DeVoy Perspectives on Theatre Series

Daniel Alexander Jones

Hailed by Backstage Magazine as “a true theatrical original,” by American Theatre Magazine as an artist whose work will “change American stages for decades to come,” and by the Public Theater as “a boundary breaking visionary,” artist Daniel Alexander Jones is not one to follow the rules. Although Jones is a playwright, a performer, a recording artist, and a director— rather than conform to just one genre or role— he says that “energy is [his] true medium.”

In 2000, Jones received the inaugural grant from Creative Capital which “supports innovative and adventurous artists through funding, counsel, and career development services.” He was later granted the 2005 Herb Alpert Award in the Arts which is “given annually to five risk-taking mid-career artists [who are] respected for their creativity, ingenuity, and bodies of work.” In 2015 he received the Doris Duke Award which honors artists “who have demonstrated artistic vitality in their work and a deep commitment to their field,” as well as the Art Matters Grant which “provides fellowships to individual artists working with social issues and experimenting in form.” Jones was a 2016 United States Artist Fellow, which “celebrates artists who have significantly contributed to the creative landscape and arts ecosystem of the country.”

Jones’ critically-acclaimed original work, Black Light, is part of American Repertory Theater’s 19-20 Season and will be performed in Cambridge, MA at OBERON September 19-29, 2019. Commissioned by Joe’s Pub and produced by the Public Theater in 2017, Black Light is described as “a spiritual revival for turbulent times. Jomama Jones invites us to the Crossroads to contemplate what we must choose at this moment in our own lives, in our civic relationships, in our country, and our world.” Jones describes Jomama as his “alter ego,” and has created three other original performance pieces for her: An Evening with Jomama, Radiate, and Night Flowers. Jomama has also recorded five albums of original songs. In an interview with MPR News (Minnesota Public Radio), Jones explained how Jomama appeared to him as a fully formed being: “…she arrived in a way that was very different from the other kind of characters that I’ve performed or written…It was an energy that was very big, extremely clear, and distinct from me.” New York Magazine affirms that “Jomama [moves us] to go from Black Light back out into daylight with our senses somehow both sharpened and softened: more able to hear others [and] more able to see ourselves.”

Jones’ other original performance works include Phantasmatron, Hera Bright, The Book of Daniel, Bel Canto, Earthbirths, Clayangels, Duat, An Integrator’s Manual, and Bright Now Beyond, among others. Jones is a former Core Writer of the Playwrights’ Center, and from 2003-2010 he was a Resident Playwright with New Dramatists. He has written essays and conducted artist interviews for HowlRound Theatre Commons. And he is currently working on a book of creative nonfiction called WAVES (A Manual for Bearing Light), which “chronicles his journey through a series of powerful lessons learned from pivotal mentors, places, and moments in time. Resonant with the call and response of Blackness, Queerness, Experimentation, Lineage, and Transformation, the book offers evidence of lives lived beyond binaries and boundaries…”

Jones did his undergraduate study at Vassar College (1991) in Africana Studies with a focus on literature and the arts, and graduate theatre study at Brown University (1993). He is currently an Associate Professor of Theatre at Fordham University where he teaches playwriting, solo performance, and theatre history.

The October 1st DeVoy Perspectives on Theatre Series lecture will focus on challenging the conventional “rules” of theatre; Jones will speak about the process for his experimental projects, and the value of having a diverse array of artistic mentors, particularly women and people of color. The lecture will be followed by an artist Q&A session.

Marcus Gardley

Award-winning Playwright Marcus Gardley to give lecture at Boston College in DeVoy Perspectives on Theatre Series

Playwright Marcus Gardley will give a lecture in the Matthew R. DeVoy and John H. DeVoy IV Perspectives on Theatre Series on Thursday, October 11, 2018. The event will start at 7:00pm in the Robsham Theater Art Center.

Described by the New Yorker as “the heir to Federico Garcia Lorca, Luigi Pirandello, and Tennessee Williams,” Gardley’s plays have been produced at some of the country’s most renowned theaters such as Arena Stage, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Lincoln Center Theater, and Yale Repertory Theatre, among others.

