's Tony Awards, the Cappies Awards will feature songs and scenes from the top-nominated shows and recognize the best in high school theater in 42 categories encompassing awards for performers, designers, technicians and critics. This year, the National Cappies (www.cappies.com) is currently collecting donations to support Stoneman Douglas High School.

The top nominee in the musical category is Boca Raton High School with 19 nominations for its musical production of Sweet Charity. The Calvary Christian Academy leads in the play category with 14 nominations for The Matchmaker.

"The Cappies was founded in part as a response to the tragedy at Columbine High School to highlight the positive contributions teenagers were making in the arts," said South Florida Cappies Program Director Lori Sessions. "As we now face a similar tragedy in our own community, we especially look forward to recognizing some of the most talented students and their achievements in theatre and journalism. We thank the Broward Center for helping make this event successful."

Cappie Award winners are determined by votes from students through a weighted peer-review voting process. Nominations are made by student critics from participating schools who attend productions at rival schools and write reviews, which then are edited by theater educators and published on FloridaTheaterOnStage.com.

Tickets are $20. Ticketmaster is the only official ticketing service of the Broward Center, Parker Playhouse and affiliated venues. Buy tickets online at BrowardCenter.org or Ticketmaster.com; by phone at 954.462.0222 or the Broward Center's AutoNation Box Office. Know who you are buying from when you purchase tickets.

The Broward Center for the Performing Arts is located in the Riverwalk Arts & Entertainment District at 201 SW Fifth Avenue in Fort Lauderdale.

For more information visit BrowardCenter.org, like us on Facebook at Facebook.com/BrowardCenter, follow us on Twitter and Instagram @BrowardCenter, subscribe to our channel at Youtube.com/user/BrowardCenter and join the conversation with #BrowardCenter.

The Broward Center 2017-2018 season is presented by the Broward Performing Arts Foundation. AutoNation, Bank of America, Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau, JetBlue, MasterCard, Paramount Refreshment Solutions and Sun Sentinel are proud sponsors of the Broward Center.

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