Alumni Notes Festival, Los Angeles CineFest, Piton International Film Festival, and Hoosierdance International Film Festival. ● Jennifer Harrison Newman ’11 is the new producing director of Compagnia de’ Colombari, the company founded and directed by Karin Coonrod (Faculty). Colombari brought The Merchant of Venice, featuring Reg E. Cathey ’81, to Venice this past summer in commemoration of the 500th anniversary of the establishment of the Jewish Ghetto and the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. Jennifer, Charlotte Brathwaite ’11, and Paul Lieber ’13 recently presented The Geneva Project at JACK in Ft. Greene, Brooklyn. The piece, inspired by photo-
“There is a veritable Yale Mafia cell operating out of Hubbard Street Dance Chicago... working together to change lives through dance.” — s u za n n e appe l ’11, som ’11.
graphs of Jennifer’s great-aunt in Depression-era South Carolina, is an exploration of race, gender, and poverty. Jennifer is also producing director of Heartbeat Opera and reports, “Our second season started off on a high note at the beautiful Columbus Circle home of long-time supporter Jill Steinberg. The season finished with sold out performances and rave reviews of Heartbeat’s second Spring Festival at the Theatre at St. 124
Clement’s in Manhattan.” ● “There is a veritable Yale Mafia cell operating out of Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, where Karena Fiorenza Ingersoll ’12 (general manager), Belina Mizrahi ’10, YC ’02 (controller), and I (director of external affairs) are working together to change lives through dance,” writes Suzanne Appel ’11, SOM ’11. “We were recently joined by Aurelia Fisher Cohen ’09 (grant writer). Come visit us in Chicago!” ● Martyna Majok ’12 premiered her play Ironbound at Round House Theatre in Bethesda, Maryland, in September 2015 and then in New York City in March 2016 at Rattlestick Playwrights Theater in a co-production with Women’s Project Theater. The play and both productions were critically acclaimed, garnering a New York Times Critics’ Pick. Martyna was nominated for an Outer Critics’ Circle John Gassner Award and The Helen Hayes Charles McArthur Award for Outstanding New Play. Martyna’s next play, Cost of Living, premiered at Williamstown Theatre Festival this past summer. The play won The Kennedy Center’s Jean Kennedy Smith Prize and The Ashland New Play Festival’s Women’s Invitational Prize. Martyna was the 2015–16 Playwrights of New York (PoNY) Fellow at The Lark. ● Caroline V. McGraw ’12 received a Tow Foundation residency at Page 73 Productions for 2016. The grant includes a salary with benefits and augmented support of a production of her play Ultimate Beauty Bible in Page 73’s 2016–17 season. ● DeDe Jacobs-Komisar ’12 reports: “We’ve had quite a year. I started as institutional giving manager at the Huntington Theatre Company in January, and in April my husband, Yaakov, and I welcomed Uriel, our third kid. Along with his brothers, Nani (born while I was a first-year at YSD) and Itai, we’re loving life in Sharon, Massachusetts.” ● Jenny Lagundino ’13 joined Page 73 Productions in January 2016 as the company’s first managing director. ● In April 2016, Palmer Hefferan ’13 sound designed Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again at Soho Rep, directed by Lileana Blain-Cruz ’12, with lighting design by Yi Zhao ’12, sets by Adam Rigg ’13 and projections by
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Hannah Wasileski ’13. She also created original music for the national tour of Remarkably Normal, which shares stories of women who have had abortions and campaigns to build a culture of compassion and support for women’s access to basic health care. In October 2016, she sound designed and composed original music for Tiger Style! at the Huntington Theatre, directed by Moritz von Stuelpnagel, with sets by Wilson Chin ’03, lighting by Matt Richards ’01, and costumes by Junghyun Georgia Lee ’01. ● Jonathan Wemette ’13 writes: “My partner, Susan Hyatt, and I were overjoyed to welcome two daughters into our lives. Susan gave birth to Delia Catherine Wemette and Josephine Sarah Wemette on March 4, 2016. Everyone is doing well!” ● Ashton Heyl ’14 acted last spring and summer alongside Caitlin Clouthier ’08 and Richard Gallagher ’06 in The Norman Conquests, a trilogy by Alan Ayckbourn, co-produced by Northern Stage, Dorset Theatre Festival, and Weston Playhouse. Evan Yionoulis ’85, YC ’82 (Faculty) directed the second play of the trilogy. ● Brittany Behrens ’14 is now Brittany Rall! She and William Rall were married on December 12, 2015, in snowy Leavenworth, Washington. Brittany celebrated two years as digital marketing manager at Seattle Opera in June. ● Shane Hudson ’14 was named executive director of Primary Stages, an Off-Broadway theatre in Manhattan. ● Lauren Dubowski ’14 spent the last year in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, where she explored puppet theatre and worked for a film production company as a Luce Scholar. She is currently at work on her dissertation, which focuses on the Polish playwright and visual artist Stanisław Wyspiański. Lauren is a Fulbright Scholar. ● Sara Holdren ’15, YC ’08 writes: “I have been selected as one of the Drama League’s two Classical Directing Fellows for 2016. I’ll be spending the summer in San Diego at the Old Globe, assistant directing Macbeth for Brian Kulick and Love’s Labour’s Lost for Kathleen Marshall, as well as working on my own projects. Rachel Carpman ’15 and I have successfully pitched to the Araca Project and will mount our original adaptation,