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“[Shishir Kurup’s translation] maintains Shakespeare’s intentions and most of his text, while elegantly and seamlessly weaving in more accessible language. The new translation allows more of Shakespeare’s ideas to come through and open the wonders and blazing relevance of the play to more people—which is what theatre should be.” Nancy Keystone, dramaturg
Playwright
Shishir Kurup
In Three Seasons at OSF: Quiara Hudes’ The Happiest Song Plays Last, Water by the Spoonful Director, Medea songs Composer and Lyricist, Medea/Macbeth/Cinderella (OSF); Ayad Akhtar’s Disgraced (Playmaker’s Rep), Aditi Kapil’s Brahman(i)(Quantum Theatre) Director.
Other Theatres: Regional: James McManus’ Love on San Pedro, Sarah Ruhl’s Demeter in the City, Tracy Young’s Candude, Sigrid Gilmer’s SEED, Everyman in the Mall (co-directed with Bill Rauch) (Cornerstone Theater Company. CTC) Director.
Composer/lyricist: The Good Person of New Haven (Long Wharf Theatre); Medea/Macbeth/Cinderella (Yale Repertory Theatre); The Two Noble Brothers(The Public Theater); As You Like It (Pasadena Playhouse); Touch the Water (Actor/Composer), Los Vecinos (Band Leader/Composer), Birthday of the Century (Actor/Composer), Central Avenue Chalk Circle (Actor/Composer), Making Paradise (Lyricist only), An Antigone Story(Writer/Director/Composer) CTC.Other credits: Ghurba (Harmony Gold Theatre), Bliss Point (The Odyssey Theatre), On Caring for the Beast (Currican Theatre, NYC, CTC, L.A.); Merchant on Venice (Lark Theatre, NYC, Small Theatre Premiere, Silk Road Rising, The Cockpit Theatre London); Writer/Director.
Resident composer/lyricist for Cornerstone Theater Company since 1994. Film/TV Actor: True Blood, NCIS, Bones, Lost, Heroes, Sleeper Cell, NYPD Blue, Monk, Alias, The West Wing, Coneheads… Awards: TIME/A.S.K. Award (one of only six nationwide awardees), Princess Grace Award, Kennedy Center Award, TCG/Alan Schneider Directing Award finalist, two time Herb Alpert Award nominee, L.A. Weekly Award, LA Stage Alliance Ovation Award nominee, Garland Awards, Drama-Logue Awards. Education: MFA, University of California, San Diego.
Dramaturg
Nancy Keystone
Nancy Keystone is a Los Angeles-based theatre and visual artist, educator, and founding Artistic Director/Executive Producer of the collaborative ensemble, Critical Mass Performance Group. With CMPG her work encompasses a variety of forms including epic historical projects, re-inventions of classic texts, intimate interactive salons, public happenings, and social practice. Known for exuberant theatricality and surprising collisions of ideas, CMPG was named 2013’s Best Theatre Company by the LA Weekly. She is committed to taking political and social institutions to task, uplifting marginalized voices, and revealing unacknowledged truths. Ms. Keystone is the honored recipient of a Doris Duke Performing Artist Award, and United States Artists Hoi Fellowship.
Most recently with CMPG, in her roles as writer, director, and scenic designer, Ms. Keystone helmed a new exploration of the Iphigenia myth at the Getty Villa. Their production of Ameryka (2010-18)–a kaleidoscopic investigation of the promises and betrayals of the United States’ core ideals—was mounted at Center Theatre Group’s Kirk Douglas Theatre, and named Production of the Year, and Best Ensemble by Stage Raw. With Cornerstone Theater Company and residents of Jordan Downs housing project in Watts, she created “A Jordan Downs Illumination,” a community-based, multi-modal performance installation (Best of 2019 by KCRW). Other multi-award-winning projects with CMPG: Alcestis, a re-invention of Euripides’ play about love and sacrifice (Boston Court Pasadena, Getty Villa); Apollo trilogy, exploring the US space program, its relationship with Nazi rocket scientists, and the surprising intersection with the Civil Rights Movement (CTG’s Kirk Douglas Theatre, Portland Center Stage); The Akhmatova Project, a movement-based piece, inspired by the life and writing of Russian poet, Anna Akhmatova.
As a freelance artist Ms. Keystone has directed and designed award-winning productions at theatres across the country, including Portland Center, Center Theatre Group, Denver Center Theatre, East West Players, Boston Court Pasadena, Actor’s Express, Georgia Shakespeare Festival, San Francisco Shakespeare Festival. Other directing forays include opera (Long Beach Opera, Musica Angelica, San Luis Obispo Mozart Festival) and film. She has been director/dramaturg for many new plays by emerging playwrights and leads boundary-busting playwriting workshops based on her devising techniques. As a visual artist, Ms. Keystone works in mixed media, creating paintings, collages, and unique scenic environments for her productions.
She is the recipient of Theatre Communications Group’s Alan Schneider Director Award, a MacDowell Fellow, and Los Angeles Institute for the Humanities Fellow at USC. She has received support from the NEA, Pew Charitable Trusts, Center for Cultural Innovation, Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, David Lee Foundation, California Community Foundation, among others. She earned an MFA in directing from Carnegie Mellon, and a BA in Theatre Arts from UCLA. She is on visiting faculty at UCLA, is a frequent university guest lecturer, and an instructor in arts-in-education programs.
In Print
Julius Caesar
A fresh, contemporary translation of one of Shakespeare’s most dramatic and popular plays.
Julius Caesar, Shakespeare’s famous Roman tragedy, chronicles the chaos leading up to the fateful murder of Caesar and the ensuing political fallout upon his death. Shishir Kurup’s translation updates Shakespeare’s language to allow more of the playwright’s ideas to come through; it opens the wonders and blazing relevance of the play’s rhetorical brilliance to the twenty-first century.
