Jesse Tyler Ferguson & Anna Chlumsky Will Host 2015 Lucille Lortel Awards; Terrence McNally, Jeanine Tesori & More to be Honored

The Off-Broadway League has announced details for the 2015 Lucille Lortel Awards, which will celebrate 30 years of recognizing Outstanding Achievement Off-Broadway. The 30th Annual Lucille Lortel Awards will be handed out on Sunday, May 10, 2015 at the NYU Skirball Center, beginning at 7:00 PM EST. The program will be co-hosted by Emmy Award Nominees Jesse Tyler Ferguson ("Modern Family") and Anna Chlumsky ("Veep," Broadway's upcoming "Living on Love").

Among the special honors to be presented this year: prolific playwright Terrence McNally will be honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award; writer and composer Jeanine Tesori will be inducted onto the famed Playwrights' Sidewalk in front of the Lucille Lortel Theatre; and veteran general manager Nancy Nagel Gibbs will receive the Edith Oliver Service to Off-Broadway Award.

Members of the general public are again welcome to view the 7:00 PM ceremony. Public tickets are $75.00 and will be available starting April 2, 2015, via phone at 212.998.4941, online at www.nyuskirball.org and in person at the Skirball Center's Shagan Box Office (556 LaGuardia) from Tuesday - Saturday from 12 - 6 PM, and two hours before performance.

Important Dates

March 31, 2015 2014-2015 Off-Broadway season ends

April 2, 2015 Nomination Meeting

April 2, 2015 Public tickets go on sale

April 20, 2015 Nominees cocktail reception

May 10, 2015 Award Ceremony at NYU Skirball Center

The Off-Broadway League's Lortel Awards Producing & Administration Committee (Terry Byrne, Dean Carpenter, Denise Cooper, Margaret Cotter, Carol Fishman, George Forbes, Michael Page, Catherine Russell, and Lindsey Sag) produces the Lortel Awards Ceremony. Acclaimed writer/director Michael Heitzman returns to direct the Lortel Awards for the sixth consecutive year. The Lucille Lortel Awards is produced by special arrangement with the Lucille Lortel Foundation. Additional support provided by Theatre Development Fund.

Representatives of the Off-Broadway League, Actors' Equity Association, Stage Directors & Choreographers Society, the Lucille Lortel Foundation, in addition to theatre journalists and academics and other Off-Broadway professionals, serve on the Voting Committee.

For updates and news about the ceremony, hosts, presenters and media releases, visit www.LortelAwards.org. Follow the Lortel Awards on Twitter at https://twitter.com/LortelAwards and like the awards on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/LortelAwards.com.

Jesse Tyler Ferguson currently stars as 'Mitchell Pritchett' on the Emmy Award-­?winning ABC comedy series, Modern Family. Now in its sixth season, the show has earned five Emmy Awards for Outstanding Comedy Series, a Golden Globe Award for Outstanding Comedy Series and four Screen Actors Guild Awards for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series. Ferguson has also received five Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series. In 2013, he was nominated for a People's Choice Award for Favorite Comedic TV Actor on behalf of the show. The theatre has always been Ferguson's first love, and he has worked extensively with The New York Public Theatre's Shakespeare in the Park in such notable productions as The Comedy Of Errors ("Distinguished Performance" nominee, Drama League Awards, 2014), The Merchant Of Venice, The Winter's Tale And A Midsummer Night's Dream ("Distinguished Performance" nominee, Drama League Awards, 2008). On Broadway he appeared in the 1997 revival of "On The Town" and originated the role of Leaf Coneybear in "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" (Drama Desk Award winner, Best Ensemble & "Distinguished Performance" nominee, Drama League Awards, 2005). A longstanding advocate for marriage equality, Ferguson co-founded Tie The Knot in 2012 with his husband, where they design limited edition bow ties, with all the proceeds going to various organizations that fight for civil rights for gay and lesbian Americans. Their first collection debuted in November 2012 and sold out in less than a month. They have released new collections seasonally since and featured ties designed by guest designers including Isaac Mizrahi, George Takei, Tim Gunn and Bryan Cranston.

Anna Chlumsky will next be seen on Broadway reprising her role as 'Iris Peabody' in, Living on Love at the Longacre theater starting April 1st. The play premiered at the Wiliamstown Theatre Festival in summer 2014. On television, Chlumsky will soon be seen in the fourth season of the Emmy-nominated HBO comedy series, Veep; the fourth seasonon premieres on Sunday, April 12th. Chlumsky was nominated for back to back Emmys in the category of Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for her performance as Amy Brookheimer', chief of staff to the Vice President of the United States on the acclaimed HBO series Veep. She most recently made her Broadway debut in the revival of You Can't Take It With You opposite James Earl Jones. Her New York stage credits include 3C; Love, Loss, and What I Wore (Westside Theatre); So Help Me God (Mint Theatre Company); Unconditional (LAByrinth Theater Company); The Fabulous Life of a Size Zero (DR2); Darwin in Malibu (Bay Street Theatre); The Butcherhouse Chronicles (Summer Play Festival); Balm in Gilead (Barefoot Theater Company - Member); Half Life (Flea Theater/Fringe Festival); Iphigeneia at Aulis (TimeSpace Productions); Measure for Measure (Astoria Performing Arts Center); No Alarms: Headfullofradio (Veritas Productions); The Trojan Women (Veritas Productions). Other notable TV credits include NBC's Hannibal, White Collar (recurring role), Covert Affairs, 30 Rock, Law & Order: SVU, Twelve Men of Christmas and 3 Weeks 3 Kids. In film, she will next be seen in The End of Tour starring Jason Segel and Jesse Eisenberg. Other notable film credits include Bert and Arnie's Guide to Friendship, In The Loop, The Good Guy, Blood Car, My Girl, My Girl 2, Gold Diggers, the Glamour Reel Short and Wait.

