 | This article may need to be rewritten to comply with Wikipedia's quality standards.(May 2024) |
Marie House Kohler | |
|---|---|
| Born | February 8, 1951 |
| Occupation | Playwright |
Marie House Kohler (born 1951) is an American writer and playwright. She is a member of the Kohler family of Wisconsin. [1]
Playwright, theater producer, director and writer, Marie Kohler is the daughter of John Michael Kohler III and Julilly House. Raised in Kohler, Wisconsin at Riverbend, the home built by her grandfather Gov. Walter J. Kohler in 1923. Marie Kohler graduated from Kohler High School in 1969 and holds an Honors BA from Harvard University (1973, Magna Cum Laude) and an MA from the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee(1979)- both degrees in English Literature.
Kohler co-founded Renaissance Theaterworks in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1993, with four other female theater professionals to create more opportunities for women in theater. She served there as Co-Artistic Director until 2013 and as Resident Playwright through 2019.
Kohler’s interest in theater began early, when her mother took her to local and national productions. She formed the first drama club of her high school, earning her the school’s first “Humanities Award.” In college, she performed with the Harvard Dramatic Society, where she met Colin Cabot; they married in 1974. The couple moved back to Wisconsin where Cabot worked at the Skylight Theatre. After the birth of their daughter, Anne, the family moved to Europe for a year when Cabot served as assistant to opera composer Gian Carlo Menotti in Scotland and Italy. When the couple returned to Milwaukee, Kohler began her master's work at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, completing her degree in 1979. Their second daughter, Marie Christine, was born the same year. In 1980, Kohler began freelancing as a journalist for various Milwaukee- and Wisconsin-based publications, as well as national publications, such as American Theater Magazine and National Trust Magazine.
In the mid-1980s, Kohler and Cabot separated, and Kohler she turned her attention to acting and writing plays and free-lance writing.
In 1989, Kohler met Brian Mani while performing in Great Expectations; they married in 1992. Mani had a daughter, Tricia Hooper. Kohler has written several roles for Mani, a classically trained actor with American Players Theatre; they have worked often together on plays she has produced or directed. She has written six plays, all professionally produced and garnering strong notice and awards. The Milwaukee Arts Board named her Artist of the Year (2005).
Kohler serves on the board of the Wisconsin Humanities Council and commits herself to environmental, cultural and social causes.
Full Productions
DEAR ELIZABETH by Sarah Ruhl, Milwaukee Chamber Theatre, 2015
THE KREUTZER SONATA by Nancy Harris, Renaissance Theaterworks, 2015
HONOUR by Joanna Murray-Smith, Renaissance Theaterworks, 2012
A PHOENIX TOO FREQUENT by Christopher Fry, Renaissance Theaterworks, 2012
Staged Readings
DUCK by Christine Kallmann, St. John's on the Lake, Milwaukee, 2017
DUCK by Christine Kallmann, Brink New Plays, Renaissance Theaterworks, Milwaukee, 2016
TRIFLES by Susan Glaspell, American Players Theatre, Spring Green, WI, 2016
FOG by Eugene O’Neill, American Players Theatre, Spring Green, WI, 2016
BUS STOP by William Inge, Renaissance Theaterworks, Milwaukee, 2008
THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST by Oscar Wilde, Renaissance Theaterworks, Milwaukee, 2005
CENSORED ON FINAL APPROACH, Milwaukee VA Medical Center, 2013
Marie Kohler has been a freelance journalist for Wisconsin and national publications since 1980. She has written film reviews for the Milwaukee Sentinel; theater reviews for Art Muscle; feature articles for Milwaukee Magazine; essays for Milwaukee Footlights, Shepherd Express and The Wisconsin Academy Review; and pieces for American Theater Magazine. She has also been published in National Trust Magazine, Great Lakes Stages and Milwaukee Metro.
Her articles explore a range of subjects — from Wisconsin's tradition of Friday night fish fries to Frank Lloyd Wright's architecture to airport mosaics to trends in theater and film.
American Theatre Magazine
Shepherd Express
Milwaukee's Grassroots Storytellers - Ex Fabula’s community-building ‘Close Encounters’
From Milwaukee to Broadway and Back - A conversation with Chike Johnson
Fabulous Stories - Ex Fabula’s new Executive Director Megan McGee
Listening, Not Just Talking! Anne Strainchamps on Wisconsin Public Radio
INVIVO's Maurice Dumit on Health and Fitness
Leslie Fitzwater: 'Once More with Feeling'…Piaf
CORE/El Centro's Healing Center
Secrets of the Milwaukee Public Museum
Beans and Barley's Long-Term Success
Josh Jaszewski - Theatergoer Extraordinaire
The Renewed Surprising Appeal of Mah Jongg
Indian Mounds: Wisconsin's Priceless Archaeological Treasures
Frank Lloyd Wright's Burnham Street Vision
Carlos Alves Beautifies Mitchell Airport
Dermond Peterson's Stunning, Milwaukee-Made Textiles
Milwaukee Magazine
Wisconsin Academy Review
MIDSUMMER in October - An End of Season Bow
Milwaukee Metro
Milwaukee Footlights
Julie Harris Playwright Award, Beverly Hills Theatre Guild, Honorable Mention - 2014
Best New Regional Play, American Theatre Critics Association - 1995
New Play Festival, Charlotte Repertory Theatre, Finalist - 1995
Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, Nominee - 1995
Best New Play - Milwaukee Magazine - 2000
Inkslinger Playwriting Competition, Semifinalist - 2018
Susan Smith Blackburn Prize - Nominee - 2005
Best of Year - Milwaukee Magazine - 2005
Abingdon Award - Finalist - 2005
Wisconsin Wrights - Finalist - 2005
Susan Smith Blackburn Prize - Nominee - 2009
Playwrights' Center Lab - Finalist - 2009
Playwrights First - Semi-Finalist - 2009
Todd McNerney Playwriting Award, Finalist - 2017
Wisconsin Wrights New Play Festival, Finalist - 2017
Kay Adshead is a poet, playwright, theatremaker, actress and producer.
