Melia Bensussen

Last updated
Melia Bensussen
Born (1962-09-18) September 18, 1962 (age 61)
New York City, US
Alma mater Brown University (BA)
Occupation Theatre director
Employer Hartford Stage
Predecessor Darko Tresnjak
Awards OBIE Award
Website meliabensussen.com

Melia Bensussen (born September 18, 1962) is an American theatre director and producer who has been artistic director of the Hartford Stage since 2019. [1] She won an OBIE Award for Outstanding Direction for Turn of the Screw in 1999 and is Professor of Performing Arts at Emerson College. [2]

Contents

Biography

Born in New York City of Jewish heritage and raised in Mexico City and San Diego, California, Bensussen is a graduate of La Jolla High School and of Brown University, where she received a Bachelor of Arts degree in theatre and comparative literature. She studied Yiddish theatre on a fellowship to Israel and taught English in Japan before returning to New York City to work as a translator and actor. [1] [3] Her first professional job was at the Hartford Stage, assisting the director Emily Mann (director) as a fellow of The Drama League Directors' Project in a production of A Doll's House featuring Mark Lamos in 1986. [4] Fluent in Spanish, she directed for the Puerto Rican Traveling Theater and served as associate director for the Festival Latino at The Public Theater. Her edition of the Langston Hughes translation of Federico García Lorca's Blood Wedding is in its ninth printing by Theatre Communications Group. Bensussen won an OBIE Award for directing Turn of the Screw in 1999. [5]

In 2000, Emerson College hired Bensussen as producing director of Emerson Stage and as professor of performing arts. [3] She chaired the department from 2008 to 2018 and is a full professor. [5] Bensussen has directed theatrical productions at Huntington Theatre, Merrimack Repertory Theatre, Baltimore Center Stage, Hartford Stage, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, La Jolla Playhouse, Shakespeare in the Park, MCC Theater, Primary Stages, Long Wharf Theatre, Actors Theatre of Louisville, People's Light and Theatre Company, San Jose Repertory Theatre, Eugene O’Neill Theater Center, and other venues. She has twice received Directing Awards from the Princess Grace Foundation-USA along with their top honor, the Statuette Award (for Sustained Excellence in Directing). [2] She serves on the executive board of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society and chairs the Arts Advisory Board for the Princess Grace Foundation. [6]

In January 2019, she was selected to succeed Darko Tresnjak as artistic director of the Hartford Stage. She became the Stage's sixth artistic director and first woman to lead the artistic side of the house. She started in June 2019. [5] The board of directors admired her "passion for reinterpreting classics and directing new plays, her broad and extensive experience at regional theatres across the country, her well-honed skill set as an artistic administrator in academia, and her commitment to advancing the theatre's community engagement initiatives and education programs." [6]

Personal life

Bensussen is married to Charles Epstein, a geneticist. The couple have two children, Jeremy and Ilana. [7]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paula Vogel</span> American playwright

Paula Vogel is an American playwright who received the 1998 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for her play How I Learned to Drive. A longtime teacher, Vogel spent the bulk of her academic career – from 1984 to 2008 – at Brown University, where she served as Adele Kellenberg Seaver Professor in Creative Writing, oversaw its playwriting program, and helped found the Brown/Trinity Rep Consortium. From 2008 to 2012, Vogel was Eugene O'Neill Professor of Playwriting and department chair at the Yale School of Drama, as well as playwright in residence at the Yale Repertory Theatre.

JoAnne Akalaitis is an avant-garde Lithuanian-American theatre director and writer. She won five Obie Awards for direction and was founder in 1970 of the critically acclaimed Mabou Mines in New York City.

Michael Wilson is an American stage and screen director working extensively on Broadway, Off-Broadway, and at the nation's leading resident theaters.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chay Yew</span> American dramatist

Chay Yew is a playwright and stage director who was born in Singapore. He was artistic director of the Victory Gardens Theater in Chicago from 2011 to 2020.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Soho Repertory Theatre</span>

The Soho Repertory Theatre, known as Soho Rep, is an American Off-Broadway theater company based in New York City which is notable for producing avant-garde plays by contemporary writers. The company, described as a "cultural pillar", is currently located in a 65-seat theatre in the TriBeCa section of lower Manhattan. The company, and the projects it has produced, have won multiple prizes and earned critical acclaim, including numerous Obie Awards, Drama Desk Awards, Drama Critics' Circle Awards, and a Pulitzer Prize. A recent highlight was winning the Drama Desk Award for Sustained Achievement for "nearly four decades of artistic distinction, innovative production, and provocative play selection."

