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Gary Schweikhart, president of the Carbonell Awards, South Florida’s Theater & Arts Honors, recently announced the recipient of this year’s prestigious George Abbott Award which will be presented at the 47th annual Carbonell Awards Ceremony on Monday, Nov. 11, 7:30 p.m., at the Lauderhill Performing Arts Center, 3800 NW 11 Place, Lauderhill.
Cuban American Nilo Cruz gained national prominence in 2003 when he won the Pulitzer Prize for drama for his play Anna in the Tropics, a Depression-era tale about migrant Cubans working in a Tampa cigar factory, for which he also received a Steinberg Award and Tony Award nomination. He has become known for his ability to successfully weave strains of magic realism and other literary traditions into his works.
His plays include A Park in Our House; Two Sisters and a Piano; A Bicycle Country; Hortensia and the Museum of Dreams; Lorca in a Green Dress; Hurricane; Sotto Voce; Bathing in Moonlight; Hotel Desiderium; Kisses through the Glass, and Thirst on Water Street. His work has been seen at numerous theaters around the country and around the world in Canada, England, France, Australia, Germany, Belarus, Russia, Costa Rica, Colombia, Japan, China, Greece, Russia and Spain.
As a lyricist, he is a frequent collaborator with composer Gabriela Lena Frank. He has written the libretti for The Conquest requiem and The Last Dream of Frida and Diego, which just premiered in San Diego and San Francisco. Cruz also adapted Ann Patchett’s 2001 novel Bel Canto for the Lyric Opera of Chicago, with Peruvian composer Jimmy López, and he penned the Dreamers oratorio for Cal Performance in Berkeley, CA.
In the world of film, he is one of the screenwriters of Alina of Cuba. He also adapted his play Anna in the Tropics for Mankind Entertainment.
Cruz, who received an MFA from Brown University and an honorary doctorate degree from Whittier College, has thrice previously served as a playwright-in-residence: In 2000, for the McCarter Theatre, in Princeton, NJ; in 2001, for the New Theatre in Coral Gables, which commissioned Anna in the Tropics, and in 2021, at UCLA through a Hearst Foundation Grant. Cruz also has taught drama at Yale, Brown, the University of Iowa, and the University of Miami. He is a member of the New Dramatists.
“It is a great honor to be receiving this prestigious award in November,” Cruz said. “Like Mr. Abbott, I have dedicated my whole life to the theater, and if I had to do it a second time, I would probably do the same thing.
“I am thrilled to join the company of so many dedicated and distinctive theater colleagues who have received this grand honor in the past,” the playwright added. “I was so happy when I got to present The Abbott Award last year to the incomparable Christine Dolen, and now I am being blessed with the same great gift. What can I say? I am blessed!”
This season’s Carbonell Awards will be presented at a glittery ceremony on Nov. 11 that is South Florida’s version of Broadway’s Tony Awards. Tickets are $45 each (including a $7 facility fee) and will go on sale after Labor Day.
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