David Alan Mamet is an American playwright, filmmaker, and author. He won a Pulitzer Prize and received Tony nominations for his plays Glengarry Glen Ross (1984) and Speed-the-Plow (1988). He first gained critical acclaim for a trio of off-Broadway 1970s plays: The Duck Variations, Sexual Perversity in Chicago, and American Buffalo. His plays Race and The Penitent, respectively, opened on Broadway in 2009 and previewed off-Broadway in 2017.
Sir Jonathan Pryce is a Welsh actor who is known for his performances on stage and in film and television. He has received numerous awards, including two Tony Awards and two Laurence Olivier Awards, and a knighthood for services to drama.
Larry Howard Shue was an American playwright and actor, best known for writing two oft-performed farces, The Nerd and The Foreigner.
Joseph Anthony Mantegna is an American actor. He has starred in the CBS television series Criminal Minds since 2007 as FBI Supervisory Special Agent David Rossi. He has voiced the recurring role of mob boss Fat Tony on the animated series The Simpsons, beginning with the 1991 episode "Bart the Murderer", as well as The Simpsons Movie (2007).
Richard Roma is a fictional character from David Mamet's 1983 play Glengarry Glen Ross and its 1992 film adaptation. Roma has been portrayed by a range of actors, including Joe Mantegna, Al Pacino and Liev Schreiber, although the role was originated by Jack Shepherd.
Lindsay Ann Crouse is an American actress. She made her Broadway debut in the 1972 revival of Much Ado About Nothing and appeared in her first film in 1976 in All the President's Men. For her role in the 1984 film Places in the Heart, she received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. Her other films include Slap Shot (1977), Between the Lines (1977), The Verdict (1982), Prefontaine (1997), and The Insider (1999). She also had a leading role in the 1987 film House of Games, which was directed by her then-husband David Mamet. In 1996, she received a Daytime Emmy Award nomination for "Between Mother and Daughter", an episode of CBS Schoolbreak Special. She is also a Grammy Award nominee.
David Rasche is an American theater, film, and television actor who is best known for his portrayal of the title character in the 1980s satirical police sitcom Sledge Hammer! Since then he has often played characters in positions of authority, in both serious and comical turns. In television he is known for his main role as Karl Muller in the HBO drama series Succession and his role as Alden Schmidt in the TV Land comedy series Impastor, as well as recurring and guest performances in numerous programs including L.A. Law, Monk, The West Wing, Veep, Bored to Death, and Ugly Betty.
Speed-the-Plow is a 1988 play by David Mamet that is a satirical dissection of the American movie business. As stated in The Producer's Perspective, "this is a theme Mamet would revisit in his later films Wag the Dog (1997) and State and Main (2000)". As quoted in The Producer's Perspective, Jack Kroll of Newsweek described Speed-the-Plow as "another tone poem by our nation's foremost master of the language of moral epilepsy."
American Buffalo is a 1975 play by American playwright David Mamet that had its premiere in a showcase production at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago. After two additional showcase productions, it opened on Broadway in 1977.
Atlantic Theater Company is an Off-Broadway non-profit theater. The company was founded in 1985 by David Mamet, William H. Macy, and 30 of their acting students from New York University, inspired by the historical examples of the Group Theatre and Stanislavski.
Oleanna is a 1992 two-character play by David Mamet, about the power struggle between a university professor and one of his female students, who accuses him of sexual harassment and, by doing so, spoils his chances of being accorded tenure. The play's title, taken from a folk song, refers to a 19th-century escapist vision of utopia. Mamet adapted his play into a 1994 film of the same name.
Theater in Chicago describes not only theater performed in Chicago, Illinois, but also to the movement in Chicago that saw a number of small, meagerly funded companies grow to institutions of national and international significance. Chicago had long been a popular destination for touring productions, as well as original productions that transfer to Broadway and other cities. According to Variety editor Gordon Cox, beside New York City, Chicago has one of the most lively theater scenes in the United States. As many as 100 shows could be seen any given night from 200 companies as of 2018, some with national reputations and many in creative "storefront" theaters, demonstrating a vibrant theater scene "from the ground up". According to American Theatre magazine, Chicago's theater is "justly legendary".
Organic Theater Company was founded in 1969 in Madison, Wisconsin by artistic director Stuart Gordon and his wife Carolyn Purdy Gordon.
Oliver Charles Cotton is an English actor and playwright, known for his prolific work on stage, TV and film. He remains best known for his role as Cesare Borgia in the BBC's 1981 drama series The Borgias.
Gregory Mosher is an American director and producer of stage productions at the Lincoln Center and Goodman Theatres, on and off-Broadway, at the Royal National Theatre, and in the West End. He is also a film director and television director, producer, and writer. He currently serves as Senior Associate Dean for the Arts at Hunter College.
Raúl Eduardo Esparza is an American actor and singer. Considered one of Broadway's most prominent leading men since the 2000s, he is best known for his Tony Award-nominated performance as Bobby in the 2006 Broadway revival of Company and for his television role as New York Assistant District Attorney (ADA) Rafael Barba in Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, where he had a recurring role in Season 14 and was promoted to a series regular in Seasons 15 to 19.
Richard John Nelson is an American playwright and librettist. He wrote the book for the 2000 Broadway musical James Joyce's The Dead, for which he won the Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical, as well as the book for the 1988 Broadway production of Chess. He is also the writer of the critically acclaimed play cycle The Rhinebeck Panorama.
Roderick Cook was an English playwright, writer, theatre director and actor of stage, television and film. Cook is known for creating, directing and starring in the musical review Oh, Coward! and portraying Count Von Strack in the Oscar-winning film Amadeus.
Michael Patrick Higgins Jr. was an American actor who appeared in film and on stage, and was best known for his role in the original Broadway production of Equus.
William Pullman is an American actor. After graduating with a Master of Fine Arts degree in theater, he was an adjunct professor at Montana State University before deciding to pursue acting. He made his film debut in Ruthless People (1986), and starred in Spaceballs (1987), The Accidental Tourist (1988), Sleepless in Seattle (1993), While You Were Sleeping (1995), Casper (1995), Independence Day (1996), Lost Highway (1997), and Lake Placid (1999). He has appeared frequently on television, usually in TV films. Starting in the 2000s he has also acted in miniseries and regular series, such as Torchwood (2011), starring roles in 1600 Penn (2012–13) and The Sinner (2017–2021). In 2021, he had a recurring role in the miniseries Halston.
