Anna Deavere Smith

Thursday, March 27, 2008

Meridian Ballroom Morris University Center

.

The SIUE College of Arts and Sciences’ Arts and Issues Series

Presents

Anna Deavere Smith

EXCITING! FUN! EXHILARATINGT!

THOUGHT-PROVOKING! STIMULATING!

Box Office Dunham Hall

1042-B

618-650-2774

or 888-328-5168

X2774

Tickets $6-$10

SIUE Students FREE! w/ valid student IDID

Department of Theater and Dance

2007-2008 Academic Mainstage

Antigone Apr 23-26 at 7:30 PM —

Apr 27 at 2 PM Dunham Hall

Theater

Tonight Anna Deavere Smith explores the role of the artist in society. Her experience as an actor, playwright and teacher provides us with a fascinating viewpoint for this timeless question. It promises to be another Arts & Issues event of provocative issues and ideas that challenge our thinking.

Arts & Issues is administered by the College of Arts and Sci-ences at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. The College provides excellent degree programs for its majors, minors, and post-graduate students and offers an outstanding liberal arts and sciences foundation for undergraduate students across the Uni-versity. The College promotes scholarly and creative activities, public service, and cultural and arts programming, all of the highest quality. The central mission of the College of Arts and Sciences at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville is to trans-form thought and Anna Deavere Smith’s appearance surely sup-ports this mission as does our last event in April with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Anna Quindlen. By being a patron of Arts & Issues you believe the artist does have a role in our lives. But what is that role? We may not have a definitive answer when we leave this evening, but perhaps we’ll look at artists, and our world, a little differently.

Kent Neely Dean

Welcome to another memorable Arts & Issues Series season!

Thursday, April 24, 2008, 7:30pm

Meridian Ballroom, Morris University Center

Tickets are available at the The Dunham Hall Fine Arts Box office

by phone 618/650-2774 or visit

www.artsandissues.com Arts & Issues is brought to you by the SIUE College of Arts & Sciences.

Anna Quindlen The Media in the Modern Age:

Better Than Ever Anna Quindlen’s books have appeared on fiction, nonfiction and self-help best seller lists. Her columns have won her many of journalism’s most prestigious awards, in-cluding the Pulitzer Prize. She became only the third woman to write for the New York Times influential op-ed page, and currently writes a column for Newsweek. Her first novel, the critically-acclaimed Object Lessons, was followed by the best-seller One True Thing, which was made into a major motion picture with Meryl Streep and Rene Zell-weger. Quindlen’s book A Short Guide to a Happy Life has sold more than a million cop-ies, while her latest novel, Rise and Shine, debuted on the New York Times bestsellers list at #1. For one memorable evening, Quindlen shares her wit, charm and intellect with SIUE audiences.

Starbucks Coffee and the

Morris University Center salutes The Arts & Issues Series

Enjoy the show!

Savor a cup of fresh brewed Starbucks Coffee be-fore or after the performance...then take home a bag

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Arts and Issues Series is Partly supported by a grant from the Illinois Art Counsel, a state agency

2000

Arkansas Rep Theatre

Capitol Steps George Gallup

Edward James Olmos

Charles Osgood

Salzburg Marionetts

2001

The Babes

Dr. Keith Campbell

Chicago Brass Quintet

Imago

Christine Lavin

Keweisi Mfume

Parsons Dance Co.

