'Record-Breaking' Wins For Chatham At State Theatre Competition

CHATHAM, NJ — Students in the Chatham High School theatre program came away with several awards and recognitions from the Speech and Theatre Association of New Jersey (STANJ) Governor's Awards.

STANJ is a statewide theatre competition in which participants compete for various governor's awards. On Jan. 10, this year's event was held at Montclair State University.

Theatre students from Chatham High School competed for awards in categories such as dramatic and comedic monologues, pairs, best actor, best actress, improvisation, pairs and senior scholarship.

Chatham Senior Tommy Nonnenmacher was one of only two students to receive the Governor's Senior Scholarship.

"This was a record-breaking year for CHS Theatre students--taking home 20 awards in total," Laura Russo, Chatham High School theatre teacher, said. "I am beyond proud of their hard work and dedication to this event. The encouragement and support they provide one another throughout the day is truly unmatched."

The STANJ, according to its website, is the advocate for the inclusion of speech and theatre arts in educational curricula.

Members of the organization come from elementary, middle, high school, college and professional theatres and are interested in acting, directing, forensics, musical theatre and technical theatre.

Among its famous and notable alumni is Gaten Matarazzo of Netflix's "Stranger Things," who attended STANJ with his theatre program for several years and won a governor's award for dramatic pairs in 2020.

Here is the full list of Chatham winners:

• Tommy Nonnenmacher: Senior Scholarship Winner
• Julia Wilcox: 1st Place Contrasting Monologues
• Tommy Nonnenmacher: 1st Place Musical Solo
• Emma Eveleth: 1st Place Short Film
• Ellie Herr: 1st Place Pantomime Solo
• Sophia Insua and Madi Kaplan: 1st Place Pantomime Pairs
• Matt Engel and Tommy Nonnenmacher: 2nd Place Comedic Pairs
• Morgan McGarry: 3rd Place Dramatic Monologue
• Charley Baird-Hassell and Madi Kaplan: 4th Place Dramatic Pairs
• Evie Dittmann and Sydney Hnatov: 4th Place Comedic Pairs
• Evie Dittmann: 5th Place Contrasting Monologues
• Andrew Krautheim: 6th Place Comedic Monologue
• Charley Baird-Hassell and Andrew Krautheim: 6th Place Improv Pairs

• JJ Horan: Comedic Monologue
• Matt Engel and Tommy Nonnenmacher: Dramatic Pairs
• Ellie Herr: Contrasting Monologues
• Jonas Wilcox: Contrasting Monologues
• Sadie Javello: Contrasting Monologues
• Charley Baird-Hassell and Niamh O’Connor: Musical Pairs
• Matt Engel and Gabrielle Vecciarelli: Musical Pairs