The Star’s culture writer Terence Toh picked up the Best Original Book and Best Original Score awards at the recent 17th Boh Cameronian Arts Awards (BCAA).
Toh, 33, won the Best Original Book award (musical theatre category) for The Working Dead, a full-length musical about corporate zombies which played at KLPac last year.
“I have followed the Cammies every year since I was a teen and to actually win one feels amazing,” says Toh, who started out in The Star‘s newsdesk before moving to the arts and culture section in 2014.
The Working Dead also won the Best Original Score, a work featuring Toh alongside Kelvin Loh, and Lydia Tong, and Best Musical Direction (Loh) awards at the BCAA, which was streamed live via Facebook on July 2.
Toh also co-wrote another full-length musical (his first) last year with playwright Cheah UiHua called Euphrasia – The Musical. The show won four awards at the BCAA, including Best Sound Direction, Best Ensemble, Best Choreographer and Best Lighting.
“I am definitely inspired to keep on writing and creating new works after this, ” says Toh, who started his professional journey in musical theatre in 2014 when he joined the Short & Sweet Malaysia festival.
This year’s BCAA, organised by arts portal Kakiseni, honoured outstanding achievements in 37 categories of music, dance, theatre and musical theatre productions that were produced, performed and staged live in the Klang Valley last year.