Early 2015 Bessies Winners and Nominees Announced
Storyboard P. Courtesy Akintola Hanif, still from Black Magic
Last week, the New York Dance and Performance “Bessie” Awards (known as the Bessies), announced the nominees for its prestigious 2015 Emerging Choreographer award. Troy Schumacher, Moriah Evans, Storyboard P and Yves Laris Cohen, a diverse group of young dancemakers, were each deservedly nominated for the title. Though the Bessies won’t be taking place until October 19th, the committee announced yesterday that Storyboard P, a hip hop, modern and jazz fusion artist and imaginative storyteller, has been given the award. A jury of three – Susan Marshall, Reggie Wilson and Shen Wei – chose Pavel Zuštiak to receive the Juried Bessie Award, which recognizes an innovative and exciting choreographer and provides them with touring and residency opportunities outside of New York.
(L to R): Matthew Rogers, Jaro Viňarský, and Pavel Zuštiak of Palissimo in Zuštiak’s Endangered Pieces. Photo: Yi-Chun Wu, Courtesy Dance Beat
Nominees for Outstanding Production and Outstanding Performer – the most populated Bessie categories – are listed below. As is tradition, productions and dancers with little stylistic overlap compete within the same category. How do we compare Soledad Barrio’s fierce and heartfelt flamenco stories with Michelle Dorrance’s inventive tap rhythms or Justin Peck’s playful pas de deux? Melissa Toogood’s performance with Juan Ogalla’s? Robert Fairchild with Lil Buck? Of course, it is an honor to be nominated (as they say) and The Bessies aren’t the be-all end-all on the best productions and performances of the year. Still, The Bessies never fail to both delight me as I am reminded of the incredible diversity that the New York City dance world offers, and confound me as I wonder if these categories, these divisions between winners and losers, are an appropriate way to recognize the gems of our dance community.
Find the full list of nominees here.
The 2015 Bessie Nominations
Outstanding Production:
600 HIGHWAYMEN
Employee of the Year
FIAF/Crossing the Line
Soledad Barrio and Noche Flamenca
Antigona
The Joyce Theater
Dorrance Dance with Toshi Reagon and BIGLOVELY
The Blues Project
The Joyce Theater
Neil Greenberg
This
New York Live Arts
Roger Guenveur Smith
Rodney King
BRIC
Xavier LeRoy
Retrospective
MoMA PS1 and Crossing the Line
Shwe Man Pwe
Music and Dance from Myanmar
Asia Society
David Neumann/Advanced Beginner Group
I
Understand Everything Better
Abrons Arts Center co-presented by The Chocolate Factory
Justin Peck
Rōdē,ō: Four Dance Episodes
New York City Ballet
Lincoln Center
Lemi Ponifasio/MAU
Birds with Skymirrors
Next Wave Festival, Brooklyn Academy of Music
Pam Tanowitz
Broken Story (wherein there is no ecstasy)
The Guggenheim’s Works & Process
Vuyani Dance Theatre Project
Umnikelo
Fall for Dance, New York City Center
Outstanding Performer:
Alexandra Albrecht and Andrew Champlin
in Polly Pocket: Expansion Pack by Jillian Peña
Danspace Project
Michelle Boulé
For her body of work with Miguel Gutierrez
Lawrence Cassella
Sustained Achievement − posthumous
Talya Epstein
in Star Crap Method by Larissa Velez-Jackson
The Chocolate Factory
Robert Fairchild
in An American in Paris
The Palace Theater
Ellen Fisher
For Sustained Achievement in Performance in the work of Meredith Monk
Lauren Grant
For her overall body of work with Mark Morris
Ryan Haskett, Daniel Price, and Lil Buck
Live Performance following NYC premiere of Pharaohs of Memphis
DAMN! Film Series
TheaterLab Annex
Juan Ogalla
in Antigona by Soledad Barrio and Noche Flamenca
The Joyce Theater
Amar Ramasar
New York City Ballet
Ryoji Sasamoto
in OQ by Kota Yamazaki
Japan Society
Melissa Toogood
For her body of work during the 2014−15 season in the work of Kimberly Bartosik, Merce Cunningham, Rashaun Mitchell, Stephen Petronio, Sally Silvers, Pam Tanowitz, among others.
