TLA Awards Ceremony – 2019 Recap
Unlike the Oscars, the Theatre Library Association’s (TLA) annual night of awards has no red carpet or fancy statues — but it does have lots of appreciation for the tremendous work that happens in libraries, archives, and museums that document live and recorded performing arts in all their glorious variety. Over 100 guests gathered for our 2019 awards ceremony on October 18, 2019 in the cafe of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts (LPA).
We were fortunate to have all four winners of the TLA Book Awards in person. The winner of the George Freedley Memorial Award, which honors outstanding works in the field of live theatre or performance, was Debra Caplan for her book Yiddish Empire: The Vilna Troupe, Jewish Theater, and the Art of Itinerancy. The Special Jury Prize winner was Kevin Winkler for his book Big Deal: Bob Fosse and Dance in the American Musical. Both were New York City locals, but the winners of our Richard Wall Memorial Award, which honors outstanding works in the field of recorded performance, came from much further away. Maya Montañez Smukler, winner for her book Liberating Hollywood: Women Directors and the Feminist Reform of 1970s American Cinema, came from Los Angeles, and J. E. Smyth, Special Jury Prize winner for her book Nobody’s Girl Friday: The Women Who Ran Hollywood, traveled from London!
They each gave warm, eloquent speeches acknowledging the role of libraries and archives in their research and writing. In addition to the Book Awards honorees, there were presentations by LPA’s Charles Morrow in memory of Theatre on Film and Tape Archive (TOFT) founder Betty Corwin, who passed away in 2019, and Nena Couch, who presented TLA’s Louis Rachow Distinguished Service in Performing Arts Librarianship Award to Norton Owen of Jacob’s Pillow.
The 2019 ceremony also marked the 50th anniversary of the Freedley Award. TLA board member David Nochimson wrote a brief history of the award for the program booklet, put together a list of all 50 years of Freedley winners on the cafe tables and posted the corresponding book covers on the wall, and curated a case of related artifacts from the George Freedley papers and the TLA records. TLA Book Awards co-chairs Annemarie van Roessel and Suzanne Lipkin curated another case of materials related to the winning titles, drawing from the holdings of LPA’s Billy Rose Theatre Division. We also served a commemorative cake!
To get a glimpse of the event, a short video of Kevin Winkler’s speech is below. Please note that submissions are still being accepted through the end of February for our next round of Book Awards!