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The Adelaide Fringe Awards celebrate outstanding events presented throughout the festival season. There are weekly awards announced each week, and overall awards announced at a special in-person awards ceremony at the end of the festival. Winners are announced on Adelaide Fringe's social media channels, and to over 100,000 Fringe eNews subscribers.
 
These awards are highly sought after, and the accolades can carry you forward to any and all future projects, prospects, and events you hold.
 
To be considered, your event will need to opt-in to the Awards program by COB Monday January 15 via your AVR event registration, and meet certain eligibility criteria. 

PLEASE NOTE the list of confirmed awards will be available closer to the 2024 Adelaide Fringe season, and are subject to change.

 

Table of contents

How to be considered for an award

If you wish participate you must OPT IN when registering your event in AVR. To check whether you have opted-in, navigate to the "Awards" page of your registration. You can go back and opt in up-to and including January 31. After this date all eligible events will be presented to the judges panel to give them time to map out their timetables, therefore no further events will be accepted into the program after this date.

By opting into the Awards program you permit Adelaide Fringe to allocate up to eight (8) complimentary tickets across the whole season to judges for your eligible event. If Adelaide Fringe requires more tickets, then they will be purchased the same as regular tickets via FringeTIX.

What are the awards? 

We are currently in the process of confirming the awards for our 2024 Adelaide Fringe season. The below should be used as a guide, and are subject to change:

Genre Awards (weekly and overall)

  • Best Cabaret Award
  • Best Circus Award
  • Best Comedy Award
  • Best Dance Award
  • Best Film & Digital or Interactive Award
  • Best Events, Workshops & Talks, Eat & Drink Award
  • Best Kids & Family Award
  • Best Magic Award
  • Best Music Award
  • Best Theatre & Physical Theatre Award
  • Best Visual Art & Design Award
  • Pick of the Week (weekly)
  • Pick of the Fringe (overall only)

Touring Awards (overalls)

  • Edinburgh Fringe Award, Presented by Arts SA
  • The Fringe World Tour Ready Award, Presented by Fringe World Perth
  • The Melbourne Fringe Tour Ready Award, Presented by Melbourne Fringe
  • NZ Fringe Festival Wellington Tour Ready Award
  • The Sydney Fringe Tour Ready Award, Presented by Sydney Fringe
  • Sarah Rohrsheim Fellowship Award
  • The Frank Ford Award

Mentorship Awards (overalls)

  • Best Emerging Producer, Presented By Milke
  • One to Watch Award, Presented by Matt Tarrant

Themes & Specialist Awards (overalls)

  • John Chataway Innovation Award
  • Adelaide Critics Circle Award
  • Take a Chance on Adelaide Award, Presented by Ray & Conrad Henley-Calvert
  • Holden Street Theatres Adelaide Fringe Award
  • Science at the Fringe Award, Presented by Inspiring SA
  • Adelaide Festival Centre's InSPACE Award
  • The Eran Svigos Award for Best Visual Art
  • Adelaide Fringe Access Award
  • Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Award
  • Sustainability Award, Presented by Visualcom
  • Adelaide Fringe Emerging Artist Award (weekly and overall)

Eligibility

Best Genre Awards:

  • Must not have a changing line up of artists from session to session - e.g. game show, variety show, comedy line up show, different headlining music act each night
  • Must not have won any of the previous overall Adelaide Fringe overall awards: overall Best Genre, Pick of the Fringe, The Frank Ford Award, People's Choice Award - NOTE: Applies to the event only, not the artists involved or brand new shows with the same name.
  • If the event’s primary genre is Cabaret, Kids and Family Event, Circus, Comedy, Magic, Theatre and Physical Theatre, there must be a minimum of three (3) public sessions during Fringe beginning on or before Friday 19 March.
  • If the event's primary genre is Dance, Event, Film & Digital, Interactive, Music, Visual Art & Design, Workshops, there must be one (1) public session during Fringe on before Tuesday 14 March 2023.

Touring Opportunity Awards:

  • Event must be tour-ready by the end of the 2024 Adelaide Fringe season
  • The final winning recipients are chosen by those companies / organisations / individuals presenting and / or sponsoring these awards.

