Tennessee Williams and the Avant Garde

Sat, Jan 15, 2011

Ari Fliakos and Kate Valk in Vieux Carre, image courtesy by Nancy Campbell

A group of noted experimental stage directors, including David Herskovitz, Moises Kaufman, Elizabeth LeCompte, and newcomer Travis Chamberlain, explore Tennessee Williams’ relation to the avant-garde and the ways in which these artists have deconstructed his works for contemporary audiences. Hosted by Andy Horwitz.

Participants

Travis Chamberlain is a director and curator based in New York City. Since 2007, he has produced and curated performances and public programs at the New Museum and from 2004-2007 served as Artistic Director at Galapagos Art Space in Brooklyn. His NYC premiere production of Tennessee Williams’ Green Eyes is being produced as a site-specific event in a suite at the Hudson Hotel January 5-23, presented by Performance Space 122 as part of COIL Festival.

David Herskovits is the Founder and Artistic Director of Target Margin Theater. New York City directing credits include: These Very Serious Jokes, Goethe’s Faust, The Mystery of the Charity of Joan of Arc,The Sandman, People Are Wrong, The Marriage of Figaro, The Hairy Ape. His 2010 production The Really Big Once, at The Ontological-Hysterical Theater, chronicled the tumultuous relationship between Tennessee Williams and Elia Kazan during the Broadway premiere of Camino Real (which Herskovitz also directed in 2009). Herskovitz also produced The Unknown Williams Lab in March 2010 at the Bushwick Starr, presenting several New York premieres of rarely produced short plays by Williams.

Moisés Kaufman is a Tony and Emmy nominated director and award-winning playwright. His directing credits include the Pulitzer and Tony Award winning I Am My Own Wife on Broadway (Obie award for direction, Tony, Outer Critics, Lucille Lortell, Drama Desk Awards nomination), Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde, and The Laramie Project. Mr. Kaufman is currently working on his adaptation of One Arm by Tennessee Williams for Steppenwolf Theater Company, as well as further plans for 33 Variations, about Beethoven's Diabelli Variations. Mr. Kaufman is a Guggenheim Fellow.

Elizabeth LeCompte is a founding member of The Wooster Group. Since 1975, she has directed all of the Group’s works, including 18 multimedia theatre pieces; seven film, video and DVD works; four short dance pieces. Her honours and awards include an Anonymous Was a Woman, NEA Distinguished Artists Fellowship for Lifetime Achievement in American Theatre, a MacArthur Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a US Artists Fellowship, and a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. The Wooster Group’s version of Tennessee Williams’ VIEUX CARRÉ will premiere in New York at the Baryshnikov Arts Center/Jerome Robbins Theater February 2-27. www.thewoostergroup.org

Andy Horwitz is a writer and curator. He has worked as producer at Performance Space 122 and as curator of PRELUDE, a festival of contemporary theater and performance at the Martin E. Segal Theater Center of the Graduate Center at CUNY. He founded and edits the arts website Culturebot.org. He is currently performing arts curator at the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. http://culturebot.org/

About The Kindness of Strangeness: Reframing Tennessee Williams @ 100

Produced in conjunction with the New York City premiere of Tennessee Williams’ Green Eyes (at the Hudson Hotel, 356 W 58th St., January 5- January 23), The Kindness of Strangeness: Reframing TennesseeWilliams @ 100 is a month-long series of companion programs inaugurating the centenary celebrations of Williams’ birth. Through public discussions, talkbacks, and film screenings, these programs reclaim Tennessee Williams as a pivotal member of the avant-garde and queer movements. Three keynote public conversations take place at the Museum of Arts and Design: I Remember Tenn (January 8), Tennessee Williams and the Avant Garde (January 15), and I’ve Covered the Waterfront: Tennessee Williams’ Queer Representations of Sex and Gender (January 22). Post show talkbacks and additional programming will take place at the Hudson Hotel and other locations around New York City.

Please review our health and safety protocols before you arrive. MAD strongly recommends all visitors six months and older are vaccinated against Covid-19 and visitors ages two and up wear face coverings, even if vaccinated. Thank you for your cooperation.

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