The supporting cast of “Baskerville” was astonishingly versatile. Each played multiple characters with hilarious specificity employing estimable comic timing. And what made it all so delightful was spoofing known cultural references. There were shades of the lunatic best from popular culture touchstones—as if Conan Doyle’s prose somehow had a ménage à trois with the Carol Burnett Show and the insane, inane world of Mel Brooks. But Ms. Pekar, as the lone female, was a singular presence. She got to run the gamut from spit and snarl through a series of perfect, delicious accents to a scarlet-gowned love interest who indeed stopped one character at first sight as he dissolved mid-sentence with “my lord, you have beautiful eyes.” It was a master class in comedic character acting. kellypekar.com
Arts & Entertainment
Winner: Jeffery Walker III
Finalists: Sam Sobel, Matthew McGee
Finalists: Sam Sobel, Matthew McGee
Winner: Lara Greene
Finalists: Kelli Vonshay Henderson, Summer Bohnenkamp
Finalists: Kelli Vonshay Henderson, Summer Bohnenkamp
In the two decades since American Stage began presenting springtime shows at Demens Landing Park, musicals have been the genre of choice, mostly on the lighter side like “Mamma Mia!” and “Footloose.” This year the company took a chance with “Ragtime,” a sweeping musical panorama of early 20th century history that comments powerfully on issues of race and class, requiring the largest Park cast yet. And go figure: Thanks to strong acting and expert direction by Erica Sutherlin, it was a big hit—and refreshing proof that outdoors doesn’t always have to mean lightweight.
americanstage.org
americanstage.org
Winner: Dunedin Fine Art Center
Finalists: Florida Craft Art, Fairgrounds St. Pete
Finalists: Florida Craft Art, Fairgrounds St. Pete
The Dalí’s new 360-degree, immersive attraction is a new way for the museum to tell the story of the famed surrealist, and while the 40-minute, 39-foot-tall experience is a feast for the eyes, it’s also a special treat for the ears of tea chasers. While certainly not intentional, the dome’s design lets you hear even the faintest whispers of those standing next to you during the show. Dalí’s life, influences and secrets come to life at 360, but you might want to keep your secrets to yourself while being blown away by this show. thedali.org
Not that she ever went away. The intrepid Jen Ring was posting updates from her hospital bed last year just days after a double lung transplant, an operation that ushered in a new chapter for a young journalist whose constant companion had been her trusty oxygen tank. Not long after her 77-day hospital stay she was out and about again, covering the arts for Creative Loafing Tampa Bay with stories like her recent survey of Tampa Bay murals. You can also find her wry, perceptive voice in Creative Pinellas’ Arts Coast Magazine and in her own JenRingWrites blog.
linktr.ee/jenringwrites
linktr.ee/jenringwrites
Not so long ago the Times had writers with individual beats in theater, museums and galleries, and classical music. Now one reporter, Maggie Duffy, covers all that, plus she writes about restaurants. We could sigh for the good ol’ days (where there were writers on the movie and media beats as well), but we can also thank Maggie, who deservedly won the St. Pete Arts Alliance’s MUSE award earlier this year for doing such a good job covering the region’s arts scene. tampabay.com
How does he do it? Senior writer and editor at the must-read online newsletter St. Pete Catalyst, veteran journalist Bill DeYoung has carved out a niche as the most prolific and reliable source of arts news in Tampa Bay. He writes about what’s happening and who’s who on a near-daily basis, interviewing, forecasting, reporting, podcasting—and has proven to be invaluable to an arts scene that needs and deserves the attention he provides. stpetecatalyst.com
Winner: Trashy Treasures at Dunedin Fine Art Center
Finalists: Gasparilla Festival of the Arts Preview Party, Wearable Art at Dunedin Fine Art Center
Finalists: Gasparilla Festival of the Arts Preview Party, Wearable Art at Dunedin Fine Art Center
Arts coverage across the Bay area, even at Creative Loafing Tampa Bay, has taken a hit, but one person who’s still joyfully driving A&E news is JoEllen Schilke, host of “Art In Your Ear,” which airs every Friday on community radio station WMNF Tampa 88.5-FM. Week in and week out, Schilke brings in movers and shakers from every corner of the local arts scene and invites them to talk about not just what they’ve been up to, but what’s troubling them, too. And when other Bay area newsrooms can’t step up (like during this recent calamity in Hillsborough County where some commissioners can’t seem to understand the function of arts funding), Schilke invites members of the WMNF news team to break down what’s happening. If CL could turn the show into a print page, our paper would be better for it. @AiYEWMNF on Facebook