In 2009 Gardley was named one of “50 to watch” by The Dramatist magazine. He is the recipient of the PEN/Laura Pels award for Mid-Career Playwright (2011), which honors a “playwright whose literary achievements are vividly apparent in the rich and striking language of his or her work.” He is a former United States Artists James Baldwin Fellow (2012) for Theater and Performance, which recognized him as one of “America’s most accomplished and innovative artists.” He was also the 2011-2012 Aetna New Voices Fellow at Hartford Stage which provides “an artistic home for important playwrights of diversity and color.”

Gardley’s work- which often centers on African American history and allegory-  challenges audiences by tackling complex social and political issues. He views his work as a form of activism, and has stated that he “can’t tell a story if there isn’t a political point.” In a 2015 interview with the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), Gardley affirmed that “What I intend for [the plays] to do, is cause conversation. From that conversation, [I hope] people are not only inspired to see more theater, but also inspired to do things in their community, so that the work is actually causing a spark for change.”

Winner of the 2010 Edgerton Foundation New Play Award, a nominee for the Steinberg New Play Award, and a nominee for the Charles MacArthur Award for Best Play, Gardley’s play Every Tongue Confess depicts intergenerational tales of loss and redemption in the town of Boligee, Alabama by intertwining biblical stories and events from the town’s own history. In 2014, his play The Gospel of Lovingkindness won the Black Theater Alliance Award (BTAA) for best play/playwright. Inspired by true events, …Lovingkindness is a drama about faith, family, and loss at the hands of gun violence.

In The Road Weeps, The Well Runs Dry, the myth, folklore, and history of the Black Seminole people emerges in the first all-black U.S. town in Wewoka, Oklahoma. Following its premier run at South Coast Repertory Theatre, The Road Weeps… had a national tour and became a finalist for the 2014 Edward M. Kennedy Prize for Drama Inspired by American History, which honors “a new play or musical each year that enlists theater’s power to explore the past of the United States, and to participate meaningfully in the great issues of our day through public conversation.”

Gardley’s play, The House That Will Not Stand, which recently opened off-Broadway at the New York Theatre Workshop in July 2018, earned him the 2014 Will Glickman Playwright Award and was a finalist for the 2015 Kennedy Prize. Regarding the world premiere production of The House That Will Not Stand at Berkeley Repertory Theater, Artistic Director, Tony Taccone, stated: “Marcus’ unique voice- at once lyrical, rigorous, and humorous- gave us a look at a little-known part of our history, and the result was compelling and illuminating.”

His recent work, Black Odyssey, which blends Greek mythology and African-American folklore to form a new vision of Homer’s 8th Century classic, received nine Excellence in Theatre Award nominations from the San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle, and won seven Theatre Bay Area awards (including “Outstanding Production of a Play” and the “Creative Specialties” award for Gardley’s adaptation of Homer’s Odyssey) for its August 2017 West Coast premiere production at California Shakespeare Theater. Black Odyssey will have its Boston premiere in April 2019, co-produced by Central Square Theater and The Front Porch Arts Collective, “a black-led theatre company committed to advancing racial equity in Boston through theater.”

The Front Porch Arts Collective Executive Director (and this year’s Rev. J. Donald Monan S.J. Professor in Theatre Arts), Maurice Emmanuel Parent, and his professional partner, Front Porch Artistic Director Dawn M. Simmons, started the non-profit in early 2017 with an opening season that included a 7-part reading series of Gardley’s plays, including the works The House That Will Not Stand, Dance of the Holy Ghosts, and Jesus Moonwalks the Mississippi, among others. "Marcus Gardley’s work is both relatable and sublime,” says Parent. “He blends magical realism with the particulars of the Black experience in a way that is impactful to members of our community and speaks to the essential humanity of all people.”

Wayne Wilderson ‘89 & Maile Flanagan ‘87

Actors Wayne Wilderson ‘89 & Maile Flanagan ‘87 will give a joint lecture about their journey from Boston College to thriving careers in television and film on Thursday, November 2, 2017 at 7:00pm in the Robsham Theater Arts Center on BC’s Chestnut Hill campus.