Long Wharf Theatre is a nonprofit institution in New Haven, Connecticut, a pioneer in the not-for-profit regional theatre movement, the originator of several prominent plays, and a venue where many internationally known actors have appeared.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Libby Appel</span> 4th artistic director, Oregon Shakespeare Festival

Libby Appel served as the fourth artistic director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) from 1995 to June 2007. Appel directed more than 25 productions at OSF, and her artistic vision influenced the 11 plays presented each year during her tenure. Despite the festival's name, she placed increased emphasis on new works. “We have made major connections with world playwrights, artists whose voices we’re particularly interested in.” Appel said. “We commission playwrights, we develop plays here; we have playwrights in residence. We’re a world force now, and I’m really proud of that.”

Diane Marie Paulus is an American theater and opera director who is currently the Terrie and Bradley Bloom Artistic Director of the American Repertory Theater at Harvard University. Paulus was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical for her revivals of Hair and The Gershwins' Porgy and Bess, and won the award in 2013 for her revival of Pippin.

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.

Anne Hamburger is an American theatre manager, producer and playwright. She founded En Garde Arts, was artistic director of La Jolla Playhouse and was also an executive at Walt Disney Creative Entertainment, producing musicals.

Careena Melia is an Irish-American actress.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Institute for Advanced Theater Training</span>

The American Repertory Theater/Moscow Art Theatre (ART/МХАТ) Institute for Advanced Theater Training at Harvard University was founded in 1987 as a training ground for the new American Theater by the Robert Brustein.

Pam MacKinnon is an American theatre director. She has directed for the stage Off-Broadway, on Broadway and in regional theatre. She won the Obie Award for Directing and received a Tony Award nomination, Best Director, for her work on Clybourne Park. In 2013 she received the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Play for a revival of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? She was named artistic director of American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco, California on January 23, 2018.

Darko Tresnjak is a director of plays, musicals, and opera, and winner of several awards, including the Tony Award. He was the artistic director of the Hartford Stage in Connecticut, United States.

<i>Indecent</i> (play) 2015 play by Paula Vogel

Indecent is a 2015 play by Paula Vogel. It recounts the controversy surrounding the play God of Vengeance by Sholem Asch, which was produced on Broadway in 1923, and for which the producer and cast were arrested and convicted on the grounds of obscenity.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maria Manuela Goyanes</span>

Maria Manuela Goyanes is a first-generation Latina theatre maker, chiefly known for her work at The Public Theatre in New York City, as well as her September 2018 appointment as the artistic director of Woolly Mammoth Theatre in Washington D.C.

Adriana Gaviria is an actor, producer, director, writer, and advocate in the United States. She is a founding member and artistic producer of The Sol Project, a national initiative to support Latinx theater, and the founder and producing artistic director for North Star Projects, an arts initiative that supports independent artists and theaters. Her advocacy also includes leadership roles with the Parent Artist Advocacy League (PAAL).

The Turn of the Screw is a theatrical adaptation by Jeffrey Hatcher of the 1898 novella of the same name by Henry James. Hatcher developed the adaptation with the Portland Stage Company as part of its Little Festival of the Unexpected program in 1995, and it debuted at the company's home theater in Portland, Maine on January 11, 1996. In 1999, the play was staged Off-Broadway by the Primary Stages company. Director Melia Bensussen won an Obie Award for the Primary Stages production.

Nafe Edmund Katter was a stage actor and director who taught theatre at the University of Connecticut from 1957 to 1997. In 2000, Katter donated $1 million to build the 241-seat Nafe Katter Theatre, which opened in 2004 on UConn's campus in Storrs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hartford Stage</span> American theatre company

Hartford Stage is an American 501(c)(3) non-profit regional theatre company located on Church Street in downtown Hartford, Connecticut. Since its founding in 1963, Hartford Stage has won the Regional Theatre Tony Award (1989) and many Connecticut Critics Circle and other awards.

References

  1. 1 2 Arnott, Christopher (2019-01-10). "Meet Melia Bensussen, The New Artistic Leader of Hartford Stage". Hartford Courant. Retrieved 2021-08-27.
  2. 1 2 "Melia Bensussen". Emerson College. Retrieved 2021-08-27.
  3. 1 2 Jobson, C. Shardae (2019-03-20). "Brookline's Melia Bensussen: Globetrotter, Director, Theater Lover". Brookline TAB. Retrieved 2021-08-27.
  4. ↑ Rizzo, Frank (2019-02-20). "At Hartford Stage, New Artistic Director Melia Bensussen Looks to Highlight Multicultural Voices". Connecticut Magazine. Retrieved 2021-08-27.
  5. 1 2 3 Arnott, Christopher (2019-01-09). "Hartford Stage picks first woman as new artistic director". courant.com. Retrieved 2021-08-27.
  6. 1 2 Musbach, Julie (2019-01-09). "OBIE Winner Melia Bensussen Named Artistic Director of Hartford Stage". BroadwayWorld.com. Retrieved 2021-08-27.
  7. ↑ Citron, Cynthia (2003-08-01). "A Visit with Director Melia Bensussen". San Diego Jewish World. pp. 18–19. Retrieved 2021-08-27.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.