Carbonell Awards Recipient Announced

Mary Damiano
(Photo Credit: Mary Damiano)

(Press Release) (South Florida – August 12, 2025) Gary Schweikhart, board president of the Carbonell Awards, South Florida’s Theater & Arts Honors, today announced the recipient of the third of seven prestigious Special Awards that will be presented at the Carbonell Awards Ceremony on Monday, November 17, at 7:30 pm at FAU’s University Theatre in Boca Raton 33431.
 
“While we will be honoring in 20 competitive categories specific theatre performances, production elements, and shows presented between September 2024 and August 2025, the Carbonell board of directors has unanimously voted to also bestow the following Special Award,” said Schweikhart.

---

The Charlie Cinnamon Award
Honoring an individual who contributes significantly to the support of the arts in South Florida and to the Carbonell Awards program.
 
Mary Damiano
Mary Damiano is the managing editor of Biscayne Times, theater reviewer for The Palm Beach Daily News, and writer for Miami Artburst, REimagine magazine, and The New Pelican newspaper. She is an award-winning writer, editor, and theater critic who has covered the South Florida arts scene since 2000. She has had more than 3,000 articles published in dozens of publications, including the Miami Times, Miami Herald, Sun-Sentinel, New Times, South Florida Gay News, She Magazine, The Palm Beach Post, BroadwayWorld.com, and MiamiARTzine.com, of which she is the founding editor, shepherding the online arts magazine through its first 100 issues. Damiano has been a Carbonell judge since 2004. She served as panel coordinator for the Carbonell Awards from 2008 until 2014 and was managing director of the organization from 2014 until 2020. She has also served as vice president of the South Florida Theatre League and vice president of the Oakland Park Art & Culture Board. Mary believes her greatest accomplishment is getting paid to be entertained.
 
In nominating Damiano for this award for this award, Zoetic Stage Co-founder Stuart Meltzer proposed that she “is long overdue for some recognition for her contributions as an arts journalist and Carbonell judge. Mary’s commitment to theatrical journalism has kept her in print for as long as I've been working professionally in this community. Her sense of humor, her heart, her eagerness to celebrate every theatre company, and her love of what she does is an example of longevity and survival.” 
 
The Charlie Cinnamon Award is named after the legendary press agent who promoted the arts in South Florida for more than six decades
 
Previous Winners of the Charlie Cinnamon Award:
Veteran reviewer and founder of FloridaTheaterOnStage.com Bill Hirschman (2023); longtime critic and Carbonell judge Hap Erstein (2022); Jennifer Sierra-Grobbelaar Director of Marketing at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts (2019); Tony Finstrom, playwright and founder of the Silver Palm Awards, (2018); and longtime arts patron and Carbonell judge Jerome J. (Jerry) Cohen (2017).
 
Already Announced Carbonell Special Awards 2025
+ The George Abbott Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Arts
William Hayes & Sue Ellen Beryl, co-founders of Palm Beach Dramaworks
+ The Jan McArt Award for Outstanding Achievement by a Small Theatre
New City Players
+ The Vinnette Carroll Award for Advancing Diversity, Equality and Inclusion in South Florida Theatre
Michel Hausmann, Miami New Drama
 
Schedule to Announce Additional Carbonell Special Awards
+ The Ruth Foreman Award – August 19
+ The Bill Hindman Award – August 26
+ The Howard Kleinberg Award – September 2
+ The Bill von Maurer Award – September 9
+ 120 Carbonell Award Finalists in 20 Categories – September 16
 
All the 2025 Special Award recipients were nominated by members from South Florida’s theatre community with the Carbonell Board of Directors making the final selection. The 120 Carbonell Award Finalists will be based on accumulated scores from the nonprofit organization’s pool of nearly 50 experienced and diverse volunteer judges—with seven judges from various counties assigned to each show. During the 2024-2025 season, Carbonell judges adjudicated over 100 professional productions at more than 30 theatres across Broward, Miami-Dade, and Palm Beach Counties.
 
This season’s Carbonell Awards will be presented at a glittery ceremony on November 17 that is South Florida’s version of Broadway’s Tony Awards®. Hundreds of actors, musicians, performers, writers, directors, back-stage technicians, producers, reviewers, designers, specialty artists, and diehard theater fans are expected to attend the event that is being produced and directed by Andrew Kato, Producing Artistic Director/Chief Executive of the Maltz Jupiter Theatre, with the award-winning Caryl Fantel serving as Music Director. Tickets for the ceremony and after party are only $45 and will go on public sale in mid-September.
 
Sponsors of the 48th Annual Carbonell Awards ceremony and after party include the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts; Aventura Arts & Cultural Center; BroadwayWorld; Broward Center for the Performing Arts; Broward Cultural Division; Carbonell Sculptures Ltd.; Cultural Council for Palm Beach County; Donald M. Ephraim Sun & Stars International Film Festival presented by MorseLife Health System; FPL; Kravis Center for the Performing Arts; Lesser, Landy, Smith & Siegel, PLLC; Miami-Dade County Auditorium, The Dennis C. Moss Center (formerly The South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center), OutClique Magazine, South Florida Cultural Consortium; South Florida Theatre League, Mark Traverso & Conor Walton, and Donald R. Walters, P.A.