Grammies, Oscars, Golden Globes, People's Choice . . . yep, it's awards season all right and a number of Chicagoans have been showered with honors recently. For the most part they're the kind that bring cash rather than golden statuettes or plaques, but that seems to be fine and dandy.

At the top of the list, the Dance Center of Columbia College has received a hefty $50,000 from the Joyce Foundation as part of the second annual Joyce Awards, grants to mainstream Midwest cultural organizations to commission works by artists of color. In this case, the term "artists of color" has been broadly interpreted for a commission to Taiwanese choreographer Lin Hwai-Min and his Cloud Gate Dance Theatre. Lin is a multiple award winner and globally recognized, as is the 32-year-old Cloud Gate, which he founded. The grant will fund Cursive III, the last work in Lin's trilogy inspired by Chinese calligraphy. The Dance Center expects to present Cloud Gate in the world premiere at the Harris Theatre in fall 2006, followed by a national tour.

While Lin and Cloud Gate do stunning work, I can't help thinking the Joyce Awards would do better to fall closer to home. Other than observing the Taiwanese artists at work (and then only when they bring the finished product here), what's the benefit to Chicago and Midwestern artists? And audiences will not become more in-touch with American cultures of color through this grant. I don't mean to suggest the choice of Lin and Cloud Gate is distasteful, but it certainly seems curious.

In the $1,000 action round, Chicago playwrights Jeffrey Essmann and Brendan Healy have been named co-winners of the Heideman Award in the Actors Theatre of Louisville 2004 National Ten-Minute Play Contest. Essmann's Johannes, Pyotr & Marge will be produced in April as part of the Humana Festival of New American Plays. Healy's Picnic (pic-nic): vi was produced on a bill of 10-minute plays by the Actors Theatre's Intern company earlier this month. His new, full-length play (title still in the works) is to be presented this summer by Open Eye Productions.

Finally, Hizzoner da Mare has received a golden plaque from Americans for the Arts and The U.S. Conference of Mayors. On Jan. 18, Richard M. Daley was presented with the 2005 Lifetime Achievement Award for Public Leadership in the Arts. Also receiving honors in other categories were Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, Mayor John Robert Smith of Meridian, MS, and legendary musician Peter Yarrow, one-third of Peter, Paul and Mary.

The awards were presented at the Mayors Arts Luncheon as part of the U.S. Conference of Mayors' 73rd winter meeting in Washington, DC. Mayor Daley was cited for his unwavering support for arts programs in Chicago since taking office in 1989. The presentation remarks specifically credited him with saving and restoring the beautiful central library building and remaking it as a cultural center; presenting Cows on Parade; creating Millennium Park; and establishing (with his wife Maggie Daley) the "Gallery 37" program which has been recognized nationally as one the leading arts education programs in the country.

There may be no such thing as too much art, but there definitely can be too much artist, especially if he's a one-eared, insane, Franco-Dutch impressionist painter. Bailiwick Repertory is offering Steven Dietz's Inventing Van Gogh, while Apple Tree Theatre and The Journeymen are mounting back-to-back productions of Vincent in Brixton by Nicholas Wright. I tell ya', it's enough to make one see starry nights, if not stars. The Bailiwick show closes Feb. 20, the Apple Tree run is Feb. 13-March 13, and the Journeymen show is March 19-April 24. The Wright play didn't receive very good reviews in New York, although critics in London—where the play is set—liked it better. We'll see if the local critics can stomach a double dose. I mean, it's not like Van Gogh was the only crazy artist!

Oh, my goodness, they're getting literary on us! Hope and Nonthings Publishing has announced a new, 400-page theatrical paperback, "200 More Neo-Futurist Plays," an anthology of two-minute plays by 27 actor/writer/performers in Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind. This volume—actually, the third Neo-Futurist collection—even includes sheet music for five Neo-Futurist musicals, and a history of the Neo-Futurists by co-founder Greg Allen. A book release party was held at the Neo-Futurarium on Feb. 16, conveniently matching the $16 price tag for the volume. Hope and Nonthings Publishing, by the way, is a small, indie Chicago outfit concerned with bringing the works of Chicago playwrights and punk-rock authors (does that mean pierced manuscripts?) into print.

By the way, the New York edition of Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind continues to play at the Belt Theatre, where it opened October of 2004.

Has anyone besides me noticed the disappearance of Masada from the 2004-2005 Broadway in Chicago (BinC) line-up? It was the first BinC show announced for this season, very early last spring. The world-premiere, pre-Broadway engagement was to have played the Ford Center/Oriental in September and October, but then was pushed back to February-March, and then vanished like smoke. Officially, Masada merely is on hold, but unofficially a BinC executive who attended a reading of the show said it was "a mess."

Cynical, old, leathery reporters like me develop instincts about these things, and my personal antennae were up from the very first press release. It touted a storyline a lot like Joshua Sobol's Ghetto, but didn't name a director, a choreographer, designers or a cast. Seemed odd to book a theatre and sell tickets without a creative team. Rather cart-before-the-horse.

The next press release announced a creative team of high-powered people, but still no cast. It also revealed that a) the principal producer of Masada also was its composer, and b) none of the authors or producers had any New York theatre experience. Rather, they came from various backgrounds in TV, pop music, children's programming and (very limited) regional theatre. Smelled like a vanity production on a grand scale.

By the way, none of this is BinC's fault. To their credit, they wanted to further solidify Chicago's reputation as a great try-out town.

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