Live Design/LDI is pleased to present the 2018 Rising Star Award to scenic designer Paige Hathaway. Established by Live Design/LDI in 2005 and presented annually, the Rising Star award recognizes a young professional working in the disciplines of scenic, lighting, sound, or projection design. Hathaway will be honored at the USITT Conference & Stage Expo, which takes place in Fort Lauderdale, FL, March 14-17, 2018.
“Her resume shows the breadth and depth of her career so far,” says Jon Young, MFA/USA 829/associate professor of scenic design at The University of Oklahoma, who was one of the professionals to nominate Hathaway for the Rising Star Award. “Note the institutions she has designed for at such an early stage: The Muny, Arden Theatre Company, and almost every major theatre in the D.C. metro area—Folger Theatre, Signature Theatre, Olney Theatre Center, Round House Theatre, and Woolly Mammoth Theatre. She has truly taken that renowned theatrical community by storm. Of more importance is her design work—it is visceral, gorgeous, and the attention to detail is stunning.”
Hathaway is a freelance scenic designer based in the Washington, DC area. She recently designed a new musical Me... Jane at the Kennedy Center; The Book Of Will at Round House Theatre; A Chorus Line at The Muny in St. Louis, Or at Round House Theatre; A Midsummer Night's Dream at Philadelphia's Arden Theatre; The Gulf at Signature Theatre; Another Way Home and The How And The Why at Theater J; The Pillowman, Dry Land, and What Every Girl Should Know at Forum Theatre; and A Midsummer Night's Dream and Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead at the Folger Theatre. She is a member of USA 829, and received her MFA in Scenic Design from the University of Maryland and her BFA in Scenic Design from the University of Oklahoma. For the 2018 Helen Hayes Awards, she has been nominated twice in the category of Outstanding Set Design-Hayes: Me...Jane: The Dreams & Adventures of Young Jane Goodall at The Kennedy Center (Olivia Sebesky, Projection Designer) and for Or, at the Round House Theatre (the Helen Hayes Awards will be presented on May 14, 2018).
For A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Arden Theatre, Hathaway says, "Matt Pfeiffer (the director) and I set out to create a neutral, ritualistic, theatrical space that contains nods or hints towards the themes and set pieces of Midsummer without being beholden to them. We wanted tastes of magic and whimsy, while still being firmly in a theatrical space that riffs off of the Arden's own unique architecture.”
Rising Star Award Winners 2005-2017
2017: Bryce Cutler, scenic/media design
2016 Stephen Moss, lighting designer
2015 Chris Wood, lighting & sound designer
2014 Janie Bullard, sound designer
2013 Aaron Porter, lighting designer
2012 Jason Simms, scenic designer
2011 Daniel Brodie, projection designer
2010 Ben Pilat, lighting designer
2009 Sean Savoie, lighting designer
2008 Elisheba Ittoop, sound designer
2007 John Horan, lighting designer
2006 Justin Townsend, scenic and lighting designer
2005 Kelly Hanson, scenic designer