Anya Reiss’s Spur Of The Moment and Simon Stephens’s Punk Rock have both been nominated for Best New Play at the 2010 Theatrical Management Association (TMA) Theatre Awards, which honour the best of British regional theatre from around the UK.
Spur Of The Moment, written when playwright Reiss was just 17, premiered at the Royal Court earlier this year and told the story of a young girl’s dangerous crush on a lodger. Stephens’s play about pressurised, aspirational sixth form students played at the Lyric Hammersmith in September 2009 and returned there this autumn. They are nominated against Watford Palace Theatre’s Mrs Reynolds And The Ruffian.
Other nominated productions which have been seen in London over the past year include the Liverpool Everyman production of The Caretaker, which played at Trafalgar Studios and earns Jonathan Pryce a Best Performance in a Play nomination, and Britain’s Got Bhangra at Theatre Royal Stratford East, which is nominated for Best Musical Production.
Ghost Stories, which is currently playing in the West End after a transfer from the Lyric Hammersmith, receives a Best Lighting Design nomination.
Bryony Lavery’s Kursk, which originated at the Young Vic, and DC Moore’s The Empire, which played at the Royal Court in April this year, are both nominated in the category of Best Touring Production.
The sister organisation of the Society of London Theatre (SOLT), the TMA is the major trade association for organisations involved in the performing arts across the UK, including producing and repertory venues, arts centres, theatre and dance companies and individuals involved with the arts.
The winners of the Theatrical Management Association (TMA) Theatre Awards will be announced in a ceremony at the Lyric Hammersmith on Sunday 7 November, hosted by choreographer Craig Revel Horwood.
For a full list of nominations visit the TMA website.
CB