2004 TDF/IRENE SHARAFF AWARDS FOR THEATRICAL COSTUME DESIGN ANNOUNCED

ANTHONY POWELL - Lifetime Achievement Award
MIRENA RADA - Young Master Award
NINO NOVELLINO- Artisan Award
LEMUEL AYERS - Posthumous Award

TONY WALTON TO BE FIRST RECIPIENT OF THE NEWLY CREATED ROBERT L. B. TOBIN AWARD FOR LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT IN THEATRICAL DESIGN

AWARDS PRESENTED ON FRIDAY, MARCH 26

Throughout her long and distinguished career, elegance and an attention to detail were the trademarks of costume designer IRENE SHARAFF. Ms. Sharaff was revered as a designer of enormous depth and intelligence, equally secure with both contemporary and period costumes. Her work exemplified the best of costume design. Such excellence is demonstrated by the winners of the 2004 TDF/Irene Sharaff Awards , who were selected by The TDF Costume Collection's Advisory Committee. The TDF/Irene Sharaff Awards are presented through Theatre Development Fund's Costume Collection.

Legendary costume designer ANTHONY POWELL will be presented with the TDF/Irene Sharaff Lifetime Achievement Award at a reception at the Hudson Theatre on Friday, March 26. Additionally, Avenue Q's MIRENA RADA will receive the TDF/Irene Sharaff Young Master Award, famed sculptor NINO NOVELLINO will receive the TDF/Irene Sharaff Artisan Award and legendary designer and producer LEMUEL AYERS will be named the winner of the TDF/Irene Sharaff Posthumous Award.

This year, TDF is proud to announce the formation of a new award, The Robert L. B. Tobin Award for Lifetime Achievement in Theatrical Design. Named for philanthropist Robert L.B. Tobin, the recipient of the new award will be an artist whose mastery of his or her craft as exemplified through his or her body of work, in one or more disciplines of theatrical design (costume, settings, lighting, sound), has become an inspiration to all designers. The first Robert L.B. Tobin Award for Lifetime Achievement in Theatrical Design will be presented to acclaimed set and costume designer, TONY WALTON.

TONY WALTON'S (Robert L. B. Tobin Award for Lifetime Achievement ) Broadway productions include the recent revivals of Our Town starring Paul Newman, I'm Not Rappaport starring Judd Hirsch and Ben Vereen, the Roundabout Theatre's The Man Who Came to Dinnerstarring Nathan Lane and Uncle Vanya starring Derek Jacobi.  Other recent Broadway work includes Annie Get Your Gun , Ashes to Ashes, 1776, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forumand The Cripple of Inshmaan for the Public Theatre. He was also the designer for Madison Square Garden's production of A Christmas Carol. His 19 films include work with directors Bob Fosse, Sidney Lumet, Paul Newman, Mike Nichols, Ken Russell, Volcker Schlondorf and Francois Truffaut.  His graphic work includes many book and magazine illustrations and caricatures for Playbill, Theatre Arts, Vogue, etc., and he has designed the posters for many Broadway and West End Shows.  His designs for opera have been seen at London's Theatre Royal Covent Garden, The Sadler's Wells Opera Company and throughout Europe and America.  His many ballet designs include Peter and the Wolf for American Ballet Theatre at the Metropolitan Opera House and the recent St. Louis Woman for Dance Theatre of Harlem at Lincoln Center's State Theatre. He has designed and directed The Importance of Being Earnest and Major Barbara for the Irish Repertory Theatre and directed Noel Coward's Song of Twilight for the Bay Street Theatre Festival. He has also directed Missing Footage for The Old Globe Theatre in San Diego and Oops -- The Big Apple Circus Stage Show for a 60-city US tour. Most recently, he designed Julie Andrews' triumphant Bay Street Theatre revival of The Boy Friend. Awards include the Oscar, the Emmy and three Tonys.  He was elected to the Theater Hall of Fame in 1991.

