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Board of Advisors

Anne Bogart
Artistic Director, SITI Company


Anne Bogart is the Artistic Director the SITI Company, which she founded with Japanese director Tadashi Suzuki in 1992. She is a Professor at Columbia University where she runs the Graduate Directing Program. Recent Works with SITI include Freshwater; Who Do You Think You Are; Radio Macbeth; Hotel Cassiopeia; Death and the Ploughman; La Dispute; Score; bobrauschenbergamerica; Room; War of the Worlds; Cabin Pressure; The Radio Play; Alice's Adventures; Culture of Desire; Bob; Going, Going, Gone; Small Lives/Big Dreams ; The Medium; Noel Coward's Hay Fever and Private Lives; August Strindberg's Miss Julie; and Charles Mee's Orestes. Other recent productions: Nicholas and Alexandra, Los Angeles Opera, Marina A Captive Spirit (American Opera Projects), Lilith and Seven Deadly Sins (New York City Opera). She is the author of three books: A Director Prepares, The Viewpoints Book and And Then, You Act.

Polly K. Carl, Ph.D.
Producing Artistic Director, the Playwrights' Center


As the artistic and strategic head of the Playwrights' Center, one of the nation's most revered playwriting hubs, Dr. Polly Carl oversees a quarter-million-dollar fellowship and residency program and curates an annual season of new play readings. In addition to commissioning and developing new work by many of the nation's most prominent playwrights, Carl manages ongoing collaborations with Twin Cities and national theater companies, launched an American-Japanese playwright exchange with Tokyo International Theater Festival, and regularly consults on the creation of new play programs for leading arts institutions.

Anne Cattaneo, Dramaturg of Lincoln Center Theater and the creator and head of the Lincoln Center Theater Directors' Lab.

Anne Cattaneo is the Dramaturg of Lincoln Center Theater and the creator and head of the Lincoln Center Theater Directors' Lab. A three-term past president of Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas, she is the recipient of LMDA's first Lessing Award for lifetime achievement of dramaturgy. She has worked widely as a dramaturg on classical plays with directors such as James Lapine, Robert Wilson, Adrian Hall, Jack O’Brien, Robert Falls, Mark Lamos, and JoAnne Akalaitis. As the director of the Playworks Program at the Phoenix Theater during the late 1970's, she commissioned and developed plays by Wendy Wasserstein (Isn't It Romantic), Mustapha Matura (Meetings), and Christopher Durang (Beyond Therapy). For the Acting Company, she created two projects: Orchards (published by Knopf and Broadway Play Publishing) which presented seven Chekhov stories adapted for the stage by Maria Irene Fornes, Spalding Gray, John Guare, David Mamet, Wendy Wasserstein, Michael Weller, and Samm-Art Williams; and Love's Fire (published by William Morrow), responses to Shakespeare sonnets by Eric Bogosian, William Finn, John Guare, Tony Kushner, Marsha Norman, Ntozake Shange, and Wendy Wasserstein. Her own translations of 20th-century German playwrights include Brecht's Galileo (Goodman Theater 1986 starring Brian Dennehy) and Botho Strauss' Big and Little (Phoenix production starring Barbara Barrie, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux). She is currently on the faculty at Juilliard.

Jennie Greer, Director of Institutional Advancement, New Dramatists

Jennie Greer recently returned to New Dramatists as Director of Institutional Advancement. She had previously served as Director of Development at New Dramatists for three and a half years. Greer worked most recently at Signature Theatre Company as the Director of Theatre Advancement. In that position, she oversaw development and marketing strategies, as well as the implementation of a new branding and communications campaign. She has also served as the Executive Director for The New Harmony Project, an Indiana-based organization dedicated to developing new works for theatre, film, and television. She is a proud graduate of the University of Evansville Department of Theatre and the MFA Performing Arts Management program at Brooklyn College.

