Marc Acito | |
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 Acito in 2009 | |
| Born | January 11, 1966 Bayonne, New Jersey, U.S. |
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| Education | Carnegie Mellon University Colorado College (BA) |
| Spouse | Floyd Sklaver |
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| marcacito | |
Marc Acito (born January 11, 1966) is an American playwright, novelist, and humorist.
Born in Bayonne, New Jersey, Acito was raised in Westfield, New Jersey, and is a 1984 graduate of Westfield High School. [1] He studied in the BFA musical theatre program at Carnegie Mellon University but left before graduation. [2] In 1990 he received a bachelor's degree from Colorado College. In 2009, Colorado College awarded him an honorary doctorate. [3]
Acito began his career as a novelist and journalist. His comic novel How I Paid for College, won the Oregon Book Awards' 2005 Ken Kesey Award for Best Novel [4] and was voted a 2005 "Teens Top Ten for favorite young adult book" of the American Library Association. [5] In April 2008, Acito published Attack of the Theater People, as a sequel to How I Paid for College.
He is also the writer of the syndicated humor column "The Gospel According to Marc", which ran for four years in nineteen gay publications. [6] His humorous essays have appeared in many publications including The New York Times (April 3, 2006) and Portland Monthly magazine (January 2007, February 2007); as well as on NPR's All Things Considered (June 2008 through February 2010).
In 2012, Acito won the Charles MacArthur Award for Outstanding New Play for Birds of a Feather, a comedy inspired by Roy and Silo, the same-sex male penguins in Central Park who raised a chick. [7] [8]
Acito wrote the libretto for the musical Allegiance , which won the 2012 Craig Noel Award for Outstanding New Musical after a record breaking run at San Diego's Old Globe Theater. [9] ALLEGIANCE - A New Musical Inspired by a True Story opened on Broadway in November 2015 and starred George Takei and Lea Salonga. [10]
In 2012, Acito also turned his novel How I Paid for College into a "one-man monologue with songs" that premiered at the Hub Theater in Fairfax, Virginia. [11]
In 2014, his musical adaptation of E.M. Forster's A Room With a View was presented in Seattle at the 5th Avenue Theater. [12] In 2015, Acito wrote the concert adaptation of Lerner & Loewe's Paint Your Wagon for New York City Center's Encores! series. [13]
He is currently[ when? ] working on the libretto for a new musical commissioned by the 5th Avenue Theater. The musical, Dutch Master, was awarded a development grant by the National Alliance for Musical Theater. [14] Also in the works is Chasing Rainbows, a musical based on the early childhood of Judy Garland, which premiered in December 2015 at Flat Rock Playhouse in North Carolina. [15]
Acito lives in New York City with his husband Floyd Sklaver. [16] [17]
Oscar Greeley Clendenning Hammerstein II was an American lyricist, librettist, theatrical producer, and director in musical theater for nearly 40 years. He won eight Tony Awards and two Academy Awards for Best Original Song. Many of his songs are standard repertoire for vocalists and jazz musicians. He co-wrote 850 songs.
Maria Lea Carmen Imutan Salonga-Chien,, known professionally as Lea Salonga, is a Filipina singer and actress. Primarily known for her work in theatre, she has starred in musicals on the West End and Broadway. Her accolades include a Tony Award and a Laurence Olivier Award, in addition to nominations for two Grammy Awards. She was conferred with the Presidential Medal of Merit in 1990 and the Order of Lakandula in 2007, and she was honored as a Disney Legend in 2011.
George Takei is an American actor, author and activist known for his role as Hikaru Sulu, helmsman of the USS Enterprise in the Star Trek franchise.
Stephen Lawrence Schwartz is an American musical theatre composer and lyricist. In a career spanning over five decades, Schwartz has written such hit musicals as Godspell (1971), Pippin (1972), and Wicked (2003). He has contributed lyrics to a number of successful films, including Pocahontas (1995), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), The Prince of Egypt, and Enchanted (2007).
Alan Irwin Menken is an American composer, pianist, music director, and record producer, best known for his scores and songs for films produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios and Skydance Animation. Menken's music for The Little Mermaid (1989), Beauty and the Beast (1991), Aladdin (1992), and Pocahontas (1995) has each won him two Academy Awards. He also composed the scores and songs for Little Shop of Horrors (1986), Newsies (1992), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), Hercules (1997), Home on the Range (2004), Enchanted (2007), Tangled (2010), and Disenchanted (2022), among others. His accolades include winning eight Academy Awards — becoming the second most prolific Oscar winner in the music categories after Alfred Newman, a Tony Award, eleven Grammy Awards, seven Golden Globe Awards, and a Daytime Emmy Award. Menken is one of nineteen people to have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony.