ANTHONY POWELL (TDF/Irene Sharaff Lifetime Achievement Award) has designed internationally for theatre, opera, film, industry, menswear and architectural projects, including the renovation of Paul Getty's 16th century mansion in Sutton Place. His many awards include three Tony Award nominations and a Tony win for his costume designs for Sir John Gielgud's School for Scandal; six Academy Award nominations; and Oscar wins for Travels with My Aunt, Death on the Nile and Tess. Mr. Powell is the recipient of the Royal Designer for Industry (Britain's highest design accolade) - 1999; Career Achievement Award by the Hollywood Costume Designers Guild - 2000; and was named "Honorary Doctor of Design" by Greenwich University - 2003. On Broadway he also designed costumes for The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Sunset Boulevard, Lettice and Lovage and Private Lives.  He recently designed the hit West End revival of Anything Goes , Roman Polanski's production of Hedda Gablerin Paris and Richard Strauss' Capriccio for The Paris Opera. His other film work: two of Steven Spielberg's Indiana Jones films and the creation of Glenn Close's Cruella deVil in 101 Dalmations and 102 Dalmations.

MIRENA RADA (TDF/Irene Sharaff Young Master Award) , who has recently designed the costumes for the hit Broadway musical, Avenue Q, was named to receive the TDF/Irene Sharaff Young Master Award. Her other costume designs include Big Apple Circus' Dreams of a City, Big-Top-Doo-Wop and Carnevale; Collected Stories with Uta Hagen; Pera Palas (Connecticut Critics Award, Costume Design); Ballet Tech's Lincoln Portrait ; Cris Angel's Mindfreak . Mirena currently teaches at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, where she received her MFA.

NINO NOVELLINO (TDF/Irene Sharaff Artisan Award), of Costume Armour, Inc.  will be the recipient of the TDF/Irene Sharaff Artisan Award. A brilliant sculptor whose designs have appeared in scores of Broadway shows, Nino is known as a consummate theatrical collaborator to scenic and costume designers alike. Most recently on Broadway, his scenic work can be seen in the revival of Gypsy; and for many Broadway seasons, his fantastical junkyard was the centerpiece of long-running production of Cats. Costume Armour,  Inc., his shop in Cornwall, New York, is a wonderland of bits and pieces from familiar shows. His scenic work on Les Miserables, The Sound of Music, Sunset Boulevard, Legs Diamond, The Phantom of the Opera, The Civil War and Sweeney Todd, in addition to his costume work on Pippin, Man of La Mancha, Jesus Christ Superstar and Once Upon A Mattress, are among the countless shows in his illustrious lifelong career. Nino's continuous work can also be seen in his creations for the Ringling Brothers Circus and internationally in numerous productions at La Scala Opera, The Paris Opera, The Metropolitan Opera, The NYC Ballet, The Santa Fee Opera, The Big Apple Circus, The Houston Grand Opera, The New York City Opera and Universal Studios.

LEMUEL AYERS ( TDF/Irene Sharaff Posthumous Award ), the original set and costume designer of such Broadway classics as Kismet , The Pajama Game and Kiss Me,Kate, will receive the TDF/Irene Sharaff Posthumous Award. Ayers, a native New Yorker, was chosen by Leonard Sillman to design the sets for the 1939 revivals of Journey's End and They Knew What They Wanted.  Major recognition came with his costume designs for the Maurice Evans/Judith Anderson production of Macbeth in 1941.  His designs were subsequently seen in, among others: Angel Street (1941); The Pirate(1942); Harriet (1943); Oklahoma! (1943); Out of This World (1950).  He received two Tony Award for Kiss Me, Kate, as  Costume Designer and as the producer of production. He died at age 40 in 1955. 

The awardees were selected by the TDF/Costume Collection Advisory Committee, which is comprised of leading members of the theatrical costume design community. They are:  Gregg Barnes, Suzy Benzinger, Alvin Colt, Lana Fritz, Rodney Gordon, Desmond Heeley, Constance Hoffman, Willa Kim, Gary Jones, Kitty Leech, Sally Ann Parsons, Robert Perdziola, Gregory Poplyk, Carrie Robbins, Ann Roth, Woody Shelp, Eduardo Sicangco, Scott Traugott and Patrick Wiley.

The TDF/Irene Sharaff Lifetime Achievement Award, first presented to the legendary Ms. Sharaff in 1993, is bestowed upon a costume designer who over the course of his or her career has achieved great distinction and demonstrated a mastery of the art.  The award is presented to a designer whose work embodies those qualities of excellence represented in the life work of Irene Sharaff: a keen sense of color, a feeling for material and texture, an eye for shape and form, and a sure command of the craft.  Such a designer's achievement may stem from work for the theatre, opera, dance or film, or, as was true of Irene Sharaff, from all of them together.