Linda Herring, Executive Director, Tribeca Performing Arts Center

Linda Herring is the Executive Director of Tribeca Performing Arts Center at the Borough of Manhattan Community College. She received her MFA in Performing Arts Management from Brooklyn College and a second MFA in Dramaturgy. She was formerly the Managing Director of New Federal Theater for over 11 years. She was the recipient of a grant from the Theater Development Fund for her first commercial production, "Stories About the Old Days," by Bill Harris and starring Abbey Lincoln. The following year she produced the musical "Easy," conceived by Jeree Palmer Wade, music composed by Frank Owens, directed by Adam Wade. The project was presented at the AUDELCO Black Theater Festival. Herring has served as General Manager for several productions: "God's Trombones by James Weldon Johnson starring Theresa Merritt, Ossie Davis, Al Freeman, Jr., Tramaine Hawkins, and S. Epatha Merkerson at the Shubert Theatre in Philadelphia; "Zora Neale Hurston" by Laurence Holder and directed by Wynn Handman at the National Black Arts Festival; "Robert Johnson: Trick the Devil," by Bill Harris at the North Carolina Black Theater Festival. Herring is a native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and there she received her training and performance experience in the arts. As an undergraduate, she joined the Pittsburgh Black Theater and Dance Ensemble and later taught dance to children and adults through the company's training school, The Afro-American Dance Center. Her responsibilities expanded and included choreography, where she contributed to five seasons of the company's annual dance concerts. She is a board member of the Alliance of Resident Theaters/NewYork.

Morgan Jenness, Abrams Artists Agency; Board Member, Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas.

Morgan Jenness joined the Public Theater/New York Shakespeare Festival Play Development Department as a script reader and intern in 1979. By the time she left, in 1988, she was Literary Manager. Between 1988-1990, she was Associate Artistic Director at New York Theatre Workshop. In 1990, she moved to the Los Angeles Theater Center as Associate Director. A freelance dramaturg between 1991-93, her projects included Angels in America on Broadway. She returned to the Public in 1993, first as Director of Play Development and then in 1995 as Associate Producer. Her many activities included supervision of the LuEsther Lab and the Play Development Department, production supervision and dramaturgy, participation in season and administrative planning, producing New Work Now! A partial list of artists she has collaborated with includes: Reza Abdoh, John Belluso, Anne Bogart, Eric Bogosian, Joe Chaikin, Connie Congdon, Migdalia Cruz, Christopher Durang, David Esbjornson, Danny Hoch, Naomi Iizuka, Harry Kondolean, Tina Landau, Craig Lucas, Eduardo Machodo, Ruth Margraff, Michael Mayer, Jose Rivera, Anna Deavere Smith, Naomi Wallace, George C Wolfe. In 1998, she joined Helen Merrill Ltd as Creative Director. She is currently in the literary division at Abrams Artists Agency.

Susan Jonas has worked in theatre for over thirty years, first as a performer, then moving on to directing, translating and adapting, dramaturgy, administration, producing, scholarship, teaching, and working as an analyst and grant-maker in public funding. (Either she has eclectic interests or commitment issues.) Currently the Producing Director at the Classical Theatre of Harlem, she does everything from managing a multi-million dollar capital campaign to curating the new play development program and programming humanities events. For ten years she masqueraded as a civil servant or Arts Analyst in the Theatre Program at the New York State Council on the Arts; she apologizes for not having been able to give bigger grants to worthy artistic organizations. She also teaches at whatever university will have her - most recently New York University, and in previous years Princeton University, Connecticut College, Brooklyn College, S.U.N.Y. Stonybrook, Purchase College, Princeton University, Cooper Union, and Goddard College, etc. ad nauseum. She has written for various theatre periodicals, including American Theatre and Theatre, and co-authored the internationally read Report on the Status of Women in Theatre, as well as edited Dramaturgy and American Theater, the standard text in the subject in this and several other countries. She has worked as a resident dramaturg for The Acting Company, Classic Stage Company, and Rushmore Theater Festival, and freelanced for many other New York and regional theatres. Her adaptations and translations have been performed at the Manhattan Theatre Club and Williamstown Theatre Festival and toured nationally with the Lincoln Center Institute and The Acting Company among other companies. She was the Managing Director of the Ensemble Studio Theater and the Co-Founder and Co-Artistic Director of the Knickerbocker Theatre Festival. Dr. Jonas has also worked in film development for a variety of studios and agencies. She received her B.A. in Comparative Literature and Creative Writing from Princeton University and her M.F.A. and D.F.A. in Dramaturgy and Dramatic Criticism from Yale School of Drama. She is currently working on a really great secret project.

