EncoreMichigan.com announces Wilde Award nominations

In fact, the top-nominated theater is Ann Arbor's Performance Network, which earned 21 nominations (possibly an all-time record, as EncoreMichigan.com's season wrap-up article notes). Plus, the company's just-closed production of "Little Shop of Horrors" garnered the most nominations for an individual show (eight) — twice the number of its closest rivals ("A Sleeping Country" at Northville's Tipping Point Theatre; "Gravity" at Chelsea's Purple Rose Theatre; "It Came From Mars" at PN and The Williamston Theatre; and "The Tale of the Allergist's Wife" at The Jewish Ensemble Theatre).

Chelsea's Purple Rose Theatre, meanwhile, earned nine nominations, with at least one nomination from each of its last four shows ("Wake," "Escanaba," "Gravity," and "Our Town"). Ann Arbor's Blackbird Theatre earned four nominations for two productions: "Orpheus Descending," and the company's five-performer take on "A Midsummer Night's Dream." Dexter's Encore Theatre, meanwhile, snagged five nominations for two shows: "Sweeney Todd" and "Little Shop of Horrors."

Wilde Award nominees — and winners, which will be announced at a ceremony at the Gem Theatre on September 1 — were selected by EncoreMichigan.com's team of theater critics: Don Calamia, Martin F. Kohn, D. A. Blackburn, Bridgette M. Redman, and myself.