School Notes: David Geffen School of Drama
July/August 2015

Yale at the Tony Awards

Yale University was represented at the Tony Awards this year by ten nominees, and three took home a Tony.  Michael Cerveris ’83 was named Best Actor in a Musical for his role in Fun Home.  Also nominated for performance: Patricia Clarkson ’85MFA and Allesandro Nivola ’94 (The Elephant Man) and Victoria Clark ’82 (Gigi). Catherine Zuber ’84MFA received her sixth Tony for her costumes in The King and I.  Nominations in this category also went to Jane Greenwood (faculty) for You Can’t Take it With You, and William Ivey Long ’75MFA for On the Twentieth Century. Joey Parnes (faculty) took home the Tony for Best Revival of a Play (Skylight); he was also nominated in the same category for This is Our Youth. Scenic designer Michael Yeargan (’73MFA, cochair of design) and Donald Holder ’86MFA (lighting design) each received nominations for their work on The King and I. The 2015 Tony Awards were presented on June 7 in New York City.

Yale Institute for Music Theatre

Established in 2009, the Yale Institute for Music Theatre is a program of Yale’s Binger Center for New Theatre that bridges the gap between training and the professional world for emerging composers, book writers, and lyricists. The institute seeks distinctive and original music theater works to be developed in an intensive two-week summer lab at Yale School of Drama, and matches the authors of the selected works with collaborators, including professional directors and music directors, as well as a company of actors and singers that includes professionals and current Yale students. The lab culminates with open rehearsal readings of each project, presented as part of New Haven’s International Festival of Arts & Ideas in June. The 2015 selections were gilgamesh & the mosquito with music by Bob Kelly and book and lyrics by Sam Chanse, directed by Lee Sunday Evans; and Horizons with music by Ben Wexler ’12 and book and lyrics by Mark Sonnenblick ’12, directed by Mark Brokaw ’86MFA, who serves as artistic director of the institute.