Lynn Nottage

Lynn Nottage is a playwright from Brooklyn. Her plays include Intimate Apparel, Fabulation, or the Re-Education of Undine, Crumbs from the Table of Joy, Las Meninas, and Ruined. They have been produced and developed at theatres both nationally and internationally, including the Manhattan Theatre Club, the Goodman Theatre, the Roundabout Theatre Company, Playwrights Horizons, Center Stage, South Coast Rep., Second Stage, Freedom Theatre, Sundance Institute Theatre Lab, St. Louis Black Rep., Crossroads Theatre, Intiman, San Jose Rep., Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Steppenwolf, Yale Rep., The Vineyard Theatre, The Women's Project, New Dramatists Playtime Lab, The Tricycle Theatre in London, among many others.
She is the recipient of numerous awards including the 2007 MacArthur Genius Award, an OBIE Award for playwriting, NY Drama Critics Circle Award, Best play and John Gassner Outer Critics Circle awards, American Theatre Critics/Steinberg 2004 New Play Award, 2004 Francesca Primus Award, and 2 AUDELCO awards. Lynn's most recent publications include: Intimate Apparel and Fabulation (TCG) and an anthology of her plays, Crumbs from the Table of Joy and Other Plays (TCG) which includes Crumbs from the Table of Joy, Las Meninas; Mud, River, Stone; Por'knockers and Poof! She was awarded a 2007 Lucille Lortel Foundation Fellowship, 2005 Guggenheim Fellowship, The National Black Theatre Festival's August Wilson Playwriting Award and the 2004 PEN/Laura Pels Award for Drama. She is a graduate of Brown University and the Yale School of Drama, where she is currently a visiting lecturer. Lynn is also a recent graduate of New Dramatists.
AWARDS

Joel Ruark, Executive Director, New Dramatists

Joel Ruark, Executive Director, New Dramatists, was Managing Director of New Dramatists from 1989 to 1992, and returned to the company in 2000 following seven years of management in the theatre and nonprofit sectors. Ruark served as Managing Director of Wind Dancer Theatre in New York, a division of Wind Dancer Productions. Prior to Wind Dancer, he served as CFO for Praxis Housing Initiatives, a nonprofit housing development agency serving the homeless and people with AIDS. Ruark previously held positions as Development Director of the George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick, NJ, General Manager of the Lambs Theatre in New York City, and Literary Manager of the Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia. He has worked in a variety of positions at professional companies including the New Jersey Shakespeare Festival, the Philadelphia Theatre Company, the Pennsylvania Ballet, and the Philadelphia Festival Theatre. A graduate of Ohio University, Ruark began his theatrical career as a literary management intern at Actors Theatre of Louisville.

Shelby Jiggetts-Tivony is the director of theatrical development for the Creative Entertainment division of Walt Disney Imagineering. In this capacity she has worked with a number of renowned theater artists including: Hinton Battle, Joe Calrco, Kirsten Childs, Dan Knechtges, Alan Menken, John Weidman and Francesca Zambello.

Prior to coming to Disney, Shelby spent over twelve years in the field of play development holding staff positions at such prestigious institutions as Crossroads Theater in New Brunswick, NJ, Lincoln Center Theater and the New York Shakespeare Festival/Joseph Papp Public Theater. As a dramaturge she has contributed to the development of over 30 plays and musicals that include several world and U.S. premieres, most notably, the award winning Bring In 'Da Noise, Bring In 'Da Funk!. Her publications include The Production Notebooks, edited by Mark Bly and she is one of the featured voices in Between the Lines: The Process of Dramaturgy by Judith Rudakoff and Lynn M. Thompson. Shelby has also been a contributor to American Theatre Magazine and is currently on the advisory committee of the Sundance Institute Theatre Program.


Copyright © 2007 America-in-Play dramaturgical project brought to you by Lynn M. Thomson. All Rights Reserved.