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Nov. 7, 2007

Contact: Jessica Moore, jkmoore@emory.edu, 404-727-1687

For Immediate Release: November 7, 2007
Media Contact: Jessica Moore, Arts at Emory, jkmoore@emory.edu 

Reading of Academy Award-Nominated Playwright José Rivera’s “Boleros for the Disenchanted” Directed by Susan Booth is Highlight of mid-Nov. Emory/ Atlanta Visit

Academy Award-nominated playwright José Rivera, the Alliance Theatre and Emory University’s Theater Emory present a free staged reading of Rivera’s play “Boleros for the Disenchanted” directed by Susan Booth at Emory’s Schwartz Center, Theater Lab, Thursday , Nov. 15, 2007, 7 p.m. This reading is one of three events during the playwright’s visit (additional events described below) and includes actors from Atlanta, Los Angeles and New York. “Boleros for the Disenchanted” tells the story of a passionate couple that falls in love while in Puerto Rico and their subsequent life together near an Army base in Alabama. The play poignantly illustrates the experience of an immigrant leaving the Caribbean for the promise of a better life in the continental United States and portrays the deep and intense commitment of marriage.

The staged reading will follow a reading and colloquium by Rivera as part of Emory’s Creative Writing Program Reading Series. Rivera will discuss survival and process as a playwright and screenwriter and read monologues from his play “Sonnets for an Old Century” on Monday, Nov. 12 at 6:30 p.m. in the Joseph W. Jones Room, 311 Woodruff Library, Emory University. A 6 p.m. reception precedes Monday’s reading and a booksigning follows. In addition, Rivera will speak and answer questions at the Creative Writing Program colloquium on Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2007 at 2:30 p.m. in room N301 of the Callaway Center, Emory University. For more information, the public may call the Arts at Emory Box Office at 404-727-5050 or visit www.arts.emory.edu. Admission is free and open to the public for all three events (no reservations or tickets required). Monday and Tuesday’s reading and the colloquium are co-sponsored by Emory’s Creative Writing Program, Department of Theater Studies, the Playwriting Center of Theater Emory and the Department of Film Studies.

While in Atlanta, Rivera will also serve as a judge for the fourth round of the Alliance Theatre’s Kendeda Graduate Playwriting Competition.

Background on José Rivera and Susan Booth:

José Rivera is the recipient of two OBIE Awards for his writing of “Marison” and “References to Salvador Dali Make Me Hot,” both produced at The Joseph Papp Public Theatre/New York Shakespeare Festival. His screenplay for “The Motorcycle Diaries” (directed by Walter Salles) was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, a British Academy of Film and Television Arts Award and a Writers Guild Award. The screenplay received Spain’s Goya Award and Argentina’s top award for screenwriting. Other honors include the Imagen Foundation’s 2005 Norman Lear Writing Award, a Fulbright Arts Fellowship in Playwriting, the 2005 Impact Award and a Rockefeller Foundation grant, a Whiting Foundation Award and a McKnight Fellowship. His play “Massacre (Sing to Your Children)” received its world premiere at the Goodman Theatre with Teatro Vista in the spring of 2007. The playwright and screenwriter studied with Gabriel Garcia Marquez at Sundance and was writer-in-residence at the Royal Court Theatre, London.

Susan V. Booth , Alliance Theatre Artistic Director, joined the Alliance Theatre in July of 2001. As a stage director, her work has been seen at theatres including Chicago’s Goodman Theatre, La Jolla Playhouse, Actors Theatre of Louisville, St. Louis Repertory, Cincinnati Playhouse, New York Stage and Film and many others. Before coming to Atlanta, Booth was the Director of New Play Development at The Goodman Theatre, Co-Artistic Director for the City of Chicago’s Professional Summer Theatre and Associate Artistic Director of Northlight Theatre. She holds degrees from Northwestern and Denison universities and was a fellow of the National Critics Institute. She has held teaching positions at Northwestern and DePaul universities and currently serves as adjunct faculty with Emory University. She is a member of Leadership Atlanta’s Class of 2003 and was cited as a Lexus Leader for the Arts by WABE-FM, “Atlanta’s Best New Visionary” by Atlanta Magazine in 2004, one of Atlanta’s “25 Power Women to Watch” in 2006 by Atlanta Magazine and was chosen as the Best Local Director in The Sunday Paper’s 2006 and 2007 Readers’ Choice Awards. Booth serves on the board of the Metro Atlanta Arts and Cultural Coalition, co-chairs the City of Atlanta’s One Book, One Community program and serves as President of the Board of Directors for Theatre Communications Group.

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