Three designers, one design team, one theatre consultancy and one Broadway production electrician make up this year’s crop of EDDY Award winners, an honor bestowed annually to the best in entertainment design and technology. This year’s honorees are all part of the theme of this year’s ceremony, “A Salute to New York Theatre.” Presented by Entertainment Design magazine, the awards will be held on Friday June 27.

This year’s EDDY Award winners are:

Sustained Achievement in Scenic Design: John Lee Beatty
Notable Work: Talley’s Folly, House and Garden, Proof, Morning’s At Seven, The Heiress, Chicago
Quote: “He’s the master,” says lighting designer Brian MacDevitt. “He’s a complete theatre artist who has a profound understanding of what is theatrical and how to enhance and support the playwright’s vision in the most inconspicuous way.”

Keeping The Lights Burning on Broadway: Production Electrician Mike LoBue
Notable Work: Kiss of The Spider Woman, Saturday Night Fever, Hairspray
Quote: “Mike possesses the most essential quality of the finest production electrician: leadership,” say lighting designers Jules Fisher and Peggy Eisenhauer.

The New Generation of Projection Design: Elaine McCarthy
Notable Work: War & Peace, Dead Man Walking, Judgment at Nuremberg, Into The Woods
Quote: “She will take my ideas and lift it out to a level I could never have imagined,” says director Leonard Foglia. “It’s what I pray every designer will do.”

Sustained Achievement in Sound Design: Dan Moses Schreier
Notable Work: Bring in da Noise, Bring in da Funk, The Tempest, The Diary of Anne Frank, Into The Woods, Radiant Baby
Quote: “I love working with Dan because he is a composer,” says director James Lapine. “He brings that set of skills and mindset to what he does.”

45 Years of Design Excellence: Theatre Projects Consultants
Notable Work: Royal Shakespeare Theatre at the Barbican, Kodak Theatre, Esplanade, Walt Disney Concert Hall
Quote: “The whole of consulting is teamwork, from economics through architecture to technology,” says founder Richard Pilbrow. “We try to ensure that the theatre is a place where artists and audiences have great experiences.”

Exemplifying the Art of Collaboration: Mary Zimmerman’s Design Team of Mara Blumenfeld, TJ Gerckens, and Dan Ostling
Notable Work: Metamorphoses, Galileo Galilei, The Odyssey, Arabian Nights
Quote: “We really love it because the scripts come out of the work,” says set designer Ostling. “I have only worked that way with Mary. It goes against everything I learned in grad school about ‘read the play, support the action,’ but with Mary you can’t do that.”

You can read more about these artisans in the May issue of Entertainment Design. The EDDY Awards will be held on Friday, June 27, 2003, at John Jay College Theatre, 899 10th Avenue (between 58th and 59th Streets) in New York City. This year’s ceremony will begin with a cocktail reception at 7:30pm, followed by the awards presentation beginning at 8:30pm. The 2003 EDDY Awards are presented in conjunction with the 9th annual Broadway Lighting Master Classes and the inaugural Broadway Sound Master Classes , a two-part professional training program that runs from June 25 through June 29, 2003.

Celebrating their 11th anniversary this year, the prestigious EDDY’s pay tribute to those whose work has made an impact in our industry. The editors of Entertainment Design select the winners with an eye toward true excellence in technical and design-related fields. Since 1991, over 35 individuals, eight design or production teams, one union, one creature shop, one concert construction company, one full-service scenic shop, and one theatrical production department have been so honored. In recent years, the EDDY Awards have celebrated both the spirit of collaboration, and remarkable individual achievement, as well as technical advancement with a series of product awards in professional audio and lighting categories.