Georgia Southern University’s theater program won awards in designing and lighting, teamwork and for its director at the 50th Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival last Thursday.

KCACTF is a national theater program involving 20,000 students from colleges and universities nationwide annually. The competition part of the festival is broken down by regions, Director Lisa Abbott said. GS is part of region four.

“The festival celebrates all aspects of the theater process,” Abbott said. “It’s a way to fellowship in all areas and network.”

Abbey Hutcheson won second place for her Émilie set design, an award she said she didn’t expect.

“It took me a minute to realize I won,” Hutcheson said. “I was like, ‘oh that’s me.’ It was my first design and my first ever convention, and there were people there who had done this way more than I have, but being able to win second was incredible.”

Mary Flott, lighting director, won first place for her work with “Émilie.” She went to the festival two days early with the rest of her crew to help set up the production and faced several challenges along the way.

“There were a lot of problems in the older space they had in terms of lighting and what they had available,” Flott said.

Because of her win, Flott will be attending a fellowship to the National KTCF festival in April. She will be paid by the organization to compete with other region members.

“It’ll be a tough competition because I’ll be competing against other region winners, so we’ll see how that goes,” Flott said.

Lisa Abbott also won a director award for faculty excellence and the crew itself won a Golden Hard Hat award, a fun award that specifies how well the crew works together.

The GS theatre department has won previous national awards for some of their other productions, including nine for “She Kills Monsters” and two for “An Octoroon.”

Shiann Sivell, The George-Anne Enterprise Reporter, gaeditor@georgiasouthern.edu