SARAH RUHL's (Playwright) plays include In the Next Room, or the vibrator play, The Clean House, Passion Play, Dead Man’s Cell Phone, Melancholy Play, For Peter Pan on her 70th Birthday, The Oldest Boy, Stage Kiss, Dear Elizabeth, Eurydice, How to Transcend a Happy Marriage, Orlando, Late: a cowboy song, and a translation of Three Sisters. She has been a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and a Tony award nominee. Her plays have been produced on and off Broadway, around the country, and internationally, where they have been translated into over fifteen languages. Originally from Chicago, Ms. Ruhl received her M.F.A. from Brown University, where she studied with Paula Vogel. She has received the Steinberg Award, the Samuel French Award, the Susan Smith Blackburn Award, the Whiting Award, the Lily Award, a PEN Award for mid-career playwrights, and the MacArthur Award. You can read more about her work on www.SarahRuhlplaywright.com. Her new book 100 Essays I Don’t Have Time to Write was a New York Times notable book of the year, and she most recently published Letters from Max with Max Ritvo. She teaches at the Yale School of Drama, and she lives in Brooklyn with her family.
BRADEN ABRAHAM (Director) joined Writers Theatre as Artistic Director in 2023. He comes to Writers from Seattle Rep, the largest resident theatre in the Pacific Northwest, where he advanced the organization as a director and producer, including the development and premiere of many new plays. He directed six world premieres for Seattle Rep and over 20 productions including: True West, Clybourne Park, Photograph 51, Ibsen in Chicago, Betrayal, Luna Gale, A View from the Bridge, A Great Wilderness, Breakin’ Hearts and Takin’ Names, and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?. Among his initiatives as Artistic Director, Braden committed Seattle Rep as one of the first partner theaters to bring the Public Theater’s model for the Public Works program across the country. Seattle Rep’s Public Works strengthens community connection through making ambitious productions of participatory theater. Braden also re-envisioned the New Play Program, commissioning and premiering plays by Anna Zeigler, Samuel D. Hunter, David Grimm, Justin Huertas, Samantha Silva, Cheryl L. West, and Karen Hartman, and supported the work of dozens of playwrights and directors through premieres and the Other Season development lab. Many projects developed through this program went on to acclaimed runs at Seattle Rep and around the country including Irene Sankoff and David Hein’s Come From Away, Cheryl L. West’s Shout Sister Shout!, Erica Schmidt’s Mac Beth, and Kate Hamill’s Pride and Prejudice. Under his leadership, Seattle Rep was the only theater outside New York and London to present David Byrne’s Here Lies Love. Most recently, Braden initiated 20x30: Reimagine the Anthropocene, to commission twenty new plays by the year 2030, and New Directions, a unique commissioning program designed to support generative work from directors. Around the country, Braden has developed new work at Ojai, O’Neill, Denver Center, and Perseverance Theatre. He has been a guest artist at Stanford, Gonzaga, Seattle University, and the University of Idaho. He conceived and developed Way Stations, a series of interactive walking tours in Seattle for the Northwest New Works Festival at On the Boards and is the co-creator of Gordon Hempton: Let it Happen, an audio installation about the life and work of Emmy-Award winning sound ecologist Gordon Hempton. He is married to Cheyenne Casebier and the proud papa of Phoenix Faye Abraham.
COURTNEY O'NEILL (Scenic Designer) Design credits include: A Doll's House, Part 2, The Burn, The Compass, Life and Limb, Of Mice and Men (Steppenwolf Theatre Company), Father Comes Home from the Wars, Parts 1, 2, & 3 (Goodman Theatre), Plantation!, Moby Dick, The Little Prince (Lookingglass Theatre Company), For Colored Girls, Five Guys Named Moe, Harvey, Waiting for Godot (Court Theatre), Christmas at Pemberley, Black Pearl Sings!, The Amish Project, Song Man Dance Man (Milwaukee Repertory Theater), Fetch Clay Make Man (Marin Theatre and Round House), The Mountaintop (Virginia Stage), among others. Courtney received a Joseph Jefferson Award for Mud (The Hypocrites) and is a recipient of the Michael Maggio Emerging Designer Award. She holds an M.F.A. from Northwestern University and a B.F.A. from DePaul University, where she currently teaches. courtneyoneill.com
MARCUS DOSHI (Lighting Designer) is an international theatre maker, professor, and author. Broadway credits include Pass Over (2021, also Amazon Film) and Linda Vista (2019). Work Off-Broadway includes The Public Theatre, Signature Theatre, New York Theatre Workshop, a longstanding collaboration with Theatre for a New Audience, and many others. His work has also been seen in Chicago at The Goodman, Steppenwolf, Court, and Chicago Shakespeare, regionally, at most major theatre and opera companies, and internationally, in 18 countries across five continents. He is the author of Towards Good Lighting for the Stage: Aesthetic Theory for Theatrical Lighting Design published by Routledge. He is a graduate of Wabash College and the Yale School of Drama, and is a Professor of Theatre at Northwestern University where he teaches in the MFA Design and Directing programs. marcusdoshi.com
DANIELLE NIEVES (Costume Designer) she/her is honored to be making her Writers debut. Her work has been seen at The Old Globe, The 5th Avenue Theatre, Seattle Repertory Theatre, Dallas Theater Center, South Coast Repertory Theatre, The Goodman Theatre, St. Louis Shakespeare Festival, ACT Theatre, Village Theatre, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, and Cleveland Playhouse. Off-Broadway credits: Pity in History, No End of Blame, Gertrude The Cry, and Lovesong of the Electric Bear for PTP/NYC at the Atlantic Stage 2. Danielle holds an M.F.A. in Costume Design from the University of California Irvine and a curatorial certification for Japanese and Western costumes from the Kyoto Costume Institute. www.daniellenieves.com