Previous winners of the TDF/Irene Sharaff Lifetime Achievement Award are Desmond Heeley (1994), Miles White (1996), Alvin Colt (1996), Patricia Zipprodt (1997), Jane Greenwood(1998), Willa Kim (1999), Ann Roth (2000), Freddy Wittop (2001), Theoni V. Aldredge(2002) and Jose Varona (2003).

The TDF/Irene Sharaff Young Master Award is presented to a designer whose work, beyond being promising, has come to fruition. The award, honoring a designer of distinction early in his or her career, is given in recognition of Irene Sharaff's wish to see young designers encouraged on their way to fully acknowledged success and excellence in the field.

TDF Irene Sharaff Young Master Awards have been bestowed upon Gregg Barnes (1994), Toni-Leslie James (1996), Paul Tazewell (1997), Martin Pakledinaz (1998), Suzy Benzinger(1999), Robert Perdziola (2000), Constance Hoffman (2001),  Gregory Gale and Jonathan Bixby (2002) and Anita Yavich (2003).

The TDF/Irene Sharaff Artisan Award, which was created in 1999, recognizes an individual or company that has made an outstanding supportive contribution in the field of costume technology. Among those who this award honors are: assistant and associate costume designers, costume shops that take sketches and turn them into glorious and breathtaking realities, teachers who dedicate their lives to turning raw talent into professional accomplished designers, and authors who create the texts and trade publications without which designers could not function.

The TDF/Irene Sharaff Posthumous Award, also created in 1999, recognizes, celebrates and remembers those artists who have pioneered the art of costume design, setting the standard for years to come. TDF believes that in reliving and reviewing the body of work of these artists, a new generation of designers is able to learn and grow, standing on the shoulders of the giants that went before them.

TDF Irene Sharaff Artisan Awards have been previously awarded to Ray Diffen (1999), Woody Shelp(2000), Barbara Matera (2001), Paul Huntley (2002) and Maria Brizzi/Grace Costumes(2003); and The Posthumous Award to Raoul Pene DuBois (1999), Lucinda Ballard (2000), Aline Bernstein (2001), Cecil Beaton (2002) and Ruth Morley (2003). 

THE TDF COSTUME COLLECTION maintains an extensive inventory of more than 85,000 costumes and accessories for rental at discounted cost by any not-for-profit theatre company, opera company, university, high schools, church groups, etc. The Collection currently serves organizations that produce approximately 1,000 productions per year in 38 states across the country. The Collection is located in a 17,000 square foot loft at 601 West 26th Street, New York, NY 10001. It stocks all periods and accepts donations from productions, institutions and individuals. These donations are tax-exempt to the degree allowed by law.

THE TOBIN FOUNDATION FOR THEATRE ARTS was founded by the late Robert L. B. Tobin, who was heir to one of the largest family fortunes in Texas.  Robert Tobin admitted to being a frustrated theatre designer with a need to be creative.  All through his academic years and early adulthood, he collected rare theatrical volumes, etchings, engravings and drawings.  At the time of his 50th birthday in 1984, The Tobin Wing of the McNay Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas, was constructed specifically to provide a museum setting for the theatre arts.  As such, the wing houses Robert Tobin's extensive collection of over 20,000 original models, scene and costume designs as well as some 8,000 rare and illustrated books.  This unprecedented collection of preliminary sketches, final renderings, maquettes, engravings and illustrated texts, provides a visual history of theatre art from the renaissance to the present.

THE TOBIN FOUNDATION FOR THEATRE ARTS exists to stimulate public interest in the art of the theatre designer through a far-reaching program of exhibitions, lectures, expansion of the collection at the McNay and to provide broad based access to this collection.  In its continuing effort to promote the art of the designer, The Foundation also sponsors programs that offer students an opportunity to exhibit their work such as at the Prague Quadrennial.  It also funds visiting artists' programs to area colleges and universities, and assists in the publication of monographs on individual designers.

This year's TDF/Irene Sharaff Awards Ceremony is being generously underwritten by The Tobin Foundation for