Post-Play Dialogue

Thursday, May 26 (8PM curtain)
Playhouse Assistant Artistic Director Liam Lonegan and Mark Lamos, director of Straight White Men and Artistic Director of the Playhouse, will lead the audience in a conversation about the unique structure of Straight White Men. Come ready to ask questions!

Liam Lonegan (Assistant Artistic Director) Before founding Egg & Spoon Theatre Collective in 2017, Liam (he/him) received his BFA from Syracuse University, where he was the Managing Director of Black Box Players while directing and assisting on numerous productions. Most recently he co-directed The Rats and directed The Killer for Egg & Spoon’s second season. Other assisting credits include Fiorello! (Off-Broadway, dir. Bob Moss); In the Heights (dir. Marcos Santana); Man of La Mancha (dir. Mark Lamos); and Thousand Pines (dir. Austin Pendleton). He is currently the Assistant Artistic Director at Westport Country Playhouse, and an Associate Member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society. (he/him)

Mark Lamos Westport Country Playhouse: Artistic Director since 2009. Broadway: Our Country’s Good (Tony nomination); The Rivals, Cymbeline, Seascape (Tony nomination, best revival) for Lincoln Center Theater; The Deep Blue Sea; The Gershwins’ Fascinating Rhythm. Off-Broadway: Tiny Alice, Measure for Measure (Lortel Awards for both); productions at Playwrights Horizons, Primary Stages, Signature Theatre, The Public Theater, Shakespeare in the Park (As You Like It). Mr. Lamos was Artistic Director of Hartford Stage for 16 seasons (1989 Tony Award). Other theater: Kennedy Center, Canada’s Stratford Festival, Guthrie Theater, Yale Repertory Theatre (Associate Artist), A.C.T., The Old Globe, Delaware Rep, Ford’s Theatre, D.C.’s Shakespeare Theatre, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, and others. He was the first American to direct a company in the former Soviet Union (Desire Under the Elms at Moscow’s Pushkin Theatre), and the first to act as dramaturge in the creation of a ballet (Alexei Ratmansky’s The Tempest for American Ballet Theatre.) His work in opera is extensive. For the Metropolitan Opera: New productions of I Lombardi with Luciano Pavarotti, and Wozzeck (both televised for “Great Performances”), as well as the world premiere of Harbison’s The Great Gatsby, and Adriana Lecouvreur with Placido Domingo. Mr. Lamos created many productions for NYC Opera, including televised productions of Paul Bunyan, Tosca, Central Park, and Madama Butterfly (Emmy Award). Other opera: Glimmerglass, Bergen National, Gothenberg, Munich Biennale, London’s Barbican, L’Opera du Montreal, Chicago Lyric, Santa Fe, St. Louis, Dallas, San Francisco, and others. Lamos began his career in the theater as an actor on and Off-Broadway and in regional theater and made his film debut in Longtime Companion. He was awarded the Connecticut Medal for the Arts as well as honorary doctorates from Connecticut College, Trinity College, and the University of Hartford. In October 2016, Mr. Lamos was the recipient of the John Houseman Award. (he/him)

Sunday Symposium

Sunday, May 29 (3 PM curtain)

David Kennedy, Associate Artistic Director of the Playhouse, will interview cast from Straight White Men.

David Kennedy. Westport Country Playhouse: Don Juan, The Understudy, Appropriate, The Invisible Hand (Connecticut Critics Circle Awards for Outstanding Production and Outstanding Director), And a Nightingale Sang, Nora, Loot, Tartuffe, Suddenly Last Summer, Beyond Therapy, Dinner with Friends. Kennedy joined the Playhouse in March 2009 as associate artistic director. He previously served as associate artistic director at Dallas Theater Center from 2004 to 2007 and as acting artistic director for their 2007–08 season. He has also staged productions at the Wilma Theater, Hartford TheaterWorks, Clarence Brown Theatre Company, Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, 78th Street Theatre Lab, Prospect Theater Company, and Kitchen Dog Theater, among others. He was a founding artistic director of The Lunar Society in Toronto and Milkman Theatre Group in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Kennedy teaches in the graduate directing program at the University of Alberta, and is a former Phil Killian Fellow at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, a Drama League Directing Fellow, and a graduate of Yale School of Drama.

Post-Play Dialogue

Friday, June 3 (8PM curtain)

Following the show, Edson Rivas, Executive Director of the Triangle Community Center, leads discussion on gender expectations.

Edson Rivas, a double major of economics and international relations from the University of Connecticut, comes from a corporate background in proxy and investor relations. He has worked with many publicly traded companies across various industries on investor communications and proxy voting. Edson joined the Triangle Community Center Board in 2015 after being a volunteer at events. Since then Edson has held many committee chair positions, served as Vice President, and President before stepping down to run the day-to-day operations in July of 2020. As an immigrant from El Salvador, Edson knows the importance of the services TCC provides and the impact they have on those who use them. Edson is a proud member of the LGBTQ+ community and a self identified extroverted-introvert. (he/him/his)

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