|
New York –
Laurie Anderson, Joan Osborne and
Suzanne Vega received Women's Project's 2010
Women of Achievement Award March 8. The 32-year-old
theater company dedicated to producing the work of
female theater artists made the wards last night on
International Women's Day at Women's Project's home,
Julia Miles Theater, 424West 55th Street.
The 2010 Women's Project
Women of Achievement Award pays tribute to the
remarkable accomplishments of women in a variety of
disciplines.
32 Years of Presenting Women Theater Artists
Founded in 1978 by Julia
Miles, and now under the leadership of Producing
Artistic Director Julie Crosby, Women's Project
provides a stage for women playwrights and
directors, who even today receive fewer than 20% of
professional production opportunities nationwide.
Women's Project (WP) produces
theater created by women, providing a forum for
women's perspectives on political, social, and
cultural topics. During its 32 years, countless
artists have achieved significant recognition
through WP productions, including Anne Bogart, Eve
Ensler, Maria Irene Fornes, Lynn Nottage, Suzan-Lori
Parks, Leigh Silverman, and Anna Deavere Smith,
among the many. WP has produced staged over 600
mainstage productions and developmental projects,
and published ten anthologies of plays by women. In
1998, WP purchased a historic off-Broadway venue on
Manhattan's West 55th Street, making WP the first
and only women's theater company to hold the keys to
its own stage.
The National Endowment for
the Arts in Washington, D.C. is no longer funding
Women's Project's development of female playwrights
and directors, perhaps figuring that Women's
Project, coming off its most successful seasons in
recent history (Freshwater, Aliens with
Extraordinary Skills, crooked, Sand)
and this year's hit, extended by popular demand,
Or, by Liz Duffy Adams, can create great
theater by women without Federal support or
stimulation. (Women's Project was also rejected for
NEA stimulus money and therefore no woman's job was
saved by the Federal government.) Have no doubt,
Women's Project will present women theater artists
no matter how the winds blow
in Washington.
|