Straight Ahead

Nadine Strossen

Jack Thompson

Lech Walesa

2002

Boys of the Lough

Mahalia: A Gospel Musical

R. Carlos Nakai

Juan Williams

2003

Robert Ballard

Corky Siegel’s Chamber Blues

National Theatre of the Deaf

San Jose Taiko

Dr. David Satcher

Gloria Steinem

Helen Tomas

George Winston

2004

Sam Abell

The Aspen Ensemble

Tony Blankely

Blinde Boys of Alabama

Gov. Howard Dean

Gus Giordan Jazz Dance Chicago

Garrison Keillor

Norman Mailer

Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra

2005

The Acting Company

Big Bad Voodoo Daddy

Blind Boys of Alabama

Dallis Brass

Joan Baez

Lady Smith Black

Mambazo

Kathy Mattea

David McCullough

2006

Deepack Chorpra, M.D

Garrison Keillor

Eileen Ivers

Imani Winds

BeavSoleil

North Carolina Dance Theatre

Glen Miller Orchestra

2007

Judy Collins

Gen. Barry R. MaCaffrey

Big Bad Voodoo Daddy

Sandra Reaves-Phillips

Arlo Guthrie

Anna Deavere Smith

Anna Quindlen

Anna Deavere Smith

Hailed by Newsweek as “the most exciting individual in Ameri-can theater,” playwright and performance artist Anna Deavere Smith uses her singular brand of theater to explore issues of race, community and character in America. She was awarded the prestigious MacArthur Foundation “genius” Fellowship for creating “a new form of theater — a blend of theatrical art, so-cial commentary, journalism and intimate reverie.”

Smith is perhaps best known as the author and performer of two one-woman plays about racial tensions in American cities — Fires in the Mirror (Obie Award-winner and runner-up for the Pulitzer Prize) and Twilight: Los Angeles 1992 (Obie Award-winner and Tony Award nominee).

Combining the journalistic technique of interviewing subjects from all walks of life with the art of recreating their words in performance, Smith transforms herself onstage into an aston-ishing number of characters (up to 46 in one show), express-ing their own points of view on controversial issues.

Smith plays National Security Advisor Nancy McNally on NBC’s The West Wing and co-starred in the CBS drama, Presidio Med. She has appeared in the films The Human Stain, Philadelphia, Dave, The American President and on TV’s The Practice. The film version of Twilight premiered at the 2000 Sundance Film Festival. Her latest book (January 2006) is Let-ters to a Young Artist: Straight-up Advice on Making a Life in the Arts — For Actors, Performers, Writers, and Artists of Every Kind. Actor Martin Sheen called it, “A practical manual for any artist as well as a powerful reminder of how we can and should live through our art.”

In 1998 in association with the Ford Foundation, Smith founded the Institute on the Arts & Civic Dialogue at Harvard (now at New York University). The Institute's mission is to ex-plore the role of the arts in relation to vital social issues.

Smith is a tenured professor at the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University and is affiliated with the NYU School of Law. Smith is working on a book about art and politics and recently finished her new play Let Me Down Easy.

benefactor ($5,000 or more) Commerce Bank Illinois Arts Council* National City Bank Schwartzkopf Printing SIUE Alumni Association sponsor ($1,000-$4,999) The Alestle The Bank of Edwardsville The Cassens Companies Conrad Press Ltd. Edward Chase Garvey Memorial Foundation Hortica Prairie Farms Dairy, Inc. Richards Brick Company SIUE Credit Union SIUE Morris University Center

patron ($500-$999) Judge David Herndon Martha E. Lo Russo Kenn Neher & Dawn Greenwood Michael and Michele Suwe Vaughn & Sue Vandegrift

friends of arts & issues ($50-$499) Grant and Darla Andree Harry C. and Marylyn Armstrong Deborah A. Bozsa and Charles A. Mecum Dr. Susan E. Breck Dr. Ivy and Matthew Cooper Dr. Albert and Donna Crider Robert and Helen Damon Kim Durr Peter Fornof Steve and Julie Hansen Lynn Heidinger-Brown Claudia Herndon

THANKS TO THE FOLLOWING WHOSE GENEROSITY

HELPS MAKE THE ARTS & ISSUES SERIES POSSIBLE

*This program is partially funded by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency.

