Blessing, Rapp and Wilson Chosen as Winners of ACTA Awards

By: BWW News Desk Apr. 03, 2006

On April 1st, the American Theatre Critics Association announced that Lee Blessing, Adam Rapp and the late August Wilson were the winner of ACTA Awards at the renowned Humana Festival in Louisville, KY.

Blessing received the top Steinberg/American Theatre Critics Association New Play Award--as well as a grant of $25,000 for his play A Body of Water, which concerns a man and a woman who wake up one morning to find their memories have vanished. A Body of Water was most recently seen at San Diego's Old Globe Theatre.

Both Rapp and Wilson (who passed away on October 2nd, 2005) were announced as recipients of the $7,500 award. Rapp's Red Light Winter, currently playing off-Broadway's Barrow Street Theatre, is a sexually charged drama involving two men and the woman they meet in New Amsterdam. Wilson's Radio Golf, with which he completed his 10-play chronicle of the African-American experience in the 20th century, premiered at the Seattle Rep and is Broadway-bound. The play involves a pair of real estate entrepreneurs faced with a dilemma of a house's demolishment in 1990s Pittsburgh.

"Since the inception of ATCA's New Play Award in 1977, the list of honorees has included Lanford Wilson, Marsha Norman, Jane Martin, Arthur Miller, Mac Wellman, Adrienne Kennedy, Donald Margulies, Lynn Nottage, Craig Lucas and Horton Foote," state press notes.

The awards are funded by a generous annual grant of $40,000 from the Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust. Created in 1986 by Harold Steinberg on behalf of himself and his late wife, the primary mission of the Steinberg Charitable Trust is to support the American theater. The trust has provided numerous grants totaling millions of dollars to support new productions of American plays and educational programs for those who may not ordinarily get to experience live theater in this country.

"The American Theatre Critics Association, founded in 1974, works to raise critical standards and public awareness of a critic's duties and responsibilities. It is the only national association of professional theater critics and has several hundred members working for newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations across the United States. ATCA is a national section of the International Association of Theatre Critics (IATC), a UNESCO-affiliated organization that sponsors seminars and congresses worldwide."

For more information, visit www.americantheatrecritics.org.

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