SEGAL TALKS with Alexis Greene & Emily Mann on Wednesday 1 December 2021

The Martin E. Segal Theatre Center presents SEGAL TALKS, a conversation about curating, producing, and presenting theatre and performance in the time of COVID with Alexis Greene & Emily Mann, livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network on Wednesday 1 December at 9 a.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 11 a.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 12 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5) / 17:00 GMT (London, UTC +0) / 18:00 CET (Berlin, UTC +1).
SEGAL TALKS: Alexis Greene & Emily Mann- ‘EMILY MANN: Rebel Artist of the American Theater’
Join us for a conversation with Alexis Greene & Emily Mann about Greene’s new book: EMILY MANN: Rebel Artist of the American Theater. Part of the Segal Center’s Fall 2021 Book Talk Series. Moderated by Frank Hentschker, Director, MESTC, The Graduate Center CUNY.
About EMILY MANN: Rebel Artist of the American Theater:
The book traces and describes Emily Mann’s family life; her coming-of-age in Chicago during the exuberant, rebellious, and often violent 1960s; how sexual violence touched her personally; and how she fell in love with theater at the Lab School in Chicago and began learning her craft at the Loeb Drama Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts, while a student at Radcliffe. Mann’s evolution as a professional director and playwright is explored, first at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, where she became the first woman to direct on the Guthrie’s main stage, then on and off Broadway and at regional theaters. Mann’s leadership of the McCarter Theatre Center is examined, along with her battles to overcome multiple sclerosis and to conquer-personally and artistically-the memories of the violence she experienced when a teenager. It is the story of a woman who defied the American theater’s sexism, a traumatic assault, and illness to create unique documentary plays and to lead the McCarter Theatre Center, for thirty seasons, to a place of national recognition.
Alexis Greene is an author, arts journalist and teacher. Recently she completed a biography of the pioneering playwright, stage director and leader of the McCarter Theatre Center: EMILY MANN: Rebel Artist of the American Theater (Applause Theatre & Cinema Books). In addition to her biography of Emily Mann, Greene has written or edited ten books about women in the American theater, including Women Who Write Plays: Interviews with American Dramatists; Lucille Lortel: The Queen of Off Broadway; Front Lines: Political Plays by American Women (co-edited with Shirley Lauro); and Pride Rock: The Lion King on Broadway, written with Julie Taymor. Greene’s articles have appeared in the New York Times, the New York Daily News, and American Theatre magazine, among other publications. She holds a Ph.D. in theater from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and has taught at Hunter College and New York University. She is a co-founder and was first president of Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas (LMDA).
Emily Mann is a Tony nominated director and playwright and a Tony winning Artistic Director. In her 30 years as Artistic Director and Resident Playwright at McCarter Theatre Center in Princeton, New Jersey, she wrote 15 new plays and adaptations, directed over 50 productions, produced 180 plays and musicals, and supported and directed the work of emerging and legendary playwrights. She has directed world premieres by Ntozake Shange, Edward Albee, Marina Carr, Christopher Durang, Nilo Cruz, Danai Gurira among others, and is known for her productions of Williams, Lorca, Chekhov, Shakespeare and Ibsen. On Broadway, she directed Execution of Justice and Having Our Say; Nilo Cruz’s Anna in the Tropics, and A Streetcar Named Desire. Her plays: Having Our Say, adapted from the book by Sarah L. Delany and A. Elizabeth Delany with Amy Hill Hearth; Execution of Justice; Still Life; Annulla, An Autobiography; Greensboro (A Requiem); Meshugah; Mrs. Packard, Hoodwinked (a Primer on Radical Islamism). Adaptations: Baby Doll, Scenes from a Marriage, Uncle Vanya, The Cherry Orchard, A Seagull in the Hamptons, The House of Bernarda Alba, and Antigone. Currently in development for Broadway: her adaptation of The Pianist and a new musical, Our Souls at Night, with composer Lucy Simon and lyricist Susan Birkenhead. Her play, Gloria: A Life about the legacy of Gloria Steinem, ran Off-Broadway and aired on PBS’ Great Performances. Awards: Peabody (for her teleplay of Having Our Say), Guggenheim, Hull Warriner, NAACP, 6 Obies; Tony, Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle, WGA nominations; Princeton University Honorary Doctorate of Arts; Helen Merrill Distinguished Playwrights’ Award; Margo Jones Award; TCG Visionary Leadership Award; The Lilly and Gordon Davidson Awards both for Lifetime Achievement in the Theater. She was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.
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