Mentorship Awards:

  • Eligibility will vary between these awards, as they provide different opportunities
  • Recipients are chosen by the individuals presenting / sponsoring the awards - e.g. "One to Watch Award", presented by Matt Tarrant, "Best Emerging Producer" presented by Milke, etc.

Specialist Awards:

Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander Award
  • A creative, or more than 50% of the creatives identify as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
  • Must opt-in to be considered for this award
Youth Participant Awards
  • A creative, or more than 50% of creatives, are under 25 years old
  • Must opt-in to be considered for this award
Emerging Artist Awards
  • Must be within the first five (5) years of their practice
  • Must opt-in to be considered for this award

Sustainability Award:

  • Event contains environmental / sustainability themes

Access Award

  • Creative or more than 50% of creatives have lived experience of disability

John Chataway Innovation Award:

  • Event must be boundary pushing either technologically or in the form

Judging

The Judges:

Our judging panel are made up of local, national, and international industry professionals, Honey Pot delegates, Adelaide Fringe staff, and seasoned audience members. Adelaide Fringe Awards Program judges are selected via an applciation process. Adelaide Fringe carefully consider all applications, and the final panel is selected on the basis of their knowledge, experience, and passion.

The Tickets:

While we do have an Awards Comp ticket option, there are several ways a judge could see your show

  • Booking an Awards Comp ticket through FringeTIX
  • Using their Adelaide Fringe pass (if applicable - artist, staff, Honey Pot, venue, etc.) and entering the event only after all paying audience members have entered
  • Purchasing a ticket through FringTIX as a general audience member

This means a judge may not appear on your door list under an Awards Comp ticket.

The Criteria:

Judging is done primarily via survey so that we can capture exactly what has and hasn't been seen. The weekly contenders are then discussed at a weekly judges meeting. Assessment is based on the following criteria:

  • Wow
  • Audience engagement
  • Overall production quality

While we endeavour to have all events attended by a judge we cannot guarantee that your event will be seen.

How do judges decide what to see?

Prior to Adelaide Fringe beginning, judging panels meet to select the events they can fit into their schedule with the aim of seeing as much as possible. They inform the Awards Coordinator of their intention and these are tracked next to surveys submitted. 

If you wish to encourage judges along to your event, please send them a message via awards@adelaidefringe.com.au and it will be passed on to the panel.

How come judges are booked into my preview?

Unlike media tickets, judges are permitted to attend previews. This is for a couple of reasons - to ensure as much as possible is seen in time for the week one award deliberations, and to ensure that as they see as many shows as possible who have opted into the awards. Without being able to attend previews, many shows would miss out on having a judge attend.

All judges will be briefed about preview sessions as follows:

You may judge a show that is in preview, but please appreciate that the show may still be in development and understand that everything may not go well on the night. Look for the potential in the show rather than judge at face value. If you are uncertain how to assess this, please avoid attending previews.

If you DO NOT want judges to attend your preview sessions, please contact awards@adelaidefringe.com.au ASAP so we can remove the Awards Comp ticketing option from these sessions. Please note that we cannot guarantee all events will be seen by judges, so the more sessions you have available, the higher your chance of being seen is. If you have had a judge attend a preview session and do not believe it was an accurate representation of your work, please contact us so we can take this into account during assessment. If this occurs and you wish the judges comments to be discarded altogether, we cannot guarantee that you will be able to get judges to attend later in your season.

A judge missed a session and didn't come to my event - what do I do?

As per the above there are several ways a judge can attend a session, so they may not always be under an Awards Comp ticket, and even if they book one they may not have been ticked off on your door list for a number of reasons.

If you believe a judge has missed the session they booked, please contact awards@adelaidefringe.com.au IMMEDIATELY so that we can investigate and, if possible, find another judge to attend another session. Do not wait until after your season is over to let us know.

Can I get feedback from the judges about my event?

Judges’ comments are for the purpose of judging only. These will not be made available to presenters.

 

For any questions regarding the awards please contact: awards@adelaidefringe.com.au 

 

Photo credit: Adelaide Fringe Award Ceremony. Photo: Bee Saint-James, 2023

Photo description: A collective stand on stage holding their Fringe award celebrating