School Notes: David Geffen School of Drama
July/August 2010

Award-winning playwright joins faculty

Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award winner Doug Wright ’85 will join the Yale School of Drama faculty as a lecturer in playwriting for the fall 2010 semester. Paula Vogel, the Eugene O’Neill Chair of the playwriting department, will take a one-semester leave of absence in the fall to work on a new play commissioned by Yale Rep through the Yale Center for New Theatre. Doug Wright received the Pulitzer Prize, a Tony Award for Best Play, the Drama Desk Award, a GLAAD Media Award, an Outer Critics Circle Award, a Drama League Award, and a Lucille Lortel Award for his play I Am My Own Wife. His other works include the books for the Broadway musicals Grey Gardens and The Little Mermaid, as well as the plays Quills, The Stonewater Rapture, Interrogating the Nude, Watbanaland, Buzzsaw Berkeley, and Unwrap Your Candy.  For a Yale Alumni Magazinereport on Wright’s work, see “Symphony for One,” Arts & Culture, July/August 2004.)

Yale School of Drama at the Tonys

School of Drama alumni were represented with 14 Tony nominations and two Tony awards, which were handed out on June 13. Lynne Meadow ’71Dra, artistic director of Manhattan Theatre Club, received two nominations, as producer of Time Stands Still and The Royal Family. Liev Schreiber ’92MFA was nominated in the Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Play category for his role in A View from the Bridge; and David Alan Grier ’81MFA was nominated for Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Play for his role in Race. Three of the four Best Scenic Design of a Play nominees received their MFAs from the School of Drama: John Lee Beatty ’74, The Royal Family; Alexander Dodge ’99, Present Laughter; and Santo Loquasto ’72, Fences. Marina Draghici ’88MFA received two nominations, Best Costume Design and Best Scenic Design of a Musical, for her work on Fela! She took home the Tony for costume design. Derek McLane ’84MFA was also nominated in the Best Scenic Design of a Musical category for Ragtime. Lighting designers Donald Holder ’86MFA and Robert Wierzel ’84MFA were both nominated for their work on the musicals Ragtime and Fela!And Constanza Romero ’88MFA and Catherine Zuber ’84CDR were both nominated for Best Costume Design of a Play forFences and The Royal Family, respectively; Zuber won the Tony in this category.

Connecticut Critics honor Yale Rep

Yale Repertory Theatre productions received five 2010 Connecticut Critics Circle awards, including Outstanding Production of a Play for Eclipsed by Danai Gurira and Outstanding Production of a Musical for POP! by Maggie-Kate Coleman and Anna K. Jacobs. Brian Charles Rooney was named Outstanding Actor in a Musical for his performance as Candy Darling in POP!; Kevin Adams received the Outstanding Lighting Design Award (also for POP!); and Chad Raines ’11MFA garnered the award for Outstanding Sound Design for Battle of Black and Dogs. Yale Rep productions were honored with an additional 12 nominations.