Santa Barbara Independent’s
2024 Indy Awards for Theater
After a Four-Year Hiatus,
Our Annual Celebration of the Theater Community
Is Back and Brighter than Ever!
By Leslie Dinaberg | Photos by Ingrid Bostrom
May 30, 2024
The 2024 Indy Award winners celebrate on the stage at SOhO. | Credit: Ingrid Bostrom
Casting away any last doubts that the beloved smell of the greasepaint and the roar of the crowd is BACK BIG-TIME after the struggles of the pandemic, Santa Barbara’s theater community came out in wonderfully ebullient force for the 2024 Indy Awards.
Monday (the traditionally dark night for theaters), May 20, at SOhO Restaurant & Music Club, was the first time the awards have been presented since 2019, and the animated crowd was excited to come together to cheer on their fellow artists and aficionados once again in a tradition that began way back in 1991 when, as Santa Barbara Independent Editor in Chief Marianne Partridge explained, our wonderful Arts Editor Michael Smith wanted to come up with a way to really support the theater community of Santa Barbara.
“We decided we would have a ceremony where we tried to acknowledge some of the outstanding performances that have been in the theater community. In those 33 years, it grew and grew, and became even more fantastic than we ever could have really dreamed,” said Partridge. The Indy Award tradition continued on for several years under the direction of Arts Editor DJ Palladino (who received a 2024 Indy Award alongside Jim Buckley for their annual Bloomsday Celebration of the work of James Joyce), then for more than a decade under the direction of Charles Donelan (who received a shoutout from Indy Award Solo Show winner Annie Torsiglieri, for his ongoing support of the arts).
Taking over the event this year — which honored work between April 2023 and April 2024 — was yours truly (Leslie Dinaberg, Arts, Culture & Community Editor) with a crackerjack planning and judging team that included Indy staffers Richelle Boyd, Callie Fausey, Terry Ortega, Xavier Pereyra, Maggie Yates, and Josef Woodard.
Indy Award–winning actor and director Brian McDonald served as an affable emcee for the evening, accompanied by cellist and longtime Santa Barbara educator Gerrie Fausett and a life-sized Bruce the Shark (embodied by Santa Barbara High School actor Chase Houston), from the current Broadway show The Shark Is Broken, to make sure that award winners didn’t go over their allotted time for acceptance speeches. Encapsulating the spirit of fun that prevailed over the evening, the first person to get “sharked” off the stage for talking too long was actually the first presenter — Independent Executive Editor Nick Welsh!
From high school musical singers to set designers, directors, actors, producers, and more, this was a joyous way to celebrate the work that goes into everything we see throughout the year on area stages.
New to the Indy Awards this year was a behind-the-scenes recognition for the flexible art space of SBCAW (Santa Barbara Community Arts Workshop), where award winners from Westmont College to Opera Santa Barbara and several dozen others rehearse and create theatrical works of art for all of us to enjoy. We also honored four well-deserving ushers of the year — Tere Jurado, Kris Rehler, Leanne Saar, and Al Souma — to represent the unsung volunteer work that all of Santa Barbara’s ushers do as one of the first and most important parts of a theatergoer’s experience.
Along with performances from students of Santa Barbara, Dos Pueblos, and San Marcos high schools, almost two dozen people gave entertaining, gracious, charming, and heartfelt acceptance speeches full of gratitude to be able to create work they love and have it be recognized and appreciated by our community. And on that joyful note — drumroll please — here is a roll call of this year’s Indy Award winners.
Award Winners
Mary Bailey
High School Performance Award for Dos Pueblos High School’s production of Anything Goes
Simon Blondell (center) and Helios Band
Music Award for Westmont College’s production of The Capulet Black & White Ball
Cassidy Broderick
Performance Award for Out of the Box Theatre Company’s production of Alice by Heart
Jim Buckley and DJ Palladino
Grassroots Award for Bloomsday Celebrations at the James Joyce
Milo Bustany
High School Performance Award for San Marcos High School productions of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and Singin’ in the Rain
Casey Caldwell (left) Santa Barbara Community Arts Workshop (SBCAW)
Behind the Scenes Award for supporting local performing arts organizations
Ben Crop and Pat Frank
Set Design Award for The Theatre Group at SBCC’s production of Treasure Island
Scott DeVine
Bringing High-Level Theater to Town Award for
Ensemble Theatre Company’s production of The Lehman Trilogy
Samantha Eve representing Out of the Box Theatre Company,
Cast Award for Out of the Box Theatre Company’s production of Jesus Christ Superstar
Isabella Fabio
High School Performance Award for Santa Barbara High School’s production of
A Chorus Line
Julie Fishell
Performance Award for UCSB Launch Pad’s production of Everybody’s Favorite Mothers
Tere Jurado
Marjorie Luke Theatre
Usher of the Year
Sascha Nikolai
Performance Award for The Theatre Group at SBCC’s production of
John Proctor Is the Villain
Kostis Protopapas (second from right)
Opera Award for Opera Santa Barbara’s production of Zorro
Kris Rehler
Ensemble Theatre Usher of the Year
PCPA Artistic Director Mark Booher accepting for Josafath Reynoso.
Josafath Reynoso
Feast for the Eyes Award for the
PCPA Solvang Festival Theatre production of American Mariachi
Leanne Saar
Granada Theatre Usher of the Year
Al Souma
Lobero Theatre Usher of the Year
Mitchell Thomas
Director Award for Westmont College’s production of Godspell
Annie Torsiglieri
Solo Show Award for the Rubicon Theatre’s production of A-Train
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