Winner: ‘Perfectly Queer’ by Jillian Abby
Finalists: ‘Ybor City: Crucible of the Latina South’ by Sarah McNamara, ‘Florida Hustle’ by Paul Wilborn
Finalists: ‘Ybor City: Crucible of the Latina South’ by Sarah McNamara, ‘Florida Hustle’ by Paul Wilborn
Winner: Ybor City Sirens
Finalists: Femmes and follies at the saint, Sheba Queen of the Night
Finalists: Femmes and follies at the saint, Sheba Queen of the Night
Most performers are drawn to the stage as kids when a teacher or relative sees some talent and they realize that it’s fun to be the center of attention and get applause. As they grow older and understand the discipline required to excel and the ridiculous odds to make a living, sane folks quit. Those still compelled to continue often take a long time to realize that great performances should amaze by seeming effortless. Think Fred Astaire, who rehearsed till he dropped to make it appear simple. Actors want to emote and it’s all too easy to “chew the scenery.” Annie in “Misery” (remember Kathy Bates) is such a trap. But Summer Bohnencamp doesn’t take the bait; she never allows her character’s psychopathic emotions to outstrip her technique. She’s perfectly calibrated for the intimate Shimberg Playhouse and chills your soul. jobsitetheater.org
Winner: Mike Alstott Celebrity Outdoor Weekend
Finalists: Mutts and Motors Adoptable Pet Fashion Show, Mike Evans Family Foundation Gala
Finalists: Mutts and Motors Adoptable Pet Fashion Show, Mike Evans Family Foundation Gala
Winner: Kimberli Cummings
Finalists: Charlie Parker, Allie Case
Finalists: Charlie Parker, Allie Case
In the hands of freeFall’s breathtaking five-member ensemble portraying 40-plus characters, the collision of cerebral murder mystery and delicious farce made “Baskerville” a must see. The excitement here drew the audience in with scenic fragments, lightning fast costume changes, a staggering array of spot-on accents, and—wink, wink—actors running offstage and re-emerging seconds later with a different hat, posture, prop, mustache, hunchback or ridiculous fake beard held on with visible elastic. Half the uproarious fun was that the audience was in on the joke. With so many choices and few stylistic restraints, they rose to the occasion with riveting results. All told, it was a complete triumph from concept to execution on par with freeFall’s best. Simply elementary, dear reader. Elementary. freefalltheatre.com
Winner: Lyla Ruth
Finalists: Mackenzie Scheu, Jordan Williams
Finalists: Mackenzie Scheu, Jordan Williams
This gallery is usually limited to Florida artists, but curators Elizabeth Brincklow and Mary Childs put out a national call and invited artists from New York, California and Massachusetts to join Florida craft makers in wood, fiber, ceramics, metal and glass. The question: can a special alchemy be created through integrating the arc of reaction between the maker, the medium and the audience? With artists of international stature, carefully curated, the show eschewed clichés and created a visual conversation across the gallery space. It confirmed that the best art demands that we stretch. brincklow-arts.com, marychildsgallery.com
What’s better for an actor than a juicy role? How about three—two of which are clones of the first? Actor Anthony Gervais met this challenge beautifully in Off-Central Players’ production of Caryl Churchill’s chilling drama “A Number,” making such specific choices in physicality and attitude that we always knew which clone was which—especially the scarily amoral “original” who was abandoned by his father (subtly portrayed by Ward Smith). theoffcentral.com
You used to be able to see Rivera all the time. But now that he's become a regular on the popular Bored Teachers national tour, you can only see the Osceola Middle School teacher at an occasional local show (or if you're in his class). His fast-paced comedy isn't for children, but it is for adults who appreciate smart writing and delivery that comes from someone with decades of stand-up experience.
thestandupteacher.com
thestandupteacher.com
The pandemic wasn't really good for anybody, but you could argue that Side Splitters actually came out of it better than before. It has multiple locations, hosts comedy competitions (and benefit shows for locals when necessary), and consistently has a variety of strong lineups coming to town. We're lucky that most of our local comedy clubs are back up and running, but few are thriving like this one.
