Legendary lighting designers Jules Fisher and Jennifer Tipton were each honored with the Ming Cho Lee Award for Lifetime Achievement in Design, bestowed by the Henry Hewes Design Awards during the 58th annual awards ceremony on October 24. “In honoring Jules Fisher and Jennifer Tipton, both of whom have had a profound impact on the artistry, history, and innovation in the craft of illumination, we celebrate two pioneers who have given us so many important dramatic memories—and have lit the way for those who follow,” noted Jeffrey Eric Jenkins, chair of the awards committee.
The Ming Cho Lee Award for Lifetime Achievement in Design was named for the iconic theatre designer Ming Cho Lee, who was the first recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Henry Hewes Design Awards. Lee designed more than 300 productions across the globe, received a Tony Award in 1983 for K2 and taught for 48 years at the Yale School of Drama. He was also the recipient of a Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2013.
Jules Fisher
In a Broadway career spanning more than 50 years, Jules Fisher has conceived and designed productions for Broadway, film, the music industry, and digital animation. He has designed more than a hundred plays and musicals and has been honored with 9 Tony Awards and 21 nominations. The Henry Hewes Design Awards committee has honored him for 7 productions dating back to Dancin’ in 1978. Among his celebrated Broadway designs are the original versions of Hair, Jesus Christ Superstar, Pippin, Ragtime, Bring in ‘da Noise, Bring in ‘da Funk, Angels in America, Assassins, and the recent revival of The Iceman Cometh starring Denzel Washington.
His film lighting designs have been seen on Dreamgirls with director Bill Condon, on Rob Marshall’s Best Picture winner Chicago and Richard Linklater’s School of Rock, among other projects. Evolving naturally into dramatic and fantastical lighting in the digital realm, his musical lighting scenes have been conceived for CG environments in the live-action Beauty and the Beast, as well as development projects for DreamWorks Animation.
Fisher also created inventive lighting before and throughout the evolution of digital lighting sources for such diverse artists as David Bowie, KISS, Parliament-Funkadelic, Whitney Houston, The Rolling Stones, Neil Young, and Simon and Garfunkel. In addition to entertainment, Fisher is a founding partner in the architectural lighting design firm, Fisher Marantz Stone, Inc. and he also founded Fisher Dachs Associates, one of the world’s foremost, forward-thinking, and experienced theatre planning and design consulting firms. Fisher holds a bachelor’s degree in Drama from Carnegie Mellon University, as well as a 2015 Honorary Doctorate. His current lighting design company, with partner Peggy Eisenhauer, is known as Third Eye, which conceives and designs lighting for all forms of entertainment.
Jennifer Tipton
Jennifer Tipton came to New York to study dance, after attending Cornell. Her interest in lighting began with a course in the subject at the American Dance Festival, Connecticut College. She has been awarded two “Bessies” and a Laurence Olivier Award for lighting dance; her work in that field includes pieces choreographed by Mikhail Baryshnikov, Jiri Kylian, Dana Reitz, Jerome Robbins, Paul Taylor, Twyla Tharp, and Dan Wagoner, among many others.
In the theatre, she has won a Joseph Jefferson Award, a Kudo, a Drama-Logue Award, two American Theatre Wing Awards, an Obie, two Drama Desk Awards, the first for The Cherry Orchard and For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow is Enuf; the second for Jerome Robbins’ Broadway, and two Tonys for The Cherry Orchard and Jerome Robbins’ Broadway. Ms. Tipton was recently nominated for a Tony Award for To Kill A Mocking Bird. She is also a recipient of six Henry Hewes Design Awards and teaches lighting design at the Yale University School of Drama.
Her opera work includes Robert Wilson’s production of Parsifal at the Houston Grand Opera and Peter Sellar’s production of Tannhauser for the Chicago Light Opera. She also directed a production of The Tempest at the Guthrie. She has been an artistic associate with the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge and the Goodman Theatre in Chicago. Her lighting designs have been employed at the American Ballet Theatre’s repertory since 1971. She held a Guggenheim Fellowship for the 1986-87 season and received the 1989 Commonwealth Award in Dramatic Arts. She has been a recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts Theater Program Distinguished Artist Award, and a grant in the National Theatre Artist Residency Program funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts.
Her recent work in theater includes To Kill A Mocking Bird for Broadway, Beckett’s First Love for Zoom and all of Richard Nelson’s Rhinebeck plays. Her recent work in opera includes Ricky Ian Gordon’s Intimate Apparel with libretto by Lynn Nottage, based on her play by the same name, at the Lincoln Center Mitzi Newhouse Theater; her recent work in dance includes Lauren Lovette’s Pentimento for the Paul Taylor Company and Balanchine’s Midsummer Night’s Dream for the Paris Opera Ballet. She has received the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 2001, the Jerome Robbins Prize in 2003 and in 2008 she was awarded the USA “Gracie” Fellowship and a MacArthur Fellowship.