JEFFREY LEVIN (Sound Designer) is an award winning sound designer and composer based in Chicago IL. Jeffrey has contributed original music and sound designs for hundreds of productions for many theaters, production companies, and universities regionally and internationally. Chicago credits include productions with Goodman, Steppenwolf, Court, Drury Lane, Northlight, Paramount, Timeline, Steep, A Red Orchid, Northwestern University, DePaul University, Columbia College, and many more. Regional works for the stage include productions with American Players Theatre, The Gulfshore Playhouse, Asolo Repertory, University of Austin, Hope Summer Repertory Theatre, Denver Center for Performing Arts, and Children’s Theatre Madison. Jeffrey has also worked on a variety of immersive theatre productions contributing many designs with the live-entertainment company Fever which produces shows in over 60 cities across Europe, America, and Asia. He also teaches Sound Design courses at the Theatre School of DePaul University and has taught music theory and sound design with other educational institutions. Awards and recognitions include three Joseph Jefferson Award wins and many nominations for Sound Design and Original Music. Other awards include the Edes Award for Emerging Artists, Kleinman Composition Competition, and Michael Merit professional award. Visit www.jeffreylevinmusic.com
RAE WATSON (Properties Designer) has been a props maker in the Chicago area and beyond for the past 13 years, the last 4 of which have been with Writers Theatre. Other companies she has worked with include Wildclaw Theatre, Promethean Theatre Ensemble, Shattered Globe Theatre, Collaboraction, The House Theatre of Chicago and many others. She has also worked in film and television for companies such as the Jim Henson Company and Noah’s Park.
TONYA LOCKYER (Movement Director) is an award-winning choreographer and cultural producer. Named a “key cultural changemaker” (Seattle Times), Lockyer has produced projects, co-founded festivals, and directed organizations that continue to have a profound impact on the U.S. dance ecology. Her work in performance has been seen at Lincoln Center, National Museum of Women in the Arts, New York’s Joyce Theater, Jacob’s Pillow, Boston’s Emerson Majestic Theater, Long Beach Opera, Paris’s International Conference on New Media, Canada’s National Arts Centre, Russia’s International Festival of Experimental Art, and Poland’s Opera Baltycka; as well as featured on NPR and in The New York Times; presented by TEDx; and received awards from The National Endowment of the Arts and the Canada Council. Recently, Lockyer choreographed Seattle Rep’s Indecent “one of the seminal productions in Seattle stage history”. A native Newfoundlander, Lockyer has collaborated with some of the most groundbreaking experimentalists of our times and enjoyed a critically acclaimed inter/national performing career.
MICAH FIGUEROA (Intimacy Director) he/him is a queer, latinx, Chicago-based Actor, Director, Choreographer, and Teaching Artist specializing in intimacy/violence, physical theatre, and circus arts. He is thrilled to be back working with everyone at Writers Theatre and Eurydice! His most recent work as a Violence and Intimacy Director was Anna in the Tropics with Remy Bumppo Theatre Company. Other select productions include: First Floor Theatre (Mike Pence Sex Dream, Plano, Botticelli in the Fire), Steep Theatre (The Leopard Play, Light Falls), UNC Charlotte (These Shining Lives), and Northwestern University (In His Hands, Something Rotten, Men on Boats, Peerless, Blood Wedding, Sweat, Indecent, Everybody, and Exit Strategy). He holds a degree in Directing and Playwriting from Southern Methodist University.
KATIE KLEMME (Production Stage Manager) At Writers Theatre: Tiger Style!, Wife of a Salesman, Into the Woods. Select credits include Villette (World Premiere) (Lookingglass), Much Ado About Nothing, Mamma Mia (Lake Tahoe Shakespeare Festival), The Porch on Windy Hill (World Premiere), Georgiana & Kitty: Christmas at Pemberley (Rolling World Premiere), Intimate Apparel, Mr. Dickens Hat (World Premiere), The Wickhams: Christmas at Pemberley (Rolling World Premiere), Landladies (World Premiere) (Northlight Theatre), Hamilton: An American Musical (Eliza Tour, Chicago), Sorin: A Notre Dame Story (National Tour), Mother and Me (Geva Theater), If I Forget, Indecent, Lettie (Victory Gardens Theater), We’re Gonna Be Okay, Welcome to Jesus (World Premiere), Men on Boats (Regional Premiere), Xanadu, The Projects (World Premiere), Disgraced (World Premiere, Pulitzer Prize), others (American Theater Company), The Realistic Joneses (Theater Wit & Shattered Globe), Mr. Burns: a post-electric play (Regional Premiere), 10 Out of 12 (Regional Premiere), Santaland Diaries, others (Theater Wit), columbinus (ArtsEmerson, Boston) and Seven Homeless Mammoths Wander New England (Todd+Bryan Present & Theater Wit, Las Vegas). She is on faculty at Loyola University Chicago in the Department of Fine & Performing Arts and a proud member of Actors' Equity Association.
KATE NAGORSKI (Assistant Stage Manager) is thrilled to return to Writers Theatre! ASM credits include Pearl’s Rollin’ with the Blues (Writers Theatre), Carmela Full of Wishes (Chicago Children’s Theatre), Sundown, Yellow Moon (Raven Theatre). Other Chicago backstage credits include The Gospel at Colonus, Fen (Court Theatre), Georgiana & Kitty: Christmas at Pemberley (Northlight Theatre), Tiger Style!, Wife of a Salesman (Writers Theatre), and Kiss Me Kate (Marriott Theatre).