Wayne Wilderson, actor and comedian, hails from Minnesota and received his B.A. in Theatre Arts from Boston College. After graduating from BC in 1989, he attended Circle in the Square Theatre School in NYC, the only accredited training conservatory associated with a Broadway theatre. He is a longtime member of the Screen Actors Guild (SAG-AFTRA), which represents approximately 160,000 actors, dancers, singers, stunt performers, voiceover artists, and other media professionals.

A veteran of the “small screen,” Wayne has made guest appearances on some of TV’s biggest hits, such as The Office, How to Get Away with Murder, The Big Bang Theory, Mom, The Middle, Two and a Half Men, Private Practice, CSI, Frasier, Seinfeld, and more than 30 other TV programs. He is perhaps best known for his recurring role in Season Five on Veep, for which he was nominated for a SAG award for “Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series” (2012).

Wilderson has appeared in the films Evan Almighty, Independence Day, and Disney’s Space Buddies, among others. He is also a frequent commercial actor, having appeared in national commercials for Fruit of the Loom (portraying the purple grape cluster!), MasterCard, Reebok, Yahoo!, Toyota, Chevrolet, Sealy, and PlayStation Portable, among several others.

Julie Burros

The Boston College Theatre department is thrilled to announce that Boston’s Chief of Arts and Culture, Julie Burros, will give a lecture in the Matthew R. DeVoy and John H. DeVoy IV Perspectives on Theatre Series on Thursday, April 21, 2016. The event will start at 7:00 pm in Fulton Hall, room 511.

Appointed by Mayor Martin Walsh in December 2014, Ms. Burros has been steadfastly planning Boston’s cultural future as the primary advocate for the arts community. Burros was instrumental in launching Boston Creates, Boston’s cultural planning process, which will create a blueprint for arts and culture in the City. Over the past year, Boston Creates has been engaging residents, visitors, and stakeholders to help local government identify cultural needs, opportunities, and resources and to think strategically about how these resources can help the community to achieve its civic goals. A primary goal of Boston Creates is to make Boston’s arts and culture ecosystem stronger, more accessible, more sustainable, and more diverse. The announcement of the City’s official cultural plan is expected in June of this year.

The 2016 DeVoy Perspectives on Theatre Series lecture, entitled Boston Creates: A Vision for the Arts, will focus on the role of City government in cultural planning and how the work of Boston Creates will impact the City’s cultural future which includes thousands of students, many of whom will go on to contribute to Boston’s vibrant creative community.

“Boston has so many cultural programs in need of the kind of recognition and support that Julie Burros will give them,” says Crystal Tiala, Chair of Theatre at Boston College. “It is encouraging that our city now has a steadfast advocate for the arts and for arts education. The potential for Boston’s cultural landscape to grow and change over the next ten years is truly exciting.”

One of Burros’ latest ventures was launching a new artists-in-resident program (Boston AIR), which connects local artists and City employees who work together to promote creative thinking about municipal government. The artists will work alongside a group of liaisons from city agencies, including: Public Works, Veterans' Services, Commission for Persons with Disabilities, Education, Women's Advancement, and the Boston Police Department, among others (cityofboston.gov). Other projects Burros overseas include public art installations, exhibits in City Hall, the Mayor's Mural Crew, and more recently, the operation of the historic Strand Theater in Dorchester.

As the Mayor’s cabinet-level commissioner for the arts, Burros plays an essential role in the future of Boston’s theater scene, leading decisions as wide-ranging as affordable artist housing, resources for sustainable funding for non-profit companies, renting City spaces for rehearsals and performances, and working with the leaders of the Huntington Theatre to find the company a permanent home. When asked by The Boston Globe in February 2015 what her “number one” performance choice would be, Burros responded: “...between an opera or a concert, a poetry reading or a gallery opening, or a play-- I’m almost always going to choose the play.”

Before arriving in Boston, Burros worked for 15 years as the Director of Cultural Planning for the City of Chicago’s Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events with the intention of “building on the arts community that was already there, and moving it forward” in order to make Chicago a major cultural destination. While there, Burros led the creation of the Chicago Cultural Plan, which was awarded the 2013 Burnham Award for Excellence in Planning for “visionary planning efforts with demonstrated results in the Chicago metropolitan region” from the Metropolitan Planning Council (metroplanning.org). Her leadership in Chicago also included the 2009 Burnham Pavilions in Millennium Park, which featured architectural exhibits designed by artists from London and Amsterdam. Additionally, Burros worked for more than a decade as a Chicago Architecture docent, developing and conducting tours and serving as an interpreter of Chicago’s architecture and history.

