After careful consideration, the Arts For Life board of directors has decided to cancel the in-person Trivia Night event set for Saturday, Jan. 22, at the Kirkwood Community Center, and will instead host a Virtual Trivia Night via Zoom that evening.

The virtual event will still feature 10 rounds of general knowledge trivia questions and monetary prize awards for the first and second place teams.

Nominations for the annual Best Performance Awards, which honors excellence in community musical theater, and the Theatre Mask Awards, which recognizes outstanding dramatic and comedic plays, will be announced throughout the night.  

People who want to register for the virtual event or have already registered should contact Kim Klick at: afltrg@artsforlife.org. Table registration is $160/8 players per team and individual registration is $20 per person. Mulligans and 50/50 raffle tickets are also available.

You can register and pay at: https://arts-for-life-2.square.site/

Questions start at 7 p.m., but the Zoom link opens at 6:30 p.m. All teams will be in the same room at the beginning of each round. Emcee Kimmie Kidd-Booker, with assist from Colin Dowd, will present each category and questions before sending each team to their breakout room.

You will then have a set amount of time to collaborate on your answers and submit via a Google document. When time is up, all teams will return to the “main” room where the answers will be displayed.

“We will still celebrate theater!” said AFL President Mary McCreight. “Since teams are playing via Zoom this year, feel free to recruit team members from around the globe.”

McCreight said the board was concerned about the health and safety of the theater community as the St. Louis-Metro East Metropolitan Region is experiencing a surge of the Omicron variant outbreak.

“There were just too many risks at this time during the ongoing COVID-19 -pandemic. We will continue to monitor data from local officials and health and safety experts in planning for our awards ceremonies — those details will be announced later,” McCreight said. “We look forward to celebrating on future dates.”

For the past 23 years, AFL has honored musical theater with the Best Performance Awards and introduced the Theatre Mask Awards to honor comedy and drama productions in 2015.

AFL hosted a virtual trivia event in 2021, and the Best Performance Awards were cancelled because the coronavirus public health crisis forced cancellation of shows, but the Theatre Mask Awards were held virtually, in a smaller capacity, for the productions that were able to be presented.

AFL held its BPAs and TMAs ceremonies virtually in 2020, honoring work in 2019.

This year’s BPA nominations take into consideration the musicals that were performed in 2020 before the pandemic shutdown began in mid-March and the productions that were mounted in 2021 after restrictions lessened.

Safety precautions have been a priority for performers and performances, and with mitigation efforts, including vaccines, COVID-19 tests, masks, and social distance seats are available, stage work has returned, and theaters are not dark, unless there is a virus outbreak forcing cancellations and postponements.

“While we did about half the usual number of shows in 2021, it did not diminish Arts for Life’s vision for a community recognition program,” “These award events recognize the incredible talent we have in St. Louis community theater and honor the passion and dedication of those who build this amazing and unique theatrical community,” McCreight said.

Master of Ceremonies Kimmie Kidd-Booker is a local professional actress who has won two AFL Best Performance Awards for Best Featured Actress in “The Wiz” at Hawthorne Players in 2014 and as Estonia Dulworth in “Nice Work If You Can Get It” in 2020.

She was nominated as Best Actress in a Featured Role as Sister Mary Hubert in “Nunsense” at Hawthorne Players in 2015 and as The Witch in “Into the Woods” at Curtain’s Up Theater in 2018. She currently serves on the AFL board of directors.

Event Sponsorships are available at $50. Sponsorship includes group/company name and logo displayed at the beginning and end of event as a sponsor, then group/company name and logo displayed on our social media sites as a sponsor.

Arts For Life is a local not-for-profit arts organization dedicated to the healing power of the arts through its work with youth, the underserved and the community, with its goal of “Making a Dramatic Difference.”

AFL is dedicated to promoting public awareness of local community theater, encouraging excellence in the arts, and acknowledging the incredible people who are a part of it.

For more information, visit the website, www.artsforlife.org, or email: afltrg@artsforlife.org