Performing Arts WA Awards highlight professional productions Statewide at Heath Ledger Theatre

Black Swan State Theatre Company and WA Opera claimed top honours in the Performing Arts WA Awards at Heath Ledger Theatre on Monday, with a strong showing by independent and regional groups Freeze Frame Opera, Broome dance ensemble Marrugeku and Albany’s Breaksea theatre company. The awards, presented annually by The Artist Relief Fund, with funding support from the State Department of Local Government, Sport and Cultural Industries, and Arts & Culture Trust, honoured WA professional productions during 2023. Black Swan’s Things I Know To Be True proved the category killer, winning all of its five nominations including best mainstage theatre production, outstanding direction (Kate Champion), outstanding lighting design (Mark Howett), and outstanding lead performance (Caroline Brazier and Humphrey Bower). The State Theatre Company’s Dirty Birds also won for outstanding sound design (Rachael Dease) and outstanding stage design (Bruce McKinven), while Stephanie Somerville took outstanding performer in a supporting role for The Bleeding Tree, by Angus Cerini. WA Opera’s Stephen Sondheim spectacular, Into the Woods, converted two of its competition-high eight nominations to win outstanding ensemble, and outstanding newcomer (musicals and opera) for Sophia Wasley. Perth Festival’s Equations of a Falling Body, by Laura Boynes with Performing Lines, also scored eight nominations, winning once for outstanding contemporary or experimental performance. WA Opera’s other wins came with outstanding performer in a supporting role for Prudence Sanders (Carmen) and Rachelle Durkin (La boheme), and outstanding performance in a leading role for Paul O’Neil (also La boheme). Hot on WA Opera’s heels was Freeze Frame, with four awards across two productions. The Little Prince took best production, outstanding musical direction or conducting (Katie How), and outstanding direction, movement direction or choreography (Adam Mitchell), for a magical imagining of the Antoine de Saint-Exupery children’s fable. And Freeze Frame’s stalwart accompanist, arranger, repetiteur and musical director Tommaso Pollio was acclaimed for outstanding composition or arranging in The Princess and The Showgirl. From the regions, Broome’s Marrugeku won outstanding new work (dance) for Burrbgaja Yalirra 2, working with Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts. In collaboration with Black Swan, Marrugeku’s Jurrungu Ngan-ga (Straight Talk) was named best production, and also took outstanding choreography for Dalisa Pigram and the performers. Far to the south, Albany-based Breaksea won outstanding new work (musicals and opera) for The Magical Weedy Seadragon artistic team Matt Reuben James Ward, Pia Harris, Jonathan Brain and a host of children drawn from across the Great Southern Region. Breaksea’s Michelle Ward also won outstanding costume design in a timely double for the same Awesome Festival production. The Blue Room Theatre proved a fertile venue, with awards for: best independent production, and outstanding new work (theatre) to Yvan Karlsson, on Hell is Other People, with Monkey Brain Theatre; outstanding newcomer (theatre) to Zoe Garciano, on Democracy Repair Services, with Noemie Huttner-Koros; outstanding ensemble to All the Fraudulent Horse Girls in the Summer Nights and Lazy Yarns series; and Stephanie Somerville’s outstanding performer in a supporting role award for The Bleeding Tree, with Black Swan. WA Ballet won three awards, with Jurgen Rahimi named outstanding newcomer for Genesis 2023, and Ludovico Di Ubaldo securing both outstanding performer and outstanding duet or ensemble, alongside Juan Carlos Osama, for Van Gogh. Individual highlights included: outstanding performer to Storm Helmore, for Co3 Contemporary Dance’s Architect of the Invisible; outstanding performer in a leading role to Morgan Cowling, for A Chorus Line, with Drew Anthony Creative; and outstanding performer in a supporting role to Adam Sollis, for Fremantle Theatre Company’s The Effect, by Lucy Prebble. Artist Relief Fund’s student endowments, supported by Minderoo Foundation, went to Reese Horne (Aboriginal performance), Monique Mitchell (acting), Georgina Simpson (dance), Kimberley Macgowan (music theatre), Sanna Absaldo (performing arts), and Kristopher Long (production and design). And to honour a 40-year theatrical career, WA actor, director and playwright Jenny Davis OAM received the lifetime achievement award. More information at performingartswaawards.com.