Drama queens, kings to be honored

Ben Cheriyan can relate to Shuler Hensley.

Cheriyan, an Atlanta 10th-grader, and Hensley, a Tony Award winner from Marietta, know what it’s like to disappear inside a costume and play for laughs. Hensley portrayed the Monster in Mel Brooks’ “Young Frankenstein” on Broadway. Cheriyan played the cow in Atlanta International School’s production of “Into the Woods.”

Tonight they’ll share the stage at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Center’s first Shuler Hensley Awards. Created by the center and named for Atlanta’s best-known Broadway star, the “Shulers” are the metro area’s first awards for excellence in high-school musical theater.

No matter that many of the kids had never heard of Hensley until they were nominated. Or that the “paparazzi” stalking them on the red carpet will mostly be fellow students from school newspapers and yearbooks. Tonight they get to hobnob with a bona-fide marquee name —- competing in 15 categories for the first batch of Shulers.

“It’s huge. It really is,” says Lara Khoury, an Atlanta International School student nominated in the best supporting actress category. “I’m just ecstatic, and I’m thrilled. I’m speechless. I’m dumbfounded.” (Khoury played Little Red Ridinghood in “Into the Woods.”)

Announced in July, the Shulers are the brainchild of Mark B. Kent, who runs Cobb Energy Centre’s educational outreach program. “It has become much bigger than I envisioned it would be in its first year,” Kent says.

He expects about 1,500 people at tonight’s event. Atlanta theater luminaries such as Kenny Leon of True Colors Theatre, John McFall of Atlanta Ballet and Dennis Hanthorn of Atlanta Opera will present the prizes. Nominees will arrive in a fleet of Mercedes sedans and walk a red carpet.

“It’s going to be a big deal for these kids,” says Hensley, a graduate of Atlanta’s Westminster Schools who attended the University of Georgia on a baseball scholarship before pursuing a career in music. The actor with the booming baritone won England’s Olivier Award and a 2002 Tony for playing the tortured Jud Fry in director Trevor Nunn’s revival of “Oklahoma!”

Nominees for the Shulers were chosen by professional judges who attended the productions, ranging from Alpharetta High School’s “Guys and Dolls” to Blessed Trinity Catholic School’s “Sweeney Todd.”

Tonight’s lead actor and actress winners will move on to compete in the first National High School Musical Theater Awards at Broadway’s Palace Theatre this summer. (Those awards —- known as the Jimmys —- are named after James M. Nederlander of the famous family of theater owners and producers.)

When it comes to thespian competitions, arts magnet schools such as Pebblebrook High and North Springs High are old hands. But Atlanta International School, which hasn’t traditionally been a musical-theater powerhouse, was shocked to be the front-runner in the first Shulers. “We were just having fun, and then it turned out that we got 11 nominations,” says Cheriyan, the 16-year-old who plays the cow in “Into the Woods.”

Now Cheriyan —- a diminutive kid with Indian parents and a great moo —- says his school is the “Slumdog Millionaire” of the Shuler Hensley Awards.