sidesplitterscomedy.com
sidesplitterscomedy.com
The formula isn't fancy— put a sign-up list on social media, show everyone the lineup Wednesday afternoon, and hold the mic that night. Comedians show up, the audience shows up, the comedy is hit and miss, and then they do it again the next week. Sounds easy, right? Unfortunately, most venues can't seem to duplicate the formula, making DeBine (stylized "deBine") a rarity in the world of open mics: consistent, reliable and with an audience every week. That's why DeBine (and mic runner Matt Fernandez) have brought home awards over the past few years.
debinebrewingco.com
debinebrewingco.com
Winner: Eight O'Clock Theatre
Finalists: St. Petersburg City Theatre, Center Stage
Finalists: St. Petersburg City Theatre, Center Stage
Winner: Mala (Fire Faerialist)
Finalists: Kelly Stalnaker, Adrianna Finocchi
Finalists: Kelly Stalnaker, Adrianna Finocchi
Boiled Horse Production’s “Stroke of Genius” was part of Tampa Fringe and returned in July for a month-long run in the newly established year-round Fringe Theatre. The play stars Shane Mayforth as Dr. Winkworth-Perez, professor of Pantomime Masturbation at Scottsdale Community College. Winkworth-Perez gave Tampa Bay an hour-long academic-style lecture on the art of pantomime masturbation, complete with dick-shaped infographics and hilariously fake historical footage of people pretending to jack it. It was the longest, most elaborate dick joke Tampa Bay has ever seen, and if that’s not worthy of an award, we don’t know what is.
boiledhorse.com
boiledhorse.com
Creative Pinellas and Visit St. Pete Clearwater teamed up to bring Tampa Bay its first Art’n Month—a month to celebrate the arts in Pinellas County—last November. It’s the same month that Creative Pinellas hosts its Arts Annual exhibition. The yearly event shares the same purpose as Art’n Month—celebrating the arts, in all of its forms, in Pinellas County. We do our best to celebrate the arts year-round at Creative Loafing Tampa Bay, but we love the idea of hitting it extra hard in November.
creativepinellas.org
creativepinellas.org
Winner: Dezee Rae Combs /Gemini Girlz
Finalists: Helena Beetle, Artemis & Aphrodite/Kelli-Lynn
Finalists: Helena Beetle, Artemis & Aphrodite/Kelli-Lynn
Winner: Wearable Art
Finalists: Cocktails and Couture, Ink Lace fashion event
Finalists: Cocktails and Couture, Ink Lace fashion event
Winner: Gasparilla International Film Festival (GIFF)
Finalists: Tampa International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival,
Tampa Bay Screams
Finalists: Tampa International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival,
Tampa Bay Screams
Winner: Victoria Jorgensen
Finalists: Lynn Marvin Dingfelder, Tyler Riggs
Finalists: Lynn Marvin Dingfelder, Tyler Riggs
In books like “For the Love of Cities,” Peter Kageyama has expressed a sunny optimism about the potential of urban life, particularly in his own St. Petersburg. Turns out that he can go to the dark side, too—or rather, the noir side. His first novel, “Hunters Point,” is a corker of a thriller, set in an evocatively rendered 1950s San Francisco where his hero, a private eye who, like Kageyama, is a third-generation Japanese American, gets tangled up with mobsters, military cover-ups, and even Jimmy Stewart (he’s in town to film “Vertigo”). Netflix, take note!
peterkageyama.com
peterkageyama.com
Raconteur, piano man, movie-star spouse, executive director of The Palladium—Paul Wilborn is all of those things and more, yet he’s found the time to write two fantastic Florida books. His first, “Cigar City,” a collection of short stories based on his experiences as a journalist in 1980s Ybor, won the Gold Medal in Fiction at the Florida Book Awards, and now he’s gone and topped himself with “Florida Hustle,” a hilarious picaresque starring a horror film-obsessed teenager, a B-movie scream queen, and a crusty, crafty con man named Cavanaugh Reilly who deserves a sequel. Full disclosure: I copy edited this novel, and it took me twice as long as it should have because I was laughing so much. wilbornwrites.com
Can we normalize celebrating Friday the 13th instead of being afraid of it? That’s what the Witches of Dunedin did when they descended upon Moon Tower in their golf carts during this year’s Dunedin International Film Festival. After the performance, DIFF screened a series of horror film shorts for a delightfully horrific celebration of an unlucky day. linktr.ee/witchesofdunedin
Winner: Cory Van Valin Magician
Finalists: Antwan Towner, Dewayne Hill
Finalists: Antwan Towner, Dewayne Hill
Winner: Good Day Tampa Bay
Finalists: Good Morning Tampa Bay, Tampa Bay Morning Blend
Finalists: Good Morning Tampa Bay, Tampa Bay Morning Blend
Yes, the Times has reduced the number of staff writers covering the arts, but they had better never lose their invaluable books critic, Colette Bancroft (who’s also the copy desk chief). Not only does she do a terrific job of reviewing important new titles, she’s the mastermind behind the Times Festival of Reading, which has brought Tampa Bay readers together for indelible encounters with their favorite writers for more than 30 years. It returns to downtown St. Pete this year on Nov. 11.
