Jimmy Awards

[1] Winners and nominees have often gone on to significant careers in musical theatre, such as Eva Noblezada, Reneé Rapp, Ryan McCartan and Andrew Barth Feldman, who went on to starring roles in Broadway productions.

Van Kaplan, the executive producer of the Pittsburgh Civic Light Opera, pitched the idea of creating a nationwide version of the awards to the Nederlander Organization.

The two organizations founded the new award, naming it after the Broadway producer and theatre owner James ("Jimmy") M. Nederlander.

[10] Students qualify for the Jimmys based on a role played in a high school musical production that year.

[12] The Jimmy Award nominees travel to New York City for a week in June, culminating in a live show in which the winners are determined.

The show is directed by Van Kaplan, choreographed by Kiesha Lalama, and music supervised and conducted by Geoffrey Ko.

[13] The show begins with an opening number (typically a "mega-mix of contemporary Broadway hits")[3] involving all nominees, followed by a series of "showcase medleys", in which several nominees appear in costume in the role they performed in their high school's musical, each in turn singing a short solo, while the remaining performers act as backup singers and dancers.