Roger Rees Awards Announce 2019 Nominees

The Broadway Education Alliance is pleased to announce the 2018-2019 student nominees who will compete for the title of Best Actor and Best Actress at The Roger Rees Awards for Excellence in Student Performance on Sunday, May 19 at the Professional Performing Arts School, 328 West 48th Street, in Manhattan.

Fifty (50) students, (25 men and 25 women) are representing 40 high schools located throughout the Greater New York area that have presented an officially licensed production of a Broadway musical during the 2018-2019 academic year. This year, 152 students who performed a qualifying role in an eligible musical have been adjudicated by a team of three educational and theatre industry professionals who attended each school production.

Click here for the complete list of nominees!

The Roger Rees Award nominees participate in a pre-award training intensive on Saturday, May 18 that includes master classes in solo and group performance and rehearsals for the award showcase lead by a group of Broadway professionals who will select 12 award finalists. The Acting Coaches areTina Maria Casamento (Actress/Faculty Rider University Musical Theatre and Acting), Michelle Millard (CW Post/Long Island University), Sean McKnight (The Hybrid Agency), and Cynthia Thole (Fairleigh Dickinson University). Music Directors are Andy Einhorn (Carousel and Hello Dolly!), Isaac Harlan (Broadway Inspirational Voices), David Libby (Chasing Rainbows: The Road to Oz) and Christine Riley (Marymount Manhattan College).

The Roger Rees Awards for Excellence in Student Performance will be hosted by NY1's Emmy Award®-winning reporter Frank DiLella and 2015 Roger Rees and Jimmy® Award-winning Best Actress Marla Louissaint. This annual showcase of student talent includes an opening and closing musical number that features the 50 nominees, solos from the 12 finalists and a performance from the PPAS cast of Caroline, or Change. The 2018-2019 Roger Rees Award judges include Broadway star Jelani Alladin (Disney's Frozen), Tony Award-winning Broadway producer and general manager Nancy Nagel Gibbs (Wicked, Fun Home), Tony Award Winner Bob Martin (The Prom, The Drowsy Chaperone), Patricia Simon (Coordinator of the Musical Theatre Program at Marymount Manhattan College) and casting director Merri Sugarman (Tara Rubin Casting C.S.A./Jersey Boys, Ain't Too Proud and more) will determine the Best Actor and Best Actress in the Greater New York. Kyra Selman, Musical Theatre Faculty at the Studio School in Los Angeles will award a scholarship to the school's pre-college summer program to one participating student.

Event ticket information and tickets can be found here.

The Roger Rees Awards-winning students will represent the Greater New York region at The Broadway League Foundation's National High School Musical Theatre Awards® also known as The Jimmy Awards, in June.

The Roger Rees Awards recognize the importance of theatre arts education and celebrate the exceptional life and career-long artistic excellence of Broadway's beloved actor/director, Roger Rees. Playwright Rick Elice, Rees' partner of over 30 years, and author of "Finding Roger," said, "Rog would have liked this chance to educate and inspire young actors, to offer a guiding hand as so many were offered to him when he too was a kid with a dream."

Throughout his life, Roger Rees was a committed educator and generous mentor to young artists. He spent countless hours in rehearsals and classrooms coaching aspiring writers, actors and directors on character development, craft, collaboration and the vast cannon of theatrical works. Rees received the Olivier® and Tony® Awards for his performance in The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, and Tony nominations for Indiscretions and as co-director of Peter and the Starcatcher. Rees passed away in July 2015 after a year-long battle with brain cancer. He was posthumously inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in November 2015.

The Broadway Education Alliance is the fiscal sponsor for The Roger Rees Awards for Excellence in Student Performance which are supported by Disney Theatricals, Camp Broadway LLC, Concord Theatricals, Music Theatre International, Nancy Nagel Gibbs, Theatrical Rights Worldwide, and many other industry leaders working in/around Broadway.

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