Ms. Burros is also familiar with university life, having taught for 13 years as an adjunct faculty member teaching Cultural Policy in the Theatre School at DePaul University, and Metropolitan Planning and Development at DePaul’s Graduate School of Public Service. She earned her M.S. in Urban Planning from Columbia University, completed the Career Discovery program in Urban Planning at Harvard University, and received a B.A. in Sociology from the University of Chicago.

Julie Burros is the third speaker in the Matthew R. DeVoy and John H. DeVoy IV Perspectives on Theatre Series, a program made possible by a generous gift from the DeVoy family. The series brings leading professionals and major creative forces in the arts to Boston College on an annual basis to share their experience and their vision with the campus community and with interested alumni and members of the greater Boston arts community. The inaugural DeVoy lecture was presented in April 2014 with American theatre visionary, director, and author Anne Bogart, followed by Tony nominated Actor and humanitarian, Bryce Pinkham, in March 2015.

Bryce Pinkham

Chestnut Hill, MA (October 30, 2014) The Boston College Theatre department is pleased to announce that Broadway actor and Tony Award Nominee, Bryce Pinkham, will give a lecture in the Matthew R. DeVoy and John H. DeVoy IV Perspectives on Theatre Series on Monday, March 23, 2015. The event will start at 7:00 pm in the Robsham Theater Mainstage.

A stage and television actor, Pinkham is currently starring in the title role in the Broadway production of A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder, for which he was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Musical. Starting in February 2015, he will play the role of Peter Patrone in the Broadway revival of The Heidi Chronicles alongside Mad Men star, Elizabeth Moss.

During his visit, Pinkham will be a guest artist for two Theatre department courses, and his evening lecture will focus on the life and career of a Broadway actor, and the importance of creating educational and social change through the arts. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Pinkham is the second speaker in the DeVoy Perspectives on Theatre Series, a program made possible by a generous gift from the DeVoy family. The series brings leading professionals and major creative forces in theatre and the performing arts to Boston College on an annual basis to share their experience and their vision with the campus community and with interested alumni and members of the greater Boston arts community. The inaugural DeVoy lecture was presented in April 2014 with American theatre visionary, director, and author Anne Bogart.

“Bryce Pinkham is a gifted artist and devoted humanitarian,” says Crystal Tiala, Chair of the BC Theatre department. “At the stage door after a performance of A Gentleman’s Guide… Bryce not only took the time to greet his fans but also made his way through the crowd to give special attention to a child in a wheelchair sitting on the sidelines. That is how I always picture Bryce: a beautiful mix of talent, kindness, and joy. It is that model I hope our students will follow.”

Pinkham’s acting credits include the original Broadway cast of Ghost: The Musical in 2012 and Bloody, Bloody Andrew Jackson (2010, debut). He has performed at Lincoln Center Theatre, the Guthrie Theatre, Yale Repertory Theatre, Hartford Stage, and Williamstown Theatre Festival, as well as in Shakespeare in the Park’s Love’s Labour’s Lost (2013). He has also been seen on television in episodes of The Good Wife and Person of Interest. In the past six years he has shared various New York stages with the likes of six-time Tony Winner Audra McDonald, five-time Tony nominee Keli O’Hara, Oscar winner Anne Hathaway, and three-time Tony nominee Kate Burton. He is also a faculty member at New York University’s Meisner Studio.

In addition to his rigorous performance schedule, Pinkham works on a number of art and social responsibility projects. He currently serves as the Executive Director of Zara Aina (a Malagasy phrase that means “share life”), a company he co-founded in 2012 with fellow Broadway actor, Lucas Caleb Rooney, to help children in developing countries expand their capacity for achievement through theatrical performance and storytelling. He is also a recurrent collaborator with Outside the Wire, a theater company that uses performance and a variety of other media to address pressing public health and social issues, such as combat-related psychological injury, prison reform, and domestic violence. Recent projects with Outside the Wire have been in Kuwait, Guantanamo Bay, and Japan.