1992

Avner the Eccentric

Ellen Goodman

Sandra Reaves-Phillips

Arthur Schlesinger

Stand Rock Indian Dance Ceremonial

Trisha Brown Dance Company

1993

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Jonathan Kozol

“Lend Me Tenor”

Irving R. Levin

Minnesota Opera “Don Giovanni”

Seattle Mime Theatre

Seattle Rep Theatre

Richard Stolzman

1994

Corky Siegel’s Chamber Blues

Maynard Fergurson

Dr. William Masters

New York Chamber Soloists

Jane Bryant Quinn

Terry Waite

Andrew Young

1995

Alvin Ailey Rep Ensemble

Arkansas Rep Theatre

Christoper Childs “Greenpeace”

Molly Ivins

Marian McPartland

Mummenschanz

Nunsense II

1996

Sarah Brady

Joe Clark

Famous People Players

Lyric Theatre Belfast

Momix

Joyce Carole Oates

The Tannahil Weavers

1997

Arkansas Rep Theatre

Bella Lewitsky Dance Company

Jocelyn Elders

Donald Johanson

Pilobolus Too

Calvin Trillin

Uptown String Quartet

1998

Caribbean Jazz Project

Morris Dees

Gregg Smith Singers

James Sewell Ballet

C. Everett Koop

Preservation Hall Jazz Band

Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra

St. Petersburg String Quartet

1999

Chenille Sisters

Myrlie Evers-Williams

Hal Holbrook as Mark Twain

Mark Russell

Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra

John Updike

Arts and Issues 1985-1007 1985

Alvin Ailey Rep Ensemble

John Kenneth Galbraith

1986

William F. Buckley

Dr. Jeffery Butler

Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center

John Cothran Jr.

Dr. Michael Debakey

Festival of India

Stephen McKinely Henderson

KDCPA Dance Company

Momix

National Theatre of the Deaf

Edwin Newman

Dr. Patrick O’Meara

Judy Onofrio

Donald Woods

1987

Borodin Piano Trio

Dizzy Gillespie

Lar Lubovitch Dance Company

Orion String Quartet

Orlando String Quartet

Nina Totenberg

Admiral Stansfield Turner

Dr. William Walsh

1988

Jack Anderson

Chinese Music Society of North America

Elisa Monte Dance Company

Miki Mandela

Nebraska Theatre Caravan

Lester Thurow

Tokyo String Quartet

Lord Harold Wilson

1989

“A Child’s Christmas in Wales”

Imago

Indianapolis Ballet Theater

Marian McPartland

Ed Meese

Negro Ensemble Company

Susan Sontag

1990

American Boychoir

Dr. Helen Caldicott

Dough Varone & Dancers

Famous People Players

Loretta Livingston & Dancers

Manhattan String Quartet

Pan Asian Repertory Theatre

William Raspberry

1991

Dave Brubeck

Jean-Michel Cousteau

Catherine Crier

Eastman Brass Quintet

Dr. Henry Heimilch

ISO Dance Theatre

Loretta Long

friends of arts & issues ($50-$499) continued John and Karen Hunt Dr. Poonam Jain & Dr. Rajneesh Jain Larry Lexow, Lexow Financial Group Gerry LeClaire Jeffrey C. McLellan and Dr. Judith F. McLaughlin Dick H. Mudge, Jr. Endowment Kent and Esther Neely Dr. Robert and Penny Parish

Dr. Karen Patty-Graham & Mr. Larry D. Graham Susan Rieken Cynthia & Michael Reinhardt Patricia Sim Jennifer Strohl Richard Tognarelli Karen K. Trone Shirley & Joseph Waide Rich & Missy Walker Brenda Wilson Carolyn and Robert Winnett Ronald Winney Susan and Larry Yager

A Special “Thank You” to the

for sponsoring the SIUE

Office of Science & Math Education’s Region XII Science Fair.

1500 Troy Road Edwardsville, IL. 62025

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Michaels has a broad assortment of prod-ucts, knowledgeable and friendly associ-ates, in-store events, classrooms and in-

structional displays.