Wendy MacLeod
Wendy MacLeod | |
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Education |
Kenyon College, BA, graduated with Distinction, Phi Beta Kappa Yale School of Drama, MFA in Playwriting |
Information | |
Notable work(s) |
Slow Food (2015) Women in Jeopardy! (2015) The Ballad of Bonnie Prince Chucky (2014) Find and Sign (2012) Things Being What They Are (2003) Juvenilia (2003) The Water Children (1997) Schoolgirl Figure (1995) Sin (1994) The Shallow End and The Lost Colony (one-acts) (1992) The House of Yes (1990) Apocalyptic Butterflies (1987) |
Website |
www |
Wendy A. MacLeod (born August 6, 1959)[1] is an American playwright.
MacLeod received a BA from Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, where she now teaches and is a playwright-in-residence.[2] She received a MFA from the Yale School of Drama.[3]
Her works include the plays Sin and Schoolgirl Figure, both of which premiered at Chicago's Goodman Theatre and were directed by David Petrarca. Schoolgirl Figure was then optioned for film by HBO and Anvil Entertainment. The House of Yes, which premiered in San Francisco at the Magic Theatre and was the theatre's second-longest running show, became an award-winning film by the same name starring Parker Posey and earned a Special Jury Award at the Sundance Film Festival.[4] Other works include The Water Children, Things Being What They Are,Juvenilia, Apocalyptic Butterflies. Apocalyptic Butterflies was filmed by the BBC as Nativity Blues 1988, starring Alfred Molina.
Her play Juvenilia, a comic drama[5] about college students "attempting to find love", premiered off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons, as did her play The Water Children, both directed by longtime collaborator Petrarca, which has also been seen at Los Angeles’ Matrix Theater where it was cited as "the most challenging political play of 1998" by the L.A. Weekly and earned six L.A. Drama Critics Circle nominations.[6][7] Things Being What They Are premiered at the Seattle Repertory Theatre and was then seen at Steppenwolf in Chicago in 2003 where its sold-out run was extended twice.[8] The House of Yes has been performed at Soho Repertory Theatre, at the Maxim Gorki Theater in Berlin and at The Gate Theater in London, where it was published in Plays International. MacLeod's play, Find and Sign, premiered at Pioneer Theatre Company in Salt Lake City, Utah in 2012. Set in the New York City music industry (with a slight nod to Othello), Find and Sign is about a bumpy romance between an on-the-rise young record executive and an idealistic public school teacher.[9]
Her critically acclaimed comedy Women in Jeopardy! premiered at Geva Theater in 2015, directed by Sean Daniels, and her newest play Slow Food was invited to the 2015 National Playwrights Conference.[10][11] She has been a guest professor at Northwestern University’s film and theater departments. MacLeod's essay "Name Brand Nostalgia"[12] was recently featured in The New York Times and her essay/talk "The Daily Struggle"[13] was given as part of the Kenyon Review's Writers-on-Writing series in October 2016. Her prose and humor pieces have appeared in Poetry magazine, The New York Times, Salon, The Rumpus, McSweeney's Internet Tendency, The Washington Post, and All Things Considered.
MacLeod worked as the Executive Story Editor for ''Popular'' (TV Series) for the WB and wrote the pilot "Ivory Tower", commissioned by CBS, produced by Brillstein-Grey (The Sopranos) and Diane Keaton, with actress Jeanne Tripplehorn (Big Love). She currently serves as the Artistic Director of the Kenyon Playwrights Conference.[14] The Kenyon Playwrights Conference supports the early-stage development of new work through its commissioning program and offers an intensive playwriting workshop for playwrights at all stages in their careers, led by artistic leaders of partner companies which have included The Atlantic Theater, Playwrights Horizons, Steppenwolf Theater, Roundabout Theatre, Hampstead Theater, The Old Vic, The Royal Court Theater, La Jolla Playhouse, and ACT in Seattle.
She is married to Read Baldwin and has two sons: Foss and Avery Baldwin.
Reviews
Women in Jeopardy!
- "A rollicking ‘Women in Jeopardy!’ at Cape Playhouse "Boston Globe"
- Women in Jeopardy is Dangerously Funny in Walnut Creek "The Mercury News"
- Theater Review: "Women in Jeopardy!" at Geva "Rochester City Paper"
- Geva's 'Women in Jeopardy!' highly entertaining "Rochester Democrat & Chronicle"
Apocalyptic Butterflies
More Plays
Footnotes
- ↑ U.S. Public Records Index, Vol 1 (Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.), 2010.
- ↑ "Wendy MacLeod, James Michael Playwright-in-Residence". Kenyon College. Retrieved 2007-02-08.
- ↑ "Wendy MacLeod". Playscripts. Retrieved 2015-04-30.
- ↑ "The A.C.T. Young Conservatory Tackles Controversial, and Hysterical, Play by the Author of The House of Yes". American Conservatory Theater. Retrieved 2007-02-08.
- ↑ MacLeod, Wendy. "Wendy MacLeod: Juvenilia". Retrieved 2007-03-03.
- ↑ "Wendy MacLeod". Samuel French.
- ↑ "L.A. Drama Critics Go for the 'Ganesh'--8 Nominations". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2015-04-30.
- ↑ "Wendy MacLeod". Kenyon College. Retrieved 2015-04-30.
- ↑ "Wendy MacLeod Find and Sign". Wendy MacLeod. Retrieved 2015-04-30.
- ↑ "Women in Jeopardy!". Geva Theatre Center. Retrieved 2015-04-30.
- ↑ "O’Neill National Playwrights Conference Sets 2015 Slate". Variety. Retrieved 2015-04-30.
- ↑ "Wendy MacLeod:"Name Brand Nostalgia"". New York TImes. Retrieved 2017-05-16.
- ↑ "Wendy MacLeod: "The Daily Struggle"". Retrieved 2017-05-16.
- ↑ "Kenyon Playwrights Conference". Retrieved 2017-05-16.