The theater established a Sondheim Award "as a tribute to America's most influential contemporary musical theatre composer". The first award, to Stephen Sondheim, was presented at an April 27, 2009 benefit with performances by Bernadette Peters, Michael Cerveris, Will Gartshore and Eleasha Gamble.[4][5][6] The 2020 awardee is Carol Burnett. Recent awardees include Cameron Mackintosh (2017), John Kander (2018), and Audra McDonald (2019).[7]
Facilities
In 1989 Signature Theatre began production in the Arlington County Gunston Arts Center.[8]: 12, 122 This original home was in the library of a former middle school which had been converted to a black box theater. They rapidly outgrew this facility and in 1993 acquired a defunct Auto Bumper Plating shop, AKA "The Garage", which they converted into a 136-seat black box.[8]: 32–40 In 2007, however, in partnership with Arlington County, Virginia, Signature moved into a new $16 million theater complex built in The Village at Shirlington.[3][9] The first floor of the building houses the Shirlington Branch of the Arlington County Public Library.[10] The upper three floors house the theater. The complex has an industrial decor, with exposed particle board, pipes and metal sheeting. It includes two state-of-the-art black box theaters. The larger, christened "Max" in honor of Maxine Isaacs, seats 275 and can expand to accommodate 350 patrons. The smaller "Ark", named in honor of Arlene and Robert Kogod, can hold 99. The theaters are built as "square box within a square box, floating on hockey pucks. At $30 a puck. It is built like a soundstage" In addition to the two performance spaces, the complex contains a lobby, meeting rooms, three rehearsal spaces, four individual dressing rooms, three shared dressing rooms, three showers, a cast greenroom, a separate orchestra greenroom, three kitchen areas, scene, prop, and costume shops.[3][11] The large lobby was named by donors Gilbert and Jaylee Mead in honor Gilbert's late son Rob Mead.[3]
Exterior of Signature Theatre above the Shirlington Library. The doors to the library are on the right, the theater entrance on the left. The lobby is behind the 14' high by 140' long second floor glass wall
^ abSchaeffer, Eric with Valente, Sarah (2011). My Signature Story. Parker, CO: Outskirts Press Inc. ISBN978-1-4327-6199-8.((cite book)): CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
