M. Elizabeth Osborn

Last updated

M[argaret] Elizabeth (Betty) Osborn, (born in Rome, Georgia on February 19, 1941; died in Virginia in 1993, age 52), was a playwright, author, theater director, critic, editor, and educator. From the 1980s to early 1990s, she was a prominent member of the American Theatre Critics Association (ATCA). She worked for the Theater Communications Group (TCG). Osborn grew up in Gainesville, Florida, and graduated from college Phi Beta Kappa.

Contents

Her work on behalf of emerging playwrights has been honored since her death by ATCA's establishment of the M. Elizabeth Osborn Award. [1] It is granted annually to a promising new American dramatist.

Dramaturg in Virginia

Osborn received her PhD in English from the University of Pennsylvania. In the 1970s, she was an assistant professor of theatre at St. Mary's College of Maryland. While on leave she was accepted as a student of directing in the Virginia Museum Theater Conservatory. From that base, she helped to pioneer the resident professional theater movement in Richmond, where she served as a "Dramaturg"—at the time a relatively new position in American regional theatre—of the Repertory Company of the Virginia Museum Theater (VMT). [2]

"Betty-O," a supportive critic

In the 1980s, Osborn moved to New York City to join the staff of Theatre Communications Group (TCG), where she focused on editing and criticism. She was known to friends as "Betty-O". In her capacity as a theater critic, Osborn leaned away from the acerbic and caustic, toward support and encouragement. She was always highly appreciative of theater artists, as typified by her letter in tribute to her colleague, the late director John Hirsch in the New York Times. [3]

Osborn was especially known for promoting and fostering little-known playwrights. She used her influence to encourage major directors and playhouses to produce their works more frequently and consistently.

Support of traditionally marginalized voices and works in theater

From the 1980s to her death in the early '90s, Osborn sought to bring attention to marginalized theater voices. Her emphasis on new plays by Hispanic authors and on dramatic works dealing with the AIDS crisis is expressed in her critical anthologies. Her book On New Ground focused on late-20th century Latino playwrights. [4]

Writings on the effects of AIDS on American stage theater

Osborn showed how American theatre artists confronted the plague of AIDS in her book The Way We Live Now. [5]

M. Elizabeth Osborn Award

The Osborn Award, a plaque shown here for Jason Wells, 2010 winner Atca WELLS Osborn.png
The Osborn Award, a plaque shown here for Jason Wells, 2010 winner

The M. Elizabeth Osborn Award was established in 1993 by the American Theater Critics Association (ATCA) to honor Osborn by continuing her mission of recognizing outstanding but little known authors. Colleagues recall how she would politely but persistently urge producers to mount productions of untried authors. [6]

The prize includes a monetary grant. The "Osborn" is conferred on a new American playwright at the Humana Festival of New American Plays held each year at the Actors Theater of Louisville. [7]

Seattle-based playwright Keri Healey was the 2013 Osborn Award winner, honored for her play Torso. [7] Darren Canady, an assistant professor at the University of Kansas (now a full professor), received the award in 2012 for his play about rural African-American life, Brothers of the Dust. [7] [8] Among other Osborn laureates are Rebecca Gilman, [7] Los Angeles author Dan O'Brien, [7] and Brooklyn playwright J.T. Rogers. [7]

Books

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">J. T. Rogers</span> American dramatist (born 1968)

J. T. Rogers is an American playwright. He is best known for his play Oslo (2016) about the 1990s Oslo Peace Accords between Israel and Palestine. The play received widespread acclaim as well as the Tony Award, Drama Desk Award, and Obie Award for Best Play. He is also known for his plays Madagascar (2004),The Overwhelming (2006), Blood and Gifts (2010), and Corruption (2024).

Lillian Groag is an Argentine-American playwright, theater director, and actress. Her plays include The Ladies of the Camellias, The Magic Fire, and The White Rose.

Lisa Loomer is an American playwright and screenwriter who has also worked as an actress and stand-up comic. She is best known for her play The Waiting Room (1994), in which three women from different time periods meet in a modern doctor's waiting room, each suffering from the effects of their various societies' cosmetic body modification practices. She also co-wrote the screenplay for the film Girl, Interrupted. Many of her plays deal with the experiences of Latinas and immigrant characters. Others deal with social and political issues through the lens of contemporary family life. Beyond that, Loomer's play The Waiting Room discusses issues such as body image, breast cancer, and non-Western medicine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ronald Ribman</span> American author, poet and playwright (born 1932)

Ronald Burt Ribman is an American author, poet and playwright.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tanya Barfield</span> American playwright

Tanya Barfield is an American playwright whose works have been presented both nationally and internationally.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Contemporary American Theater Festival</span>

The Contemporary American Theater Festival (CATF) is an American annual professional theatre festival held at Shepherd University, located in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. According to the New York Times (in 2015), it is one of "50 essential summer festivals". In 2016, Germany's World Guide identified the festival as one of the "Top 10 theatre festivals not to miss this summer". A representative of the Theatre Communications Group in its publication American Theatre stated that "(CATF's) forward focus has helped ... change the American theatre conversation, bringing new voices and pressing topics to the stage ..."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lauren Gunderson</span> American dramatist (born 1982)

Lauren Gunderson is an American playwright, screenwriter, and short story author, born in Atlanta. She lives in San Francisco, where she teaches playwriting. Gunderson was recognized by American Theatre magazine as America's most produced living playwright at Theatre Communications Group member theaters in 2017, and again in 2019–20.