Marc Shaiman is an American composer and lyricist for films, television, and theatre, best known for his collaborations with lyricist and director Scott Wittman, actor Billy Crystal, and director Rob Reiner. Shaiman has received numerous accolades including two Grammy Awards, a Primetime Emmy Award, and a Tony Award. He has also received seven Academy Awards nominations.
Jeffrey Daniel Whitty is an American playwright, actor, and screenwriter.
Michael John LaChiusa is an American musical theatre and opera composer, lyricist, and librettist. He is best known for musically esoteric shows such as Hello Again, Marie Christine, The Wild Party, and See What I Wanna See. He was nominated for four Tony Awards in 2000 for his score and book for both Marie Christine and The Wild Party and received another nomination in 1996 for his work on the libretto for Chronicle of a Death Foretold.
Marc Kudisch is an American stage actor, who is best known for his musical theatre roles on Broadway.
Victoria Clark is an American actress, musical theatre soprano, and director. Clark has performed in numerous Broadway musicals and in other theatre, film and television works. Her voice can also be heard on various cast albums and in several animated films. In 2008, she released her first solo album titled Fifteen Seconds of Grace. A five-time Tony Award nominee, Clark won her first Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical in 2005 for her performance in The Light in the Piazza. She also won the Drama Desk Award, Outer Critics Circle Award, and the Joseph Jefferson Award for the role. She won a second Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical in 2023 for her performance in Kimberly Akimbo.
Tammy Blanchard is an American actress. She rose to prominence for her role as teenage Judy Garland in the critically acclaimed television film Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows (2001), for which she received a Golden Globe Award nomination and a Primetime Emmy Award. Her other notable film roles were in The Good Shepherd (2006), Sybil (2007), Into the Woods (2014) and The Invitation (2015).
Steven Sater is a Tony Award, Grammy Award, and Laurence Olivier Award-winning American poet, playwright, lyricist, television writer and screenwriter. He is best known for writing the book and lyrics for the Tony Award-winning 2006 Broadway musical Spring Awakening.
How I Paid for College: A Novel of Sex, Theft, Friendship, and Musical Theater is a 2004 teen novel, the first by American author Marc Acito. The story centers on Edward Zanni, a 17-year-old high school senior living in New Jersey, US in the early 1980s, whose ambition to ascend to the Juilliard School in New York City to study acting is quashed when his father refuses to pay his tuition fees.
Stafford Arima is a Canadian-born theatre director. Arima studied at York University in Toronto, where he was the recipient of the Dean's Prize for Excellence in Creative Work. He is a member of the SDC and CAEA. In April 2017, he became the artistic director of Theatre Calgary.
Scott Sanders is an American television producer, film producer and theatre producer. His theatrical musical version of Alice Walker's novel The Color Purple, for which he was a lead producer alongside co-producers Oprah Winfrey and Quincy Jones, premiered on Broadway in 2005, garnering 11 Tony Award Nominations including Best Musical.
Telly Leung is an American actor, director, singer and songwriter. He is known for his work in musical theatre on Broadway and for his role as Wes, a member of the Dalton Academy Warblers on the Fox comedy-drama series Glee. In 2011, he starred in the Broadway revival of Godspell at the Circle in the Square Theatre.
Allegiance is a musical with music and lyrics by Jay Kuo and a book by Marc Acito, Kuo and Lorenzo Thione. The story, set during the Japanese American internment of World War II, was inspired by the personal experiences of George Takei, who starred in the musical. It follows the Kimura family in the years following the attack on Pearl Harbor, as they are forced to leave their farm in Salinas, California and are sent to the Heart Mountain Relocation Center in the rural plains of Wyoming.
Fun Home is a musical theatre adaptation of Alison Bechdel's 2006 graphic memoir of the same name, with music by Jeanine Tesori, and book and lyrics by Lisa Kron. The story concerns Bechdel's discovery of her own lesbian sexuality, her relationship with her closeted gay father, and her attempts to unlock the mysteries surrounding his life. It is told in a series of non-linear vignettes connected by narration provided by the adult Alison character.
Michael K. Lee is an American theater actor and singer who resides in Seoul, Korea.
Alexander Michael Brightman is an American actor and singer, best known for his work in musical theatre, specifically as Dewey Finn in the musical adaptation of School of Rock and the titular character in Beetlejuice The Musical. Both roles earned him nominations for the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical in 2016 and 2019 respectively. Since 2020, he has voiced Robo Fizz and Fizzarolli in the adult animated musical animated series Helluva Boss, and since 2024, he has starred as Sir Pentious and Adam in Hazbin Hotel.
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