Dael Orlandersmith is an American actress, poet and playwright. She is known for her Obie Award-winning Beauty's Daughter and the 2002 Pulitzer Prize Finalist in Drama, Yellowman.
Sarah Ruhl is an American playwright, poet, professor, and essayist. Among her most popular plays are Eurydice (2003), The Clean House (2004), and In the Next Room (2009). She has been the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship and the PEN/Laura Pels International Foundation for Theater Award for a distinguished American playwright in mid-career. Two of her plays have been finalists for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and she received a nomination for Tony Award for Best Play. In 2020, she adapted her play Eurydice into the libretto for Matthew Aucoin's opera of the same name. Eurydice was nominated for Best Opera Recording at the 2023 Grammy Awards.
Lynn Nottage is an American playwright whose work often focuses on the experience of working-class people, particularly working-class people who are Black. She has received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama twice: in 2009 for her play Ruined, and in 2017 for her play Sweat. She was the first woman to have won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama two times.
Sheila Callaghan is a playwright and screenwriter who emerged from the RAT movement of the 1990s. She has been profiled by American Theater Magazine, "The Brooklyn Rail", Theatermania, and The Village Voice. Her work has been published in American Theatre magazine.
Cheryl L. West is an American playwright.
Gina Gionfriddo is an American playwright and television writer. Her plays Becky Shaw and Rapture, Blister, Burn were finalists for the 2009 and 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, respectively. She has written for the television series Law & Order, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, FBI: Most Wanted, The Alienist, and House of Cards.
Sharon Langston Ott is a director, producer and educator who worked in regional theaters and opera throughout the United States. Two plays she directed, A Fierce Longing and Amlin Gray's How I Got That Story, each won an Obie award after their New York runs.
Barbara Schneider originally from Germany, is an American playwright.
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.
Amy Herzog is an American playwright. She is known for her poignant and character-driven plays that explore themes of family dynamics, personal relationships, and the complexities of human experience. She has received a Drama Desk Award as well as a nomination for a Tony Award.
Carrie Alexandra Coon is an American actress. In television, she has starred as grieving mother Nora Durst in the HBO drama series The Leftovers (2014–2017) and as Gloria Burgle in the third season of the FX anthology series Fargo (2017). She won a Critics' Choice Television Award for Best Actress for The Leftovers and was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress for Fargo. She also starred in the second season of the anthology drama series The Sinner (2018), and has played aspiring socialite Bertha Russell in the HBO series The Gilded Age since 2022.
T.L. Wagener is a playwright, screenwriter, and novelist. Her plays include The Man Who Could See Through Time, The Tattler: The Story and Stories of a Pathological Liar, Currently Married, Ladies in Waiting, Semi-Precious Things, Damn Everything But The Circus, Work, and The Age of Outrage. Her film work includes Fried Green Tomatoes, and others. She is known in Hollywood as the writer whose work got Jessica Tandy to say "yes."Her novel, written as T.W. Bristol, is "DID YOU FIND EVERY THING YOU WERE LOOKING FOR?", published by Quixote Publishing, March 5, 2024.
Jennifer Haley is an American playwright. She grew up in San Antonio, Texas and studied acting at the University of Texas at Austin for her undergraduate degree. Haley also received a MFA in playwriting at Brown University in 2005, where she worked under American playwright and professor, Paula Vogel. Now living in Los Angeles, Haley is pursuing a career in theatre, film and television.
Hilary Bettis is a playwright, a producer, and a writer.
Lauren Yee is an American playwright.
Aleshea Harris is an American playwright, spoken word artist, author, educator, actor, performer, and screenwriter. Her play Is God Is won the American Playwriting Foundation's Relentless Award in 2016. In 2023, her play On Sugarland was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
Heidi Schreck is an American playwright, screenwriter, and actress from Wenatchee, Washington. Her play What the Constitution Means to Me, which she also performs in, was a finalist for the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and Tony Awards for 2019 Best Play and Best Actress in a Play.
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.
Jayne Regan Pink is a British dancer, choreographer, repetiteur, dialect coach and artistic associate. She studied at the Royal Ballet School and spent much of her professional career as a principal dancer with Northern Ballet Theatre. She created leading roles in most of the company's repertoire between 1986 and 1998 alongside collaborators including director Christopher Gable, director-choreographer Michael Pink, composer Philip Feeney and designer Lez Brotherston. She has been referred to as "one of the jewels in the crown of English dance" and "one of the finest dramatic dancers of today, ranking alongside Lynn Seymour, Marcia Haydee, Anna Laguna and Elaine McDonald." Since retiring from dance, she has moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin with her husband, Artistic Director of the Milwaukee Ballet Michael Pink. She has served as a choreographer, movement director, dialect coach and repetiteur in Milwaukee and internationally. She currently serves as Artistic Associate with Renaissance Theaterworks.