Aurin Squire is an award-winning American playwright, poet, screenwriter, and reporter [1]. He has written numerous plays, essays, and poems [2], while his reporting has appeared in the Chicago Tribune, Miami Herald, and ESPN, among other publications.[3]
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Born in 1979 and raised in Opa Locka, Florida, by high school graduation Squire was professionally reporting for five different local publications.
At Northwestern University, Squire majored in radio/TV/film and worked as a professional journalist for the Chicago Tribune and The Miami Herald. In his senior year, "Shadows in the Light" an epic play about Cuban immigrants in Miami was produced by the ETA Theatre in Chicago.
In 2001, the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) commissioned Squire to write "Crash," a play about AIDS in the Black community. During this time he also served as managing editor for In Focus Interactive and the Miami bureau chief for Globe Street.
While studying playwriting at the Actors Studio from 2002–2005, Squire won the 2003 Change Inc. Grant for Emerging Artists. After graduating, he became a member of Vital Theatre's R&D group, the 2005 Lincoln Center Lab, and the Ars Nova Play Group.
In 2004, Squire wrote "Nueva Cancion," concerning the rise and fall of former Chilean president Salvador Allende. The docudrama was produced in September 2004 by Slant Theatre Project[4] at Cherry Lane and the Phil Bosakowski Theatre and was later co-sponsored by Amnesty International.
Many of Squire's plays have received enthusiastic reviews and revivals, among them "To Whom it May Concern," which ran off-Broadway in 2009, "Defacing Michael Jackson,” winner of the 2005 Samuel French, Inc. International Play Competition and "Match Me," produced by the New York International Fringe Festival in 2005.[5] His art has been called ‘a true gem that deserves to be set apart from the rest’ by the Drama Review, "brilliant" and "thoroughly entertaining" by Show Business Weekly, and ‘engaging and provocative’ by critic Martin Denton.[6][7]
His 2007 dark comedy “To Whom It May Concern” premiered at the Abingdon Theatre and won the Fresh Fruit Festival awards for best play and best playwright.[8] "To Whom It May Concern" was also produced off-Broadway in 2009 at the Arclight Theatre with a cast including: Israel Gutierrez, Matthew Alford, Nicholas Reilly, and Carmelo Ferro.
In 2009, Squire wrote the book for the children's musical "Matthew takes Mannahatta," called "refreshingly clever" and a "cheerful tribute to our multiracial, multicultural America" by the New York Times.[9]
In 2010 he was hired by installation art company Local Project and wrote the script for "Dreams of Freedom" for the National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia. "Dreams" is an interactive multimedia piece based on interviews of Jewish immigrants coming to America.
Squire's "Dreams of Freedom" won a Core 77 Design Award [10], NMAJ's Communication Award, and an AIGA Design Effectiveness Award [11]