Steppenwolf Theatre Company Blog – Chicago Theater, World-Class Ensemble

Reasons to work on a Tina Landau show:

• Experience the application of Viewpoints in it’s purest form, and reap the benefits on stage
• Meet the most generous, caring, and talented actors and crew in the business because of her incredible instinct in assembling ensembles that meld as actors and friends
• Exercise your attention to detail because her eye for specifics is unparalleled in this business
• Her sense of humor
• Experience the collaboration of all aspects of the Theater, as it should be
• Work with a director who genuinely loves actors and respects what we do, and in turn gets the best results possible out of productive conversation and experiment
• Blunt honesty is not scarce in her rehearsal room, which saves a lot of time and energy that would be better spent getting work done

I could continue but you get the point. Great working conditions. Read the rest of this entry »

The Steppenwolf crowd celebrates August: Osage County winning 5 Tony Awards. Explore more moments from this special event.

Last night, I joined a lively cross-section of the Steppenwolf community—including staff, ensemble, artists, trustees, and subscribers—to excitedly await the announcement of the seven Tony awards for which August: Osage County had been nominated. Although Superior Donuts is now in technical rehearsals, the cast and crew had graciously surrendered their theater for our celebration and we gathered to watch the awards on the two large projection screens that now obscured their set. Some brilliant soul in marketing had come up with the idea of distributing little pill bottles filled with blue jelly beans—an homage to the pills Violet Weston inhales over the course of the play—and we marked our excitement by shaking these noisemakers every time a member of the Steppenwolf family was mentioned.

Ten minutes in, Rondi Reed accepted the first award of the evening (for Best Featured Actress in a Play) by saying “Families. It’s about families for us,” and I think all of us in the theatre felt the truth of that statement. I moved to Chicago to join the staff here in November, and, as a new member of the Steppenwolf family, I was moved to hear how frequently our nominees mentioned the importance of our community in their speeches. The August nominees’ heartfelt expressions of gratitude painted an image of Steppenwolf’s uniquely rich artistic ecosystem that must have been clear to even the most disconnected observer. Anna Shapiro expressed it perfectly: “I’m pretty sure that the only way that you get to have a life in the theatre is if somewhere in your life you come upon a group of people who although they don’t need to, make room for you. And if you’re incredibly lucky, that group of people is the Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago.” Read the rest of this entry »

Director of New Play Development, Ed Sobel, talks with actors after a reading of Fair Use for First Look 101. Explore more moments from this reading.

The Traffic season is done, we’re well into the run of Dead Man’s Cell Phone, and we’re gearing up for Superior Donuts and First Look . Hmmm, this seems like the perfect moment to hop on the train (that’s how we roll) and head down to the beautiful Chicago Cultural Center to hear the Mayor and others talk about the importance of theater in Chicago. The official purpose of the occasion on Monday, June 9, 2008 was a salute to Chicago’s award-winning theater community and the Tony nods for Chicago Shakespeare Theatre and Steppenwolf. However, Cultural Programming Deputy Commissioner Janet Carl Smith played host to a line up of beloved icons including Commissioner of Cultural Affairs Lois Weisberg, CST Artistic Director Barbara Gaines, and our own Artistic Director Martha Lavey; the event turned into a love fest for everyone in the artistic and cultural community. Read the rest of this entry »