@colettemb on the app formerly known as Twitter.
@colettemb on the app formerly known as Twitter.
We’ve toured Ybor City with Tampa Fringe every May since 2017. It’s been fun seeing theater pop up in unexpected places throughout the district. So fun, that sometimes it’s hard to wait until May—but now we don’t have to. Tampa Fringe established a year-round home in Ybor’s historic Kress building. The new Fringe Theatre hosts Shameless Stories every second Wednesday, Tuesday night open mics, Walt Belcher’s monthly “BoomerTown” on fourth Sundays, Clark Brooks’ “Tampa Newsforce Live” on fourth Wednesdays, Fringeoke on Thursday nights, and Fringe Fridays. Fringe on!
tampafringe.org
tampafringe.org
Winner: Chad Mize’s Space ‘Say Gay’
Finalists: Fairgrounds St. Pete’s Shrimpfinity, SKIN Art Show
Finalists: Fairgrounds St. Pete’s Shrimpfinity, SKIN Art Show
Winner: Tampa Improv
Finalists: Fre$h P,Spitfire Comedy Club
Finalists: Fre$h P,Spitfire Comedy Club
Women, they run the world and make sure it doesn’t go off the rails. For her new book, Tampa native and historian Sarah McNamara compiled about a decade's worth of research into a deep dive into the story of Tampeñas who not only fought fascism, but some who served as local organizers for the American Federation of Labors (Luisa Moreno). Luisa Capetillo, a Puerto Rican anarcho-syndicalist, feminist, and labor organizer who is the only known lectora to live and work in Ybor City, is visited, and present day labor organizers have used the book— “Ybor City: Crucible of the Latina South’’—as inspiration. @Dr_SarahMac on the social media network formerly known as Twitter.
Winner: Tampa Review
Finalists: Neptune Poetry Magazine - St. Petersburg, Arts Coast Magazine
Finalists: Neptune Poetry Magazine - St. Petersburg, Arts Coast Magazine
Winner: ‘Black Pioneers’ - The James Museum
Finalists: ‘Where Ideas Come From: Dalí's Drawings’, ‘The Mummy’ - St Pete History Museum
Finalists: ‘Where Ideas Come From: Dalí's Drawings’, ‘The Mummy’ - St Pete History Museum
Ice hockey (or cricket) fans know that a hat-trick is something special. I’ve never met an American who could explain cricket, so let’s imagine the Lightning’s Steven Stamkos scoring three goals in a single game. It’s an elite accomplishment. Followers of musical theater across Tampa Bay witnessed a hat-trick this season from the honey-voiced Julia Rifino. From her seductive puppet skills as “Avenue Q”’s lovesick Kate Monster & antagonist Lucy the Slut to continually striking the right tone navigating the topsy-turvy world as Jobsite’s “Alice,” to the hilarious perpetually hysterically pregnant, Pickles in Stageworks’ “Great American Trailer Park Musical,” she triumphed.
@juliarifino on Instagram.
@juliarifino on Instagram.
Heather Krueger is a chameleon, both onstage and off. Her impressive vocal ability and stage presence make her a force to be reckoned with. But when the pandemic derailed her acting options, she added stage manager to her other roles as doting mother and charismatic performer/choreographer. Luckily for us, her bawdy persona was on full display as Linoleum (aka Lin) in Stageworks’ musical tribute to Florida trailer parks. She particularly ingratiated herself to packed houses when describing her neighbor’s affair as a “rendezvous.” Then, breaking the fourth wall with a naughty grin to make eye contact with an unsuspecting patron down front, she squeals with delight, “that’s French for fucking”—which brought a snorting roar from the crowd.