A proud Boston College Alumni in the Communication and Theatre department’s Class of ’05, Pinkham went on to earn his MFA in Acting from the Yale School of Drama. Soon after graduating from Yale, Pinkham was identified by the Leonore Annenberg Foundation as one of a limited number of “exceptionally talented” actors and was awarded the prestigious and highly selective Leonore Annenberg Fellowship for the Performing and Visual Arts (2012). Up to 10 Arts Fellows are selected each year with the goal of helping individuals in their early career become successful so they may someday serve as leaders in their field.

Anne Bogart

Chestnut Hill, MA (April 1, 2014) -- The Boston College Theatre department is pleased to announce that stage director, educator, essayist, and theatre visionary Anne Bogart will give the inaugural lecture in the Matthew R. DeVoy and John H. DeVoy IV Perspectives on Theatre Series on Wednesday, April 30, 2014. Bogart's presentation—titled "What's the Story: the role of storytelling in the theater of the 21st century and beyond"—will take place at 7:00pm in Gasson 100 at the center of Boston College's main campus.

Anne Bogart is one of three Co-Artistic Directors of the SITI Company, the innovative ensemble theatre that she founded with Japanese director Tadashi Suzuki in 1992.  The SITI Company's mission focuses on the creation of original theatre work, professional performance training, touring nationally and internationally, and collaborating with leading artists and writers from other disciplines. Bogart has directed the vast majority of SITI Company creations, including three productions seen in the Boston area: The Trojan Women (After Euripides) (2013) and Café Variations (2012), both presented by ArtsEmerson: The World on Stage, and Marivaux's La Dispute (2003) at the American Repertory Theatre, for which she received the Elliott Norton Award for Outstanding Direction.

Bogart and the SITI Company's most recent project is Steel Hammer, a collaboration with Bang-on-a-Can composer Julia Wolfe and four playwrights based on the folk legend of John Henry.  Steel Hammer received its world premiere at the Actors Theatre of Louisville's Humana Festival of New Plays in March 2014.

Bogart is also a Professor in the School of the Arts at Columbia University, where she heads the MFA graduate program in Directing, and the author of several widely read books about creativity and theatrical process, including And Then You Act (2007), The Viewpoints Book (with Tina Landau) (2004), and A Director Prepares (2001).

Anne Bogart is the inaugural speaker in the new Matthew R. DeVoy and John H. DeVoy IV Perspectives on Theatre Series, a program made possible by a generous gift from the DeVoy family of Newton, Massachusetts. The series will bring leading professionals and major creative forces in theatre and the performing arts to Boston College on an annual basis to share their experience and their vision with the campus community and with interested alumni and members of the greater Boston arts community.

"There is no better person than Anne Bogart to launch the DeVoy Perspectives on Theatre series," says Scott T. Cummings, Chair of the Boston College Theatre department. "As director, teacher, author, and instigator of collaborative conversations, her influence on the American theatre is profound and wide-ranging. What she is thinking about is always of interest."

Bogart's DeVoy lecture at Boston College is based on her forthcoming book from Routledge, What's the Story: Essays about art, theater and storytelling, which is due for release within days of her talk at BC. In chapters with such one-word titles as "Spaciousness," "Heat," "Error," and "Sustenance," Bogart explores how contemporary theatre artists can renew their connection with the primal impulse to tell stories as a way of making sense of the world. Her thoughts derive from her extensive reading in neuroscience, sociology, and performance theory, as well as her 35 years of practical experience as a theatermaker.

Bogart's distinguished career in the American theatre has included a year as the Artistic Director of the Trinity Repertory Theatre in Providence, Rhode Island (1989-90); a term as President of the Theatre Communications Group (1990-92); and teaching appointments at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts and the University of California, San Diego. She is the recipient of numerous awards and accolades, including the Doris Duke Performing Artist Award, the Rockefeller Fellow from the USA Artists Foundation, a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Career Achievement Award from the Association for Theatre in Higher Education, two Obie Awards, and a Bessie Award. She is a graduate of Bard College (B.A.) and New York University (M.A.).