ONYX Awards For Pitt’s Kuntu Rep

Pitt’s Kuntu Repertory Theatre won 15 awards at the fourth annual African American Council of Theatre Arts’ Onyx Awards for Blacks in theater and dance.
The Kuntu Rep’s production of Sarafina! alone took home 11 of the possible 13 awards for musicals. The Sarafina! awardees included Mary Mease Warren (for costumes), Jason Peroney (lights), Kenneth Ellis (sets), Olusegen Ojewuyi (direction), James Altson (musical direction), Leslie “Ezra” Smith (supporting actor), Grace Kelly Kalassa (lead actress), and Genna Styles (supporting actress). Sarafina! also won awards in the musicals’ ensemble and best sound categories.
For productions of plays, Kenneth Ellis won the Onyx Award for his sets in the Kuntu Rep’s production of Sing Black Hammer, and Vanessa German received the Onyx in the lead actress category for Kuntu’s Relativity. Kuntu also won four of the competition’s five People’s Choice Awards, which were determined by online votes. Relativity won for best play, Sarafina! for best musical, and the two best actress awards went to Stephanie Batiste (for Relativity) and Mamothena Mothupi (Sarafina!).