stageworkstheatre.org
stageworkstheatre.org
Winner: The Dalí (Salvador Dalí Museum)
Finalists: The James Museum of Western & Wildlife Art, Museum of Fine Arts St. Petersburg
Finalists: The James Museum of Western & Wildlife Art, Museum of Fine Arts St. Petersburg
When a community has outgrown spaces that are decades old and wants to centralize all city employees, it’s nice that the design enhances the available site, but that it also captures the small town ethos on the Gulf coast. Dunedin’s new city hall wave design fits the topography, the community and the crowning glory, of course, is stunning public art. Heath Satow’s ‘The See’ sleek contemporary interpretation of a water droplet, rises gloriously from the ground, reflecting all citizens who come and go, and reminding us that "individually we are one drop, together we are an ocean." (R.Satoro). Inside, Mr. Still’s enormous 65-foot reproduction of his original painting captures sunset across St. Joseph Sound and reinforces “with the incoming tide, all boats will rise.” Dunedin walks the walk. dunedinfl.net
Lisa Marie’s DC Love mural is now a must-visit tourist stop in our nation’s capital. Just ask Lady Gaga. Thalhammer and her team hope to paint rainbow murals in all 50 U.S. states throughout 2023 and 2024 to “honor the beautiful diversity of our world and connect us through the power of public art.” Our region is lucky that this striking symbol now graces the entire height and length of Body Electric’s north wall. It’s sure to become a St. Pete touchstone. lisamariestudio.com
This year, a group of Tampa Bay’s most talented professional photographers and lens-based artists formed the St. Petersburg Month of Photography, a nonprofit dedicated to elevating photography in the Tampa Bay area. SPMOP brought St. Pete its first dedicated month of photography last May, with workshops, portfolio reviews, and photography exhibitions. They crowned St. Pete’s first photo laureate, set up a website devoted to photography in the Tampa Bay area, and created a calendar for folks to find photo-forward local events year-round. It was enough to inspire anyone and everyone to get out there and start taking better photos. spmop.org
Winner: Side Splitters Comedy Club
Finalists: Tampa Improv, Smoken Words
Finalists: Tampa Improv, Smoken Words
“In McClintock's Corn” is the true story of little-known Nobel-prize-winning geneticist Dr. Barbara McClintock spanning five decades beginning in the 1920s. Set entirely in a cornfield, Playwright Carolyn Gage’s play is about gender-non-conforming, neurodivergent geneticist McClintock and her companion/partner Harriet Creighton. It tells the story of McClintock’s revolutionary quest to understand diversity in nature and to reframe “deviance from the norm” as an expression of natural variance. Actors Smith (Barbara) and Belew (Harriet) simply shine with palpable chemistry.
powerstories.com
powerstories.com
Winner: Smoken Words
Finalists: Dunedin Brewery, Ruby's Elixir
Finalists: Dunedin Brewery, Ruby's Elixir
Winner: Smoken Words
Finalists: GrowHouse First Mondays, Jazzy Cat Cafe and Lounge
Finalists: GrowHouse First Mondays, Jazzy Cat Cafe and Lounge
Despite the governor and legislature misunderstanding what it means to be transgender and doing all they can to foment fear through misinformation, actor Newt Rametta is proudly establishing a fruitful career while non-binary. “I remember looking at [a trans actor on Netflix] and going wow, it is possible to get these kinds of jobs and just be who you are, as a human being,” Rametta told Creative Loafing Tampa Bay. This season (he/him, she/her) played both men and women as complex humans with equal grace, even successfully splitting the difference in “In McClintock’s Corn” as both Margaret and Carl.
Winner: St. Petersburg Opera Company
Finalists: Tampa Bay Opera, Opera Tampa
Finalists: Tampa Bay Opera, Opera Tampa
Opera invites overreach; directors can be tempted to freshen up old war horses with concepts that bury the original’s intrinsic value. But sometimes the match of opera and director makes magic, and that’s what happened at St. Pete Opera with Ben Robinson’s inspired choice to set Rossini’s “L’Italiana in Algeri” aboard a cruise ship. The setting fit the wacky libretto perfectly, allowing for such cruisy touches as an onboard buffet (complete with pie fight) and amorous stateroom encounters. A gifted cast under Mark Sforzini’s musical direction made the whole thing cruise along like a song.
