Tag: Arena Stage
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The Ms. Q&A: Why Holland Taylor Wanted to Act Like Ann Richards
Originally published by Ms. Magazine on September 16, 2019. I’ve always looked forward to being old enough to play Ann Richards in a one-woman show—so imagine what happened when I saw that Holland Taylor’s Ann was on Broadway HD and running at Arena Stage, with Jayne Atkinson in the starring role. I was eager to talk to […]
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A Feminist Retelling of Sovereignty
Originally published by Ms. Magazine Blog on January 10, 2018 As a student at Tulane Law School, activist, writer and lawyer Mary Kathryn Nagle once persuaded her Critical Race Theory professor to let her write a play as her final paper that was based on Worcester v. Georgia, an 1832 case in which the Supreme Court ruled that tribal […]
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Truthful Intelligence: A Play about Power and Politics
Originally published by HowlRound on February 24, 2017. Exactly eight days after Donald Trump was elected president, Oxford Dictionaries selected “post-truth”—defined as “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief”—as 2016’s international word of the year, citing a 2000 percent […]
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Lynn Nottage Talks Research, Collaboration, and the Fracturing of America,
Originally published by Howlround on January 28, 2016 Lynn Nottage’s newest play, Sweat, a co-commission by Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) and Arena Stage, originated in OSF’s American Revolutions: The United States History Cycle. Nottage’s contribution to this ten-year program of commissioning “up to thirty-seven new plays from moments of change in United States history” deals […]
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Women’s Voices Theater Festival: A Weekend in the Emerald City
Originally published by HowlRound on November 10, 2015 This piece is a follow up to an earlier preview of the Women’s Voices Theater Festival. Read the original piece here. Was it Oz? Well, it took me about as long to recover from my weekend in DC as I imagine it took Dorothy to settle back […]
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The Little-Told Story of Elizabeth Keckley and Mary Todd Lincoln
Cross posted at Ms. As the DVD of Spielberg’s latest epic, Lincoln, hit shelves last week, the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C. was telling a different Lincoln story: that of Mary Todd Lincoln and her dressmaker, former slave Elizabeth Keckley. Keckley, author of Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty years a Slave, and Four Years in […]
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Race on Stage and in the Rehearsal Room: Tazewell Thompson’s Mary T. and Lizzy K.
What made you want to write a play about Elizabeth Keckly and Mary Todd Lincoln? Thompson: I was actually commissioned to write play in 2001 and the only stipulation was that it be set in Washington. When Molly Smith, artistic director of Arena, said “Washington” I immediately thought political and I thought Lincoln. The idea […]
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Trains, Pullman Porters and a Woman’s Blues
Cross posted at Ms. What do you get when you combine passionate individuals determined to survive with multi-generational family drama and two key moments in African American history? A pretty great new play, that’s what. Opening November 23 at Arena Stage in Washington, DC, Pullman Porter Blues, by Cheryl L. West (Jar the Floor, Before […]
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Cheryl L. West, Lisa Peterson, E. Faye Butler, and Christine Sumption on Pullman Porter Blues
A conversation about the new play Pullman Porter Blues with playwright Cheryl L. West, director Lisa Peterson, actor E. Faye Butler, and dramaturg Christine Sumption. Read the full article at Ms. The Ms. Magazine Blog: What would you say Pullman Porter Blues is about? West: The entire play really is about how do you survive: […]
Holly L. Derr 