Edinburgh dominates CATS

Jun 14 2015 | By More

All but one Critics’ award for Edinburgh companies

The Royal Lyceum has triumphed at this year’s Critics Awards for Theatre in Scotland, with three productions winning a total of six gongs between them.

Further nods have gone to two productions which have Traverse involvement and to Catherine Wheels Theatre Company.

Grant O' Rourke (right), won best Male Performance as Zanetto/Tonino. Photo: Alan McCredie

Grant O’ Rourke (left), won best Male Performance as Zanetto/Tonino. Photo: Alan McCredie

Leading the pack for the Lyceum was The Caucasian Chalk Circle, which won an impressive four awards, including best production overall and best director for Mark Thomson, the theatre’s artistic director who announced that he is leaving the post at the end of the coming season.

Amy Manson, who played the key role of Grusha, won the award for Best Female Performance – her second such award as she won in 2008 for her performance as Stepdaughter in the Lyceum’s NTS co-production of Six Characters in Search of an Author – while the company won the ensemble award.

Grant O’Rourke, who has been a regular on the Lyceum stage over the last five years and has found international fame as Rupert MacKenzie in Outlander, took the gong for Best Male Performance, for his portrayal of the twins Zanetto and Tonino, in The Venetian Twins.

The Lyceum’s revival of Bondagers won the Best Design award for set and costume designer Jamie Vartan and Simon Wilkinson who designed the lighting.

Martin McCormick’s Squash won Best New Play. Photo: Lesley Black

Martin McCormick’s Squash won Best New Play. Photo: Lesley Black

The Traverse was heavily involved in Martin McCormick’s Squash, which won him the Best New Play award and was produced by A Play, a Pie and a Pint as part of its lunchtime theatre season. Slope, from Glasgow-based Untitled Projects which won Best Technical, was produced in partnership with online arts video resource KILTR, Citizens Theatre and the Traverse Theatre Company.

Catherine Wheels won their sixth award in the Best Show for Children and Young People category for The Voice Thief, the immersive production which played at Summerhall and is being revived there during this year’s fringe.

Kai Fisher’s Last Dream (On Earth), which he created in association with National Theatre of Scotland and Tron Theatre, Glasgow, won Best Music and Sound, for musicians Tyler Collins and Gameli Tordzro with sound designer Matt Padden.

The critics gave an extra CATS Whisker award  to Junction 25, the youth theatre based at the Glasgow Tramway, on the occasion of its tenth anniversary.

Commenting on the successes of the Lyceum, CATS co-convenor Joyce McMillan, the Scotsman theatre critic, said: “This is nevertheless a challenging time for theatre in Scotland with three of this year’s winning companies facing uncertain futures.

“As the Royal Lyceum enters its fiftieth anniversary year it has to cope with a major cut in funding. Slope, meanwhile, may be the last Untitled Productions show in Scotland for some time. Now we appear to have lost The Arches, a trailblazing company that is one of the most tangible legacies of Glasgow’s year as European Capital of Culture. We all sincerely wish that ways will be found to ensure the work commissioned and created by these wonderful companies continues to be part of Scotland’s rich theatrical landscape.”

Here are the citations: https://www.alledinburghtheatre.com/cats-citations-news-cats15/

ENDS

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