stpeteopera.org
stpeteopera.org
Winner: Tampa Bay Lightning
Finalists: Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Tampa Bay Rays
Finalists: Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Tampa Bay Rays
“Those who can—do. Those who can’t—criticize,” goes the old saying. But Stageworks’ production of “When the Righteous Triumph”—a riveting account of the unrest that swirled around African-American sit-ins at segregated Tampa lunch counters in the 1960s—showed that longtime Creative Loafing theater critic Mark E. Leib is as incisive a playwright as he was a critic. It’s been a good year for Leib: he also just published his first novel, “Image Breakers,” to considerable acclaim. markeleib.me
Winner: The Mosh Jelton Show
Finalists: Tampa Bay Nightlife TV, The Lazy Ass Podcast
Finalists: Tampa Bay Nightlife TV, The Lazy Ass Podcast
When the beautiful New Tampa Performing Arts Center opened this year in Hunters Village, the county picked exactly the right guy to be its general manager: Keith Arsenault, whose broad experience (including close to 17 years managing the theater at HCC and a much-awarded career as a lighting designer) should be an ideal match for the the new facility, which includes a 354-seat theater and dance/rehearsal studio space. A weekend festival earlier this month showcased NTPAC’s programming potential for music, theater, dance and more. sprout.link/newtampapac
Winner: Straz Center for the Performing Arts
Finalists: Ruth Eckerd Hall, The Mahaffey
Finalists: Ruth Eckerd Hall, The Mahaffey
Winner: Bob Devin Jones
Finalists: Natalie Symons, Deborah Bostock-Kelley
Finalists: Natalie Symons, Deborah Bostock-Kelley
Winner: Morean Center for Clay
Finalists: The Hive St Pete, Sugar Cream Clay
Finalists: The Hive St Pete, Sugar Cream Clay
Winner: Straz Center for the Performing Arts
Finalists: American Stage, Jobsite Theater
Finalists: American Stage, Jobsite Theater
Winner: Pin Chasers
Finalists: Dunedin Lanes, Splitsville
Finalists: Dunedin Lanes, Splitsville
Winner: William Powell
Finalists: Christine Drewitt Photography, Andrea Wood Photography
Finalists: Christine Drewitt Photography, Andrea Wood Photography
Winner: Peabody's Restaurant, Bar & Billiards
Finalists: Strokers Bar & Billiards, Stix Billiards
Finalists: Strokers Bar & Billiards, Stix Billiards
Winner: St. Pete murals
Finalists: Flamingo at Tampa International Airport, 1937 Antifascist Women's March Mural by Michelle Sawyer and Sarah McNamara
Finalists: Flamingo at Tampa International Airport, 1937 Antifascist Women's March Mural by Michelle Sawyer and Sarah McNamara
Winner: The Mosh Jelton Show
Finalists: Drew Garabo Live, The Mike Calta Show
Finalists: Drew Garabo Live, The Mike Calta Show
Winner: 102.5 The Bone
Finalists: WMNF 88.5,98 Rock
Finalists: WMNF 88.5,98 Rock
The lust for facism is a real thing in Florida, but Michelle Sawyer’s Ybor City mural commemorating the district’s 1937 antifascist women’s march is a reminder that regular folks like yourself have stood up to fascists for the better part of the last century. Her work, produced in conjunction with author Sarah McNamara, features three women—Dolores Ibárruri who rallied against Franco, Guatemalan labor organizer Luisa Moreno, and McNamara’s great aunt, Margot Falcón Blanco who was born in Ybor City—and inspires us to fight modern day fascists every day.
michellesawyer.com
michellesawyer.com
When health issues forced Stephanie Gularte to step away from leading the region’s oldest professional theater, which also sports the largest budget, there were big shoes to fill. Unfortunately, after an exhaustive search, the chosen candidate ended up not being a good fit and the theater board had to find another leader. Enter playwright/director Helen R. Murray who seems to have brought a steady hand to St. Pete. The recent bi-lingual production of “La Gringa” was a triumph of distinctive design and evocative acting. The 2023-24 season promises powerful stories, boldly told including several regional/state premieres and a world premiere next summer about the rewards of kindness. americanstage.org
Florida politics have been hard on Tampa Bay’s LGBTQIA+ community this year, and Tampa Bay artists were just waiting for the perfect opportunity to art on it. That opportunity came with “Hot Box” at Chad Mize’s Space venue in June. The centerpiece of the exhibition: a three-sided selfie wall by Mize, Saumitra Chandratreya, and Andrea Pawlisz. Here, you could take your mug shot with a drag queen, stand in a library full of banned books, or say gay in a sea of rainbow doodles. Nearby, David rode a rainbow wave in Saumitra Chandretreya’s “Queer Revolution Is Coming.” A drag queen looked on in horror as Ron DeSantis sank his teeth into a children’s book in Chad Jacob’s “Freshly Squeezed.” And Apollo, Artemis, and Demeter are depicted as trans persons in Rhys Meatyard’s life-sized “Apollo, Artemis, Demeter.” chadmize.com