Terrence McNally was awarded the Dramatists Guild Lifetime Achievement Award in 2011. He is the winner of Tony Awards for his plays Love! Valour! Compassion! and Master Class and his books for the musicals Ragtime and Kiss of the Spiderwoman. In 2010 the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts presented Terrence McNally's Nights at the Opera, a three-play festival of his work. In 1996, he was elected to the Theater Hall of Fame. More recently, It's Only a Play opened at Broadway's Schoenfeld Theater and Mothers and Sons, his 20th Broadway production, received a 2014 Tony Nomination for Best Play. The musical The Visit, for which he wrote the book, will be opening at Broadway's Lyceum Theater in the spring of 2015. Off-Broadway, Golden Age opened at Manhattan Theatre Club's Stage One at City Center and the Pearl Theatre premiered And Away We Go at their new home on 42nd St. Other plays include Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune, Lips Together, Teeth Apart, The Lisbon Traviata, Corpus Christi, The Ritz, Some Men, A Perfect Genesh, Bad Habits, The Stendhal Syndrome, Dedication or the Stuff of Dreams, Deuce, and Unusual Acts of Devotion at the La Jolla Playhouse and Philadelphia Theatre Company. He has written the books for the musicals The Full Monty and A Man of No Importance. He also wrote the libretto for the opera Dead Man Walking which had its premiere at San Francisco Opera. His newest opera, Great Scott, will be premiering at Dallas Opera in the fall of 2015. He has written a number of TV scripts, including Andre's Mother for which he won an Emmy Award. He has received two Guggenheim Fellowships, a Rockefeller Grant, and a citation from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Jeanine Tesori composed the scores to the Broadway productions of Violet, Caroline, or Change (2004 Tony nomination for Best Original Score), Shrek the Musical (Tony and Drama Desk Award nominations for her music) and Thoroughly Modern Millie (2000). Her Off-Broadway musical Violet, (Obie Award, New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Musical, and Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Musical), opened on Broadway last season starring Sutton Foster. Her recent Off-Broadway musical, Fun Home, a finalist for the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, played a sold-out run at the Public Theater last season, and will open on Broadway in April 2015. She has written music for several plays, including Twelfth Night at Lincoln Center (Tony Nom. for best score), John Guare's A Free Man of Color, and Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage and Her Children, which was part of the 2006 Shakespeare in the Park season and starred Meryl Streep. Her film scores include Nights in Rodanthe, Every Day, and You're Not You. Her opera, A Blizzard on Marblehead Neck (libretto by Tony Kushner) premiered at Glimmerglass Festival in 2011 and her newest opera, The Lion, the Unicorn and Me, had its world premiere run at D.C.'s Washington National Opera in December 2013. She is the creative director and co-founder (with Idina Menzel) of A Broader Way Foundation, an immersive arts education program for girls from underserved communities of New York City. She is the founding artistic director of Encores! Off-Center at New York City Center and is a lecturer in music at Yale University.

Nancy Nagel Gibbs has been a Producer, General Manager and Company Manager for Broadway and Off-Broadway since 1982. She has frequently been connected to Off-Broadway. Producing credits include Peter and the Starcatcher (originally at NY Theatre Workshop); Bat Boy: The Musical (originally at the Directors' Company); Striking 12 (originally at Ars Nova); The Big Bang (Fairbanks Theatre); The Last Session (47th Street Theatre); Fully Committed (The Cherry Lane), and Smoke on the Mountain (The Lambs Theatre). As a General Manager, Nancy has worked on The Vagina Monologues (Westside Theatre); Fully Committed (Cherry Lane); Street of Dreams (Promenade Theatre); Lifegame (Jane Street Theatre); I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change (Westside Theatre); De La Guarda (Daryl Roth Theatre); Over the River and Through the Woods (John Houseman Theatre); Visiting Mr. Green (Union Square); Full Gallop (Westside); Santaland Diaries (Atlantic Theatre); Hank Williams: Lost Highway (Little Shubert Theatre); John & Jen; Smoke on the Mountain; and The Prince and the Pauper (all three at the Lambs Theatre). As company manager she worked on Tomfoolery (The Village Gate) and Little Shop of Horrors (Orpheum).

In addition, Nancy was the General Manager for two seasons at Ford's Theatre in Washington D.C. Occasionally she can be persuaded to work on Broadway where her credits, as a principal of 321 Theatrical Management with partners Nina Essman and Marcia Goldberg, include Wicked (Broadway, Chicago, California, Two National Tours); Sister Act (Broadway); Bring It On (Broadway and National Tour); Next To Normal (Broadway and National Tour)(Originally at Second Stage Theatre); The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (Broadway, Chicago, San Francisco, Boston, National Tour)(Originally at Second Stage Theatre); Man of La Mancha (2002 Revival); The Graduate (Broadway and National Tour); and The Search for Signs... (2000 Revival). 321 also advises the many international companies of Wicked (currently Australia, London and UK tour).