For the first time in 15 years, I’ll be appearing onstage in a play. In this case, I’m excited to make my Marin County debut in Ross Valley Players’ production of Karen Zacarias’ comedy The Book Club Play, directed by Mary Ann Rodgers. More soon!
As I depart Oakland School for the Arts (OSA), I’m happy to be joining the faculty of the Ruth Asawa School of the Arts (SOTA) in San Francisco. It’s a homecoming for me. SOTA is where I did my student teaching and spent my first year as a credentialed teacher, before moving to OSA. I’m thrilled to be back to become the director both the Musical Theatre and Theatre departments and to join the English Department faculty. Onward!
I’ve spent an amazing 9 years (!) at Oakland School for the Arts (OSA), most recently as the school’s Artistic Director. I’ve decided to say good-bye and embrace a new path. I started out at OSA as a teaching artist in the Theatre program, one year into my credential. I branched out from there to teach courses in both arts and academics, become the chair of the Theatre program and eventually become the Artistic Director overseeing nine arts programs serving grades 6-12. Thank you to everyone at OSA who created a space for me to facilitate work that felt important, and relevant. It was a pleasure!
Found a graduation photo, which feels appropriate given that, in a way, I’m graduating.
I’m excited to be working with Cal Performances on co-producing a series of exhibitions, performances, and symposia around the theme of MIGRATIONS to be held both at OSA and at UC Berkeley. These events are all in support of the world premiere of Dreamer, a new oratorio by Jimmy Lopez (music) and Nilo Cruz (text), which will be performed at Zellerbach Hall on Sunday, March 17. These are all open to the public. More info to come!
I'm currently a fellow with the Career Technical Education/Career Pathways Institute and working in collaboration with the California Department of Education. In my role I am developing career technical curriculum for performing arts programs in secondary schools across California. By May it will be on CTE Online for teachers to use. Stay tuned!
The world premiere of my short play The Little Mermaid had a great run at OSA in December, directed by OSA faculty member and TBA Award-winning director Nicole Helfer. Thanks to the OSA community for the warm reception!
I'm excited to share that I've been commissioned by the Throckmorton Theatre (formerly 142 Throckmorton for those of us who've been here long enough to remember!) to write a panto that combines "The Empreror's New Clothes" and our current presidential administration. It almost writes itself...but come see what develops! Opens in December for a limited holiday run. Details soon!
Along with the inimitable musical theatre scholar and fellow OSA faculty member Becky Potter and opera luminary and fellow faculty member Marie Plette, I'm getting down to work on a new version of THE THREEPENNY OPERA to debut April 2018. We hope to partner with the Goethe Institut and offer related events (lectures, symposium). Stay tuned for more info and for heads-ups about readings and workshops.
I'm looking forward in a little more than a month to the second year of the SF Summer Arts Collective, a residency program that connects younger artists with older more established peers. Unlike a traditional classroom, this residency is focused on the creating of art as a means of mentorship in itself. The two-week program will end in a gallery showing and performance of works in progress. I'll be heading up a playwriting and site-specific performance component. I'm looking forward to working on (and debuting parts of) my new version of The Oresteia which I'm hoping to announce soon will be a cross-generational co-production between Oakland School for the Arts and a local professional theatre company (check this blog for updates).
I'm excited to announce that I've been appointed to an advisory position at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (which comprises the De Young Museum and the California Palace of the Legion of Honor). I will be developing curriculum that connects students with objects in the Legion of Honor's collection. Since visual art plays a large role in my teaching of literary and cultural theory, I'm thrilled to share my background and interests (in pre-modernist art particularly) with Bay Area students in an authentic and intellectually rigorous way. My goal is to reduce the barriers between a diverse student body in San Francisco and the museums' collections, and to do so in an authentic and culturally relevant way.
I'm excited to announce that I've written a brand new verse version of Euripides' tragedy The Trojan Women which will be premiered at HEART OF OAKLAND on 2/4/16 at 7pm. The event is being held in the Fox Theatre in downtown Oakland and is a way for Oakland School for the Arts to connect with the city that gives the school its name. Each school of art at OSA has been given fifteen minutes to show what it does best. The School of Theatre (of which I'm proud to be the chair) is preparing a piece with particular relevance to Oakland. This new version of The Trojan Woman retains the classical feel and the Trojan War context of the original, but it has been updated to reflect the loss of young men of color to systematic oppression. A cast of nearly fifty School of Theatre students of all ages and grade levels will bring this piece to life. While this is a community outreach event first and foremost, any net proceeds will benefit arts education at OSA.
Tickets can be purchased online: http://www.ticketmaster.com/event/1C004F73FAE7455C
Prices range from $10 to $50 for VIP seating and commemorative art print. Please join us for this important and exciting event.
I'm thrilled to share that I've been granted permission by the British Library to examine selected autograph manuscripts and personal effects of Gerard Manley Hopkins and Christina Rossetti, two of the most acclaimed poets of Victorian England and among the most talented in the English language.
As a teacher and literary scholar I take great interest in Victorian poetry and the works of Hopkins, Rossetti, Algernon Charles Swinburne, and Alfred Tennyson. The Victorian period was a time of both traditionalism and significant innovation in poetry and offers fascinating issues to wrestle with in the areas of poetics, gender norms, and social change.
I'll be sure to post reports of my encounters with these artifacts, and probably a picture of me screaming and crying as if I were a teenager at a Beatles concert.
Over the summer I had the privilege to partner with Salome Milstead who is a local visual artist, filmmaker, and fellow educator. We created the San Francisco SummerArts Collective, a two-week residency at Workshop Residence in San Francisco dedicated to bringing together emerging artists and established artists for the purposes of making art. View my work and the work of my fellow artists at: http://www.sfsummerarts.com/blog.html.