Geraldine Hughes to Host Origin's 1st Irish Festival Awards Ceremony Next Week

The 8th annual Origin's 1st Irish Festival hands out its top honors at an Awards Ceremony co-hosted by the Broadway actress Geraldine Hughes at Scandinavia House, 58 Park Avenue, on Monday September 28 at 7pm.

The Festival, which continues through October 4, is announcing today that in addition to its creative awards in seven categories, two new cash prizes will be offered -- a Breaking Ground Award for playwriting sponsored by the Irish Business Organization of New York, and a Special Appreciation Award sponsored by the Irish pub Ryan's Daughter.

A wine reception precedes the ceremony; start time 7pm. The Awards Ceremony is a free event open to all Festival participants and audience members. For more information visit www.1stirish.org.

In all 7 mainstage plays were seen in competition during the five-week festival that began on September 2. The productions vying for the tourney's jury-voted awards are from Belfast, Dublin, Limerick, and New York. Three of the seven -- "Pondling," "The Quare Land" and "Python" -- are still performing through Sunday October 4.

The mainstage productions from Ireland include the Dublin-based Fishamble: The New Play Company's comic thriller "Little Thing Big Thing" by Donal O'Kelly; Dublin's Gúna Nua and Ramblinman's production of Genevieve Hulme-Beaman's macabre solo show "Pondling;" Limerick's Bottom Dog Theatre's gay-pride heart-warmer "Language UnBecoming a Lady" by Myles Breen, and the acclaimed Irish actor and comic Pat Shortt's sketch comedy romp "Selfie," presented by the Irish Arts Center.

Locally grown are the cell's world premiere of "Stoopdreamer," a new play by Pat Fenton; Dublin playwright Brendan Connellan's new comedy-thriller "Python," premiering in The Bronx courtesy of Poor Mouth Productions, and The Irish Rep's cantankerous comedy "The Quare Land" by John McManus.

In addition to the awards in the best actor; best actress; best director; best playwright, best design, and best production categories, the Festival hands out a Special Jury Prize for a unique contribution to the Festival.

This year's blue-ribbon panel of judges includes former Fox News senior producer Marvin Himelfarb, TheaterMania.com editor in chief Andy Lefkowitz and Doug Reside, curator of the Theater Division at the NY Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center.

The Awards Ceremony is co-hosted and coordinated by Ciaran Grant. The event is free and open to the public.

Funding support for 1st Irish 2015 is generously provided by the Festival Sponsors Mutual of America; McVicker & Higginbotham; the Northern Ireland Bureau; Tourism Ireland; the American Ireland Fund; the Irish Consulate, New York, and the NY State Council for the Arts. The newest sponsors are The Arts Council of Northern Ireland; the British Council -- Northern Ireland, and Goldman Sachs.

Curated and coordinated by Festival founder George C. Heslin, Origin's 1st Irish is the only festival of its kind to focus exclusively on the work of Irish playwrights, and is the city's only all-Irish theatre festival. Origin Theatre Company (Heslin is the artistic director) is a year-round theatre company based in New York devoted to presenting the American premieres of new works by Europe's brightest contemporary playwrights. Over the past 13 years, Origin has introduced works by 150 playwrights to US audiences, from such countries as Romania, Macedonia, Norway, Ireland and the United Kingdom. For information on Origin visit www.origintheatre.org.

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