Winner: Cocktail St Pete
Finalists: CJ's On The Island, American Social
Finalists: CJ's On The Island, American Social
Between September 2018 and August 2019, actor/writer/photographer/divorcée Becca McCoy traveled to eight states in the U.S. and seven other countries with five different travel companions or sometimes by herself. The stunning result, “The Year of Extraordinary Travel,” contained short tales and hundreds of photos celebrating the relationship-deepening, horizon-expanding, joy-inducing nature of travel, and the beauty of our diverse earth and common humanity. Her text explored reflection vs. memory vs. regret as she spun great yarns. Laughter joined angst as part of this memorable journey about living life to the fullest. beccamccoy.com
Winner: NovaCane
Finalists: Gemini Fox Poetry, Stephanie Jackson, Dennis '"DRod the POET"" Rodney
Finalists: Gemini Fox Poetry, Stephanie Jackson, Dennis '"DRod the POET"" Rodney
Winner: Dewayne Hill
Finalists: Johnny B, Rick Stepinsky
Finalists: Johnny B, Rick Stepinsky
Winner: Side Splitters Comedy Club
Finalists: Improv Comedy Theater, Snappers Grill & Comedy Club
Finalists: Improv Comedy Theater, Snappers Grill & Comedy Club
Winner: 2001 Odyssey
Finalists: OZ Ladies and Gentlemen's Clubs, Mons Venus World Famous Nude Strip Club Tampa
Finalists: OZ Ladies and Gentlemen's Clubs, Mons Venus World Famous Nude Strip Club Tampa
Winner: David Jenkins
Finalists: Ryan Bintz, Tony Gilkinson
Finalists: Ryan Bintz, Tony Gilkinson
Winner: Nick Harrison at Doom Club Tattoo
Finalists: Skip Sampson at 1603 Tattoo Co., TJ Hal at Doom Club Tattoo
Finalists: Skip Sampson at 1603 Tattoo Co., TJ Hal at Doom Club Tattoo
Winner: ‘The Addams Family’ at Center Stage
Finalists: ‘Dracula’ at Jobsite Theater, ‘9 to 5 the Musical’ at Eight O'Clock Theatre
Finalists: ‘Dracula’ at Jobsite Theater, ‘9 to 5 the Musical’ at Eight O'Clock Theatre
As a student of art history, Tampa artist and academic Alicia Campos couldn’t help but notice that there are notably fewer books about women artists than male artists. “If you buy a general book on art history, still you don't see the women in it,” Campos told CL last year. More than 100 contemporary Tampa Bay-based women artists contributed to Campos's “100 Women Artists in Art History” exhibition, which premiered at Spain Restaurant in downtown Tampa in January 2023. Campos assigned one historical artist to each participating contemporary artist. The contemporary artists then created new artwork inspired by their given historical artist’s work. Some of Tampa Bay’s most talented and prolific women artists, including Diane Radel, Rebecca Skelton, Marjorie Greene Graff, and Heather Rippert, participated in the show. Several younger, relatively unknown artists participated as well. The object of the show was to give women a voice through their art—a privilege historically denied to them. aliciacamposmasso.art
Winner: FOX 13
Finalists: Bay News 9, ABC Action News
Finalists: Bay News 9, ABC Action News
Winner: Rocky Horror Picture Show at Gigglewaters
Finalists: Hell on Heels Rocky Horror Picture Show, Movies at Screen Door: An Ybor City Microcinema
Finalists: Hell on Heels Rocky Horror Picture Show, Movies at Screen Door: An Ybor City Microcinema
Comedy is subjective, but a good work ethic isn't. And Dixon will usually take whatever spot you offer him on a show. Have a feature spot across the state? He's there. Hosting opportunity in another county? Count him in. A guest spot on a last-minute show? If he's open, he'll take it. A strong stage presence and positive attitude doesn't hurt, either. If you're seeing his name around town more, it's because clubs and other venues are taking notice. @thegordondixon on Instagram—MM
You don’t see a lot of artists using papier-mâché as a fine art medium, but it’s always interesting when they do. This is especially true when the artist builds a fort out of palm branches and painted papier-mache body parts. St. Pete-based artist Amy Wolf’s “Beginner’s Mind” premiered at SHAMc in January 2023. The tangled body parts, frequently used in Wolf’s work, symbolize humanity’s spiritual interconnectedness. Stepping inside Wolf’s fort of fragmented humanity felt like stepping into a cave full of prehistoric paintings. Wolf makes her mark. amywolfart.com
“The Wolves” chronicles six Saturday mornings in the lives of a teen girls’ soccer team somewhere in suburban America as they prepare for their games. Ultimately, there is a particular kind of love that is forged between young women at an early moment in their lives that is eternal. When No. 14 is tragically killed in a traffic accident, teammates assume they will have to forfeit. However, they rally together as No. 14’s Soccer Mom, Jaimie Giangrande-Holcom, caps the evening with a brief, but breathtaking, speech manic with grief while clearly avoiding the subject. Her simple restraint only doubles the emotional impact of unspoken pain. thinktanktya.org
Winner: Timeless Entertainment
Finalists: Trivia Nation, The Original Bandingo Music Bingo
Finalists: Trivia Nation, The Original Bandingo Music Bingo
The late USF professor, C. David Frankel, co-founded Tampa Rep to focus on American drama. For the 2022-23 season, the company chose three riveting plays—a new American sequel to a 19th century classic, a British powerhouse well-known here and across the pond and Arthur Miller’s first American tragedy. Each production wowed audiences and the judges for Theatre Tampa Bay where TRT received a slew of award nominations on Sept. 17 to cap its most successful season. tamparep.org
Winner: Catherine Bergman
Finalists: Chad Mize, Julie Haura Art + Design
Finalists: Chad Mize, Julie Haura Art + Design
Winner: Gasparilla Festival of the Arts
Finalists: SHINE mural festival, Mainsail St Pete
Finalists: SHINE mural festival, Mainsail St Pete
Winner: Chad Mize
Finalists: Abstractartcanvas- Paul Michael, Humm.ngbird (Steve Brown)
Finalists: Abstractartcanvas- Paul Michael, Humm.ngbird (Steve Brown)
What’s a city to do when they have an old-style, million-gallon water tower in need of a facelift? Well, if it already looks like a giant egg, why not honor sea turtles and gopher tortoises hatching their way into our world? Large scale muralist Tom Stovall created “Henry and Sylvia” on the Curlew Water Tower honoring legendary Caladesi Island settler Henry Scharrer on the east side with a happy, 11-color tortoise. Sylvia, the simpler but more colorful turtle on the west face, honors longtime Dunedin resident, legendary marine biologist, National Geographic explorer-in-residence, Time magazine “Hero for the Planet” and author Sylvia Earle. These giant, joyful reptiles are guaranteed to make you smile. tomstovall.me
Between the pandemic, inflation, and climate change, life’s more complicated these days. We understand if you need a moment to reflect and find a new way to move forward in this new world. Steph Hargrove (@art4theppl) and Rose Cervantes’ art journaling workshops, hosted at the Morean this year, gave Tampa Bay the supplies and skills needed to reflect productively on this moment. Sometimes, our thoughts and feelings are elusive, pushed to the back of our minds so we can survive, trapped without a way to come out. It’s incredible how, with a box of free art supplies and a little prompting, we can release our most buried thoughts and feelings. Thanks to support from the National Endowment for the Arts, Creative Pinellas, and the Pinellas County Board of County Commissioners, Hargrove and Cervantes (@tabirose) provided 100 therapeutic art boxes to Tampa Bay residents for free. Each box contained an instruction manual full of prompts along with the supplies needed to respond to those prompts through the most accessible of art mediums—collage. Thanks to these two, everyone had the opportunity and the means to collect their thoughts moving into 2023.
Run by local comedians Hugh Carey and Lauren Gray, Unholy Comedy show—now at St. Pete's Zubrick Magic Theater—has quickly become a popular comedy curiosity, selling out regularly and with a waiting list for future shows. If you're offended by the use of religious imagery for shock effect, it's not for you. But if you like professional headliners performing in a theatrical, gothic setting, check it out (if you can score a ticket). unholycomedyshow.com
We knew Ybor City's Kress Building would become Tampa’s hottest new art hang the moment we heard that Tracy Midulla (Tempus Projects) and Emiliano Settecasi were moving in. But then more artists and arts organizations set up shop at 1624 E 7th Ave. Summer came, and the art events popped up with the temperatures. Before we knew it, we were spending multiple days a week in Ybor City. Tampa News Force and Shameless Stories on Wednesdays, Art openings on Thursdays, Fringe on Fridays, and movies at Screen Door all weekend long. It never ends, and we’re here for it.