Sybille Pearson is a playwright, musical theatre lyricist and librettist.

Jason Wells is an American actor and award-winning playwright.

Caridad Svich is a playwright, songwriter/lyricist, translator, and editor who was born in the United States to Cuban-Argentine-Spanish-Croatian parents.

The American Theatre Critics Association (ATCA) is the only nationwide professional association of theatre critics in the United States. The ATCA membership consists of theatre critics who write reviews and critiques of live theatre for print, broadcast, and digital media. The organization is best known for its annual Steinberg/ATCA New play Award recognizing work developed and premiered in regional theaters. It also makes the recommendation for the Regional Theatre Tony Award. ATCA is an affiliate organization of the International Association of Theatre Critics. The current chair of ATCA's executive committee is David John Chávez, a San Francisco-based theatre critic. The vice chair is Cameron Kelsall, a freelance theatre critic in Philadelphia.

Martín Zimmerman is an American bilingual playwright.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lucas Hnath</span> American playwright

Lucas Hnath is an American playwright. He won the 2016 Obie Award for excellence in playwriting for his plays Red Speedo and The Christians. He also won a Whiting Award.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lisa Portes</span>

Lisa Portes is a director, educator, and advocate. She heads of the MFA Directing program at The Theatre School at DePaul University. She serves on the board of the Theatre Communications Group, the Executive Board of the Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers, and is a founding member of the Latinx Theater Commons.

Dominique Morisseau is an American playwright and actress from Detroit, Michigan. She has written more than nine plays, three of which are part of a cycle titled The Detroit Project. She received a MacArthur Fellowship in 2018.

Kate Hamill is an American actress and playwright.

Todd London is the Head of the MFA Playwriting Program at the New School School of Drama and the Director of Theatre Relations for the Dramatists Guild of America.

Nikkole Salter is an American actress, playwright, and advocate known for her work on the Obie Award-winning and Pulitzer Prize nominated play In the Continuum. Salter co-wrote and co-starred in In the Continuum with Danai Gurira. The success of In the Continuum prompted Salter to co-launch The Continuum Project with Glenn Gordon NSangou. The Continuum Project is a non-profit organization that "provides innovative cultural programming for the unification, enrichment and empowerment of the global African Diaspora." As a playwright, Salter has written seven full-length plays. Salter's plays have been produced Off-Broadway and in five countries around the world. As an actress, Salter has performed Off-Broadway and at many regional theaters including Arena Stage, Huntington Theater, Berkley Repertory Theater, and the Shakespeare Theater Company.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shirley Lauro</span> American writer

Shirley Shapiro Mezvinsky Lauro is an American playwright, screenwriter, and novelist. Her plays include A Piece of my Heart, Open Admissions, The Radiant, All Through the Night and others. Her novel is The Edge and she edited an anthology, Political Plays by American Women, with Alexis Greene.

Michele Lowe is an American playwright and librettist whose work has been produced on Broadway, off Broadway and around the world. She received the Francesca Primus Prize in 2010 for her play Inana. She is the only playwright in the history of the Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award to be nominated and receive finalist status in one season. She is also the recipient of two Edgerton Foundation New Play Awards. She is Jewish.

References

  1. "American Theatre Critics Association – Osborn New Play Award – The M. Elizabeth Osborn Award". Americantheatrecritics.org. February 24, 2011. Retrieved March 17, 2016.
  2. "Theatre Staff" listing, "Festival of Britain: The 1976–1977 Season," program of the Repertory Company of the Virginia Museum Theatre
  3. "JOHN HIRSCH; In Memoriam". The New York Times. August 27, 1989. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved June 15, 2023.
  4. Osborn, On New Ground, Theatre Communications Group; 1st edition (January 1, 1993) ISBN   0930452682
  5. Osborn, The Way We Live Now: American Plays and the AIDS Crisis , Theatre Communications Group (January 1, 1993) ISBN   1559360062
  6. As exemplified by the Burbank (California) Victory Theater's west coast premiere of Jon Klein's T Bone N Weasel in 1987. Osborn had promoted the play to co-producers Ken Letner and Keith Fowler, and it played for an extended run and subsequently won the HBO Playwrights USA Award. http://www.jon-klein.com/awards--honors.html
  7. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Complete List of Osborn Award Winners, http://americantheatrecritics.org/osborn-new-play-award/
  8. Canady expressed gratitude on the KU web site, saying that the Osborn Award brought national recognition to his very personal writing: "I grew up hearing, seeing, and listening to family stories that were only told if they could be performed with as much blood, life, exuberance, and expressiveness as possible." http://archive.news.ku.edu/2012/april/19/canady.shtml