Eight 2018 honorees announced for Theater Hall of Fame
Acting, directing and playwriting are equally honored in the just announced 2018 inductees to the Theater Hall of Fame. The playwrights are Adrienne Kennedy and David Henry Hwang, plus Maria Irene Fornes, influential as much as an innovative director as playwright. The actors are Cicely Tyson (oldest of the inductees, in her 90s), Christine Baranski,and Rene Auberjonois. Joe Mantello (the youngest, in his 50s) began as an actor, became a Tony-winning director and still acts on occasion. To be inducted posthumously is James Houghton (1958-2016), founder and artistic director of the playwright-centered Signature Theatre.
The honors were announced by Terry Hodge Taylor, producer of the Hall of Fame, which is located in the Gershwin Theater, where the names of honorees are displayed on the walls in gold letters, above display cases of theatrical memorabiliagoing dating back to the Hall’s origins in 1971 in the then-named Uris Theatre.
Selections are made annually from a list of 40-50 nominees by a national electorate combining the 250-member American Theatre Critics Association, members of the Hall of Fame, and selected theater notables. Eligibility requires at least five major theater credits over a career of at least 25 years. Broadway veterans usually dominate, but in this year’s class Kennedy, Fornes, and Houghton all made their names off-Broadway or beyond.
The eight new members will be inducted at an invitation-only celebration on November 12, with Hall member Dana Ivey as emcee.
A complete list of the 552 members of the Theater Hall of Fame is available here. For lists of inductees year-by-year and accounts of the annual induction ceremonies, visit that section of the ATCA website.
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