The 2025 Collaboration Awards Honors Women Helping Women

The 2025 Collaboration Awards: Women Working with Women on Saturday honored outstanding artists creating new interdisciplinary work in theater, film and dance.

The gala, produced by the Women in the Arts & Media Coalition (WAM Coalition), honored outstanding partnerships between professional women from different specializations across the arts and media industries.

The event, held in the Fred and Adele Astaire Ballroom at the Houghton Hall Arts Community in Manhattan, was presented at a time when opportunities for both women and the arts are under threat. A centralized resource for professional women in the performing arts and media industries, the WAM Coalition represents more than 100,000 women and nonbinary artists in the arts and media through its affiliates.

Each winner is a member of one or more of the WAM Coalition member organizations, which include Actors' Equity Association, Associated Musicians of New York Local 802 AFM, Dramatists Guild, League of Professional Theatre Women, New York Women in Communications, New York Women in Film & Television, SAG-AFTRA New York Local, Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, and the Writers Guild of America, East — or an individual member. Presenting Sibyl Reymundo-Santiago with the WAM Coalition's Community Collaboration Award for her work as executive director and head of programming for the Soho International Film Festival was producer and former New York Women in Film & Television (NYWIFT) executive director Terry Lawler. Reymundo-Santiago also hosted the evening.

The WAM Coalition presented its 7th Collaboration Award to playwright Lynda Crawford and choreographer Kat Files for the play with dance Dusk! 

Attending were:

• First Runners-up Pamela Weiler Grayson, who was honored with Arielle Flax for the play Observant, and Arlene Hutton, who was honored with Dana Brooke for the play Blood of the Lamb.
• Honored Finalists abs wilson, who was honored with Veronica Mansour for the musical Lighthouse, and Melissa Bell and director Laurie A. Guzda, honored for the dark comedy Zoe Comes Home. Kao Kalia Yang and composer Jocelyn Hagen, selected as honored finalists for the opera The Song Poet, sent recorded acceptance speeches.
• Finalists Abby Rooney and Bibiana Torres, honored for their work on Bedroom Pop, also attended. Other teams selected as finalists were Karen Howes and Maggie Marion for Five Degrees Above Polaris, Sharon Baker Sharon Baker and Carol Antman for The Best Party Ever and Allyson Morgan and Tara Sheffer for The Ghost.
• Student Collaboration Awardees Bella Panico and Isabella De Oliveira Makiyama Lopes of Marymount Manhattan College for The Nowhere Women, and Beatriz Coelho de Soarez and Destinee-Jolene Marcion of the School of Visual Arts BFA Film Department.

For more information about the Women in the Arts & Media Coalition at www.womenartsmediacoalition.org.