Opera Australia’s new Verdi tops the poll with Melbourne Theatre Company the other judges favourite.

Nominations for Melbourne’s 2013 Green Room Awards were announced yesterday with Opera Australia heading their category followed closely by Victorian Opera. Melbourne Theatre Company also picked up 30 nominations in an impressive list overshadowed for some in the press by the exclusion of any candidate for Best Musical.

Opera Australia’s collaboration with La Fura dels Baus on Verdi’s A Masked Ball proved more popular with the judges than with some critics (although here at Limelight we were very positive). Àlex Ollé’s production was nominated for Best Production, Best Director, Best Conductor, Best Set, Best Lighting, Best Female Lead (Csilla Boross) and two nods for Best Male Lead – Diego Torre and José Carbó.

Victorian Opera’s staging of John Adams’ Nixon In China picked up nearly as many nominations – Best Production, Best Director (Roger Hodgman), Best Lighting Design, Best Conductor and two Best male Leads for Barry Ryan’s Nixon and Bradley Daley’s Mao.

Top of the poll among the theatre nominees was Melbourne Theatre Company who picked up an impressive 30 nominations including 14 for its main stage productions and seven for MTC/Belvoir/Kim Carpenter’s Theatre of...