The Grammy’s, the Academy Awards, the Golden Globes – most major awards shows struggle to maintain tradition, while simultaneously, becoming relevant to a new generation of viewers.

The challenge isn’t unique to Hollywood’s red-carpet extravaganzas. In San Diego, following a two-year hiatus, the organizers of the Nicky Awards, San Diego’s GLBT community honors, were tasked with revamping the show for a young, vibrant audience, accustomed to sound bites and flashy performances.

Enter Michael Mack and David Cohen, owners of Hawthorn’s Restaurant Lounge. The pair knew to make the Nicky Awards a draw for a young crowd, the once-lengthy show needed an overhaul: new location, new awards categories, new performers, and the full red-carpet, VIP treatment.

Taking the reigns (with permission, of course) from Nicole Murray-Ramirez, the omnipresent activist and founder of the Nickys, Mack and Cohen, along with the awards show’s board of governors and the community’s support, are attempting to create a show reminiscent of the GLAAD Awards, and notable community awards events.

“We’re trying to, and we will, make this similar to the format of the GLAAD Awards – in format, scope and entertainment value,” says Cohen.

The most notable of changes, perhaps, is the venue – a convenient location for the Hawthorn’s business owners. The show has upgraded from hotel ballrooms to the Birch North Park Theatre, which has been a draw for the show’s A-list entertainment.

“The fact that we’re doing this in a theater has made it easier to secure entertainment, because they know this is a serious production,” Cohen says. “It isn’t a hotel ballroom, it isn’t a rinky-dink stage. We’re going to have a million dollars in equipment we’ll be using that night, so entertainers know they’re going to look and sound amazing.”

Among the entertainers, the Nicky Awards have secured Mack’s friend, Niki Haris, who was a backup singer touring and performing with Madonna for 18 years.

“She’s very high energy,” Mack says. “She ranges from jazz to R&B to dance – she has a wide array of CDs out.”

“She’s very Madonna-esque at times,” Cohen says. “She took a lot of direction from Madonna. She’s very performance oriented and high energy.”

“That’s what we needed, one thing the Nickys lacked in the past,” Mack says. “It was award after award – we really needed to step it up and entertain everyone.”

With Haris on board, the pair also lined up guitarist David Casey with dance performers Gabriel Winns, Megan McBride, Elizabeth Halajian, and dance crew SuperGalacticBeatManipulators, formed under the direction of Kevin Brewer, who also launched the Jabbawockeez, crowned America’s Best Dance Crew on MTV.

Mack and Cohen also lined up Monique Marvez, host of Jack FM’s Monique & The Man morning radio show, who will inject humor among the awards distribution.

“She’s so supportive of the gay community,” says Cohen. “She takes jabs at us every now and then, but it’s because she loves us so much – she has done Mama’s Kitchen events for years. She’s just so supportive.”

With the new venue, the entertainment lineup and a full orchestra (prepped to cue up music and hustle chatty awards recipients off stage), the stage is set for The Nicky Awards return to San Diego, May 19 at 7:30 p.m.

With all the change, Mack and Cohen say the heart of the show, honoring the best of San Diego’s GLBT community, will remain intact.

After all, this is the events 30th year of doing so. And while the categories may have changed through the years, the meaning behind the awards ceremony has not.

“Through the years the Nickys have remained a way for the community to come together to show appreciation for the work that so many people do, but yet it so often goes unrecognized,” said “Big” Mike Phillips, who notes that winning a Nicky Award can be a very humbling and joyful experience.

The recipient of nine Nickys – including Best Bartender, Most Popular Personality, and Man of the Year, as well as the Awards’ highest honor, the Board of Governor’s Award for his work with Ordinary Miracles – Phillips, who now sits on the board of governors, says of any of the recognition he has received for his work in the GLBT community in the past two decades, he is proudest of his Nickys.

“I finally knew that people truly appreciated the work I have done and they were saying it in a very meaningful way,” Phillips says.

This year the community had the opportunity to vote online, as well as at the traditional Nicky Award Nomination Parties held at local bars. While many of the award categories are similar to years past, there are a few changes.

And although Murray-Ramirez has taken a hands-off approach to this years Nickys, it is a given that he couldn’t completely let go of his cherished awards show.

He admits that while travel obligations and health problems required he not be at the helm of the awards, he ensured that among the some of the new categories included would be Outstanding Transgender Personality and Outstanding Levi / Leather Personality.

According to event organizers, there will also be three Board of Governors Awards handed out this year.

MTV will be the recipient of the Harvey Milk Leadership Award and Tom Blair, editor of San Diego Magazine, will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award in Journalism.

“For some 15 years, when he wrote for the Union-Tribune, Blair was San Diego’s best-read columnist and he is a member of the gay community,” Murray-Ramirez says, chiming in that GLT readers know who the most read columnist is these days.

He also says that what sets this year’s awards apart from years past is that for only the third time the prestigious Mayor George Mosconi Award will be presented to who he would only say is a very “special recipient.”

Murray-Ramirez did however say this special award, like all Nickys in the end make one thing very clear: “I believe in saying thank you and recognizing people,” says the philanthropist, whose work in the GLBT community spans more than four decades.

“The Nicky Awards are about two words that should be said more often – not only in the GLBT community but in all communities – and that is thank you.”

Proceeds from this year’s Nicky Awards will go to The Center, The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, Children’s Summer Academy, and the Imperial Court of San Diego. The Board of Governors is still accepting donations for the silent auction.

The Nicky Awards will be held on Monday, May 19, at the Birch North Park Theatre. Awards ceremony doors open at 6:30 p.m. and the event starts at 7:30 p.m.

For more information, visit www.nickyawards.com.