Theater News

Maksim Chmerkovskiy, Bill T. Jones, Karine Plantadit, Keith Roberts, Twyla Tharp, et al. Receive Astaire Awards Nominations

Keith Roberts and Karine Plantadit in Come Fly Away
(© Joan Marcus)
Keith Roberts and Karine Plantadit in Come Fly Away
(© Joan Marcus)

Nominations for the 2010 Fred & Adele Astaire Awards were announced tonight by Emmy Award winner Richard Thomas. The awards will be presented on Monday, June 7 in a ceremony at the the Gerald Lynch Theater at John Jay College. Lee Roy Reams will direct the event, which will also serve as a benefit for Career Transitions for Dancers.

Nominated stage choreographers include Bill T. Jones (Fela!), Twyla Tharp (Come Fly Away), Sergio Trujillo (Memphis), Marcia Milgrom Dodge (Ragtime), and Steven Hoggett (American Idiot).

Male dancer nominees include Come Fly Away‘s Charlie Neshyba-Hodges, Keith Roberts, and John Selya; Burn the Floor‘s Maksim Chmerkovskiy, and the Memphis male ensemble: Brad Bass, Kevin Covert, Bryan Fenkart, Rhett George, John Jellison, John Eric Parker, Jermaine R. Rembert, Ephraim Sykes, Cary Tedder, Daniel J Watts, Charlie Williams, James Brown III, and Tyron Jackson.

Female dancer nominees include Come Fly Away‘s Karine Plantadit, Laura Mead, and
Holley Farmer; Savannah Wise for Ragtime; and Nicole Chantal de Weever and the Fela! female ensemble: Hettie Vyrine Barnhill, Lauren de Veaux, Elasea Douglas, Rujeko Dumbutshena, Catherine Foster, Shaneeka Harrrell, Chanon Judson, Shakira Marshall, Afi McClendon, Jill Vallery, Iris Wilson, and Aimee Graham Wodobode.

In film categories, nominated choreographers include Marguerite Derricks (Fame), Rob Marshall and John DeLuca (Nine), and Lula Washington (Avatar), while director nominees include Kenny Ortega (This is It), Frederick Wiseman (La Danse, Le Ballet de l’Opera de Paris), Ruedi Gerber (Breath Made Visible), and Adam Del Deo and James D. Stern (Every Little Step).

As previously reported, director/choreographer Kenny Ortega will receive the Douglas Watt Lifetime Achievement Award.

For tickets or more information, visit www.TheFredAdeleAstaireAwards.com.