2011 Tony Awards: Marianne Elliott and Tom Morris Win 'Best Direction of a Play'

The American Theatre Wing's 64th Annual Antoinette Perry "Tony"® Awards were held at Radio City Music Hall on Sunday, June 13, 2011 and broadcast on the CBS Television Network. For more information visit tonyawards.com.

Nominations in 26 competitive categories for the American Theatre Wing's 65th Annual Antoinette Perry "Tony" Awards® were announced May 3, 2011 by Tony Award winning actor Matthew Broderick and Tony Award winning actress Anika Noni Rose.

The Antoinette Perry "Tony" Awards are bestowed annually on theatre professionals for distinguished achievement. The Tony is one of the most coveted awards in the entertainment industry and the annual telecast is considered one of the most prestigious programs on television.

To view the complete list of 2011 Tony Award winners, click here.

BroadwayWorld Congratulates
Marianne Elliott and Tom Morris
2011 Tony Award Winner
'Best Direction of a Play'

Marianne Elliott and Tom Morris (War Horse) Marianne Elliott is Associate Director of the National Theatre, where she has co-directed War Horse and directed Season's Greetings, Women Beware Women, Mrs. Affleck, Harper Regan, Saint Joan (Olivier Award for Best Revival, South Bank Show Award), Thérèse Raquin and Pillars of the Community (Evening Standard Best Director Award). She was an Associate Director at the Royal Court, where her productions include Stoning Mary, Notes on Falling Leaves, The Sugar Syndrome and Local. Previously she was an Artistic Director of the Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester, where she directed Port, Design for Living, Les Blancs, As You Like It, A Woman of No Importance, Nude With Violin, Fast Food, Martin Yesterday, Deep Blue Sea, Mad for It, Poor Superman and I Have Been Here Before. Other theater includes Much Ado About Nothing for the RSC in 2006, The Little Foxes at the Donmar and Terracotta at Hampstead and Birmingham Rep.   Tom Morris: Since 2009 Artistic Director at Bristol Old Vic: directed Juliet and Her Romeo (with Sian Phillips and Michael Byrne) and Swallows and Amazons (with music by Neil Hannon); launched Bristol Ferment as a program of artist development; created Bristol Jam, the festival of improvisation. Also Associate Director at the National Theatre: co-directed Every Good Boy Deserves Favour and War Horse, co-wrote A Matter of Life and Death and developed Coram Boy. From 1995-2004 Artistic Director at Battersea Arts Centre: devised/directed a range of experimental work including Othello Music, All That Fall, Macbeth, Unsung, Disembodied, Kombat Opera Klubneit; produced the Sam Shepard Festival, the Shout's Tall Stories and Jerry Springer: The Opera. Also a writer and broadcaster for the BBC, The Sunday Times, The Observer, The independent, The Guardian and Time Out. He sits on the boards of Complicité, Punchdrunk and is chair of the JMK Trust.

 

'Best Direction of a Play'
2011 Tony Award Nominees

Marianne Elliott and Tom Morris (War Horse)
Marianne Elliott is Associate Director of the National Theatre, where she has co-directed War Horse and directed Season's Greetings, Women Beware Women, Mrs. Affleck, Harper Regan, Saint Joan (Olivier Award for Best Revival, South Bank Show Award), Thérèse Raquin and Pillars of the Community (Evening Standard Best Director Award). She was an Associate Director at the Royal Court, where her productions include Stoning Mary, Notes on Falling Leaves, The Sugar Syndrome and Local. Previously she was an Artistic Director of the Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester, where she directed Port, Design for Living, Les Blancs, As You Like It, A Woman of No Importance, Nude With Violin, Fast Food, Martin Yesterday, Deep Blue Sea, Mad for It, Poor Superman and I Have Been Here Before. Other theater includes Much Ado About Nothing for the RSC in 2006, The Little Foxes at the Donmar and Terracotta at Hampstead and Birmingham Rep.

 

Tom Morris: Since 2009 Artistic Director at Bristol Old Vic: directed Juliet and Her Romeo (with Sian Phillips and Michael Byrne) and Swallows and Amazons (with music by Neil Hannon); launched Bristol Ferment as a program of artist development; created Bristol Jam, the festival of improvisation. Also Associate Director at the National Theatre: co-directed Every Good Boy Deserves Favour and War Horse, co-wrote A Matter of Life and Death and developed Coram Boy. From 1995-2004 Artistic Director at Battersea Arts Centre: devised/directed a range of experimental work including Othello Music, All That Fall, Macbeth, Unsung, Disembodied, Kombat Opera Klubneit; produced the Sam Shepard Festival, the Shout's Tall Stories and Jerry Springer: The Opera. Also a writer and broadcaster for the BBC, The Sunday Times, The Observer, The independent, The Guardian and Time Out. He sits on the boards of Complicité, Punchdrunk and is chair of the JMK Trust.

Joel Grey & George C. Wolfe (The Normal Heart)
Joel Grey: In a career that was launched in the early 1950's, Joel GreyGeorge M. Cohan in George M! (1967, Tony® nomination), as Charles VII in Goodtime Charlie (1975, Tony® nomination), as Jacobowsky in The Grand Tour (1979, Tony® nomination), as Olim in New York City Opera’s Silverlake (1981), as Amos Hart in the landmark revival of Chicago (1996), and as the Wonderful Wizard of Oz in Wicked (2004).

Grey’s non-musical stage roles include John Guare’s Marco Polo Sings a Solo (1975) at The Public Theater; the title role in the Williamstown Theatre Festival production of Chekhov’s Platonov (1978); Larry Kramer’s seminal THE NORMAL HEART (1986) at The Public Theater; The American Repertory Theatre’s production of Ibsen’s When We Dead Awaken (1991) at the Sao Paulo Biennale, directed by Robert Wilson; Herringbone at the Hartford Stage (1992); John PatrickBrian Friel’s Give Me Your Answer, Do! (1999), for which he received a Drama Desk Award nomination.

His film credits include Cabaret (Academy Award®), Frank Perry’s Man on A Swing (1974), Robert Altman’s Buffalo Bill and the Indians (1976); Herbert Ross’s The Seven Percent Solution (1976); Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins (1985, Golden Globe Nomination); Steven Soderbergh’s Kafka (1991); Altman’s The Player (1992); Phillip Haas’s The Music of Chance (1993); Michael Ritchie’s adaptation of The Fantasticks (2000); Lars von Trier’s Dancer in the Dark (2000) with Bjork and Catherine Deneuve; and Clark Gregg’s Choke, which premiered at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival. Grey’s recent television credits include Alias, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Brooklyn Bridge, (Emmy Award®-nomination), Oz, Law and Order: Criminal Intent, House, Brothers & Sisters, Private Practice and Grey’s Anatomy. The Paley Center for Media recently presented An Evening with Joel Grey, celebrating his remarkable, multi-decade career in television, at their New York and Los Angeles locations.

An internationally exhibited and acclaimed photographer, he has had three photography books published: Pictures I Had to Take (2003), Looking Hard at Unexamined Things (2006) and 1.3: Images from My Phone (2009).

Grey is one of the only eight actors to have won both the Tony® and the Academy® award for the same role. In 1984, he was inducted into the Theatre Hall of Fame and has received his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He is also the recipient of the Distinguished Artist Award from the Los Angeles Music Center. In 1993, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis presented him with the Municipal Arts Society medal naming him a Living New York Landmark. In October 2009, Grey performed at Carnegie Hall, alongside Lady Gaga, Bono, Rufus Wainwright and more to benefit (RED) and help stop AIDS in Africa. In addition, The Museum of the City of New York will honor his life and career with its upcoming exhibition, Joel Grey / A New York Life. He is currently represented on Broadway in two productions: Starring opposite Sutton Foster in Anything Goes and directing THE NORMAL HEART.

George C. Wolfe: Theatre directing credits include Jelly’s Last Jam (Drama Desk and Outer Critics Award), Angels In America—Millennium Approaches (Tony® and Drama Desk Award) and Perestroika, (Drama Desk Award), Bring In ‘Da Noise, Bring In ‘Da Funk (Tony® and Drama League Awards), Topdog/ Underdog (Obie Award), Twilight: Los Angeles 1992 (Drama Desk Award), Elaine Stritch At Liberty (Tony® Award, Unique Theatrical Event), The Tempest, The Wild Party, Caroline Or Change and A Free Man Of Color.

He is the writer of the award-winning The Colored Museum, directed Spunk (Obie Award), created Harlem Song for the world famous Apollo Theatre and conceived/directed a celebration of the American Musical at the White House.

Mr. Wolfe directed the film Lackawanna Blues, for which he earned The Directors Guild Award, a National Board of Review Award, an Independent Spirit Nomination for Best First Feature, a Christopher Award and the Humanitas Prize. He also directed the film Nights In Rodanthe.

From 1993-2005 he was the Producer of The Public Theatre/New York Shakespeare Festival. He serves on The President's Committee For The Arts and The Humanities and was named a living landmark by the New York Landmark’s Conservancy.

Additional awards include Actors Equity Paul Roberson Award, Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers Calloway Award, The Dramatist Guild’s Hull-Warner Award, The New Dramatist Outstanding Career Achievement Award, The NAACP Lifetime Achievement Award, The Lambda Liberty Award, The Spirit of the City Award, The Brendan Gil Prize, The Distinguished Alumni Award from NYU, A Princess Grace Award for fostering the careers of young artists, A Cultural Laureate Award and A Library Lion.

Anna D. Shapiro (The Motherf**ker with the