Arlene Crewdson

The Jeff Awards announced that Arlene Crewdson, Founding Executive/Artistic Director and Global Voices Director of Pegasus Players, will receive a Special Award at the 36th Annual Non-Equity Jeff Awards Ceremony on June 8, 2009, honoring her outstanding contributions to Chicago theatre.

Arlene Crewdson founded Pegasus Players in 1978 and has directed many productions there. She taught classic theatre on PBS station Channel 11 in Chicago, published “A Study to Classic Theatre,” and served for many years as a professor in the Communications Department at Truman College. The Chicago Tribune has twice named her one of the twenty Chicagoans who have made memorable contributions to the arts. She was awarded a $70,000 Chicago Community Trust Fellowship for her efforts to provide access to the arts for the disadvantaged. She has also served as a mayoral appointee to the Community Development Block Grant Committee. Dr. Crewdson was awarded a British American Arts Administrative Training Institute Fellowship, sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts, and was the national representative for the United States Information Agency at Tashkent 's First International Theatre Festival in Uzbekistan , and represented the Chicago Artists International Program in Egypt and Turkey. She has been a mainstay of the Chicago theatre world for three decades and has literally brought Pegasus's unique mission to people all over the world. After her 30 years with Pegasus Players, which has garnered over 70 Non-Equity Jeff Awards along the way and provided arts programming to hundreds of thousands of people who would otherwise have no access to the arts, Arlene Crewdson is retiring.

The Jeff Awards previously announced 114 nominations in 24 categories for Non-Equity Jeff Awards, which honor excellence in Chicago theatres not under a union contract, for productions that opened between April 1, 2008, and March 31, 2009. The Jeff Awards judged the opening nights of 130 productions offered by 59 non-Equity producing organizations and recommended 54 of them for further judging, making those 54 eligible for Non-Equity Jeff Award nominations in all categories.

The 36th Anniversary Non-Equity Jeff Awards Ceremony will be held on Monday, June 8, 2009, at the Park West, 322 W. Armitage, Chicago, IL. Doors open for a cash bar at 6:00 p.m., with a light buffet at 6:30 p.m., and presentation at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $35 in advance, $40 at the door. Festive cocktail attire is suggested and the public is cordially invited. Tickets may be purchased on-line with a credit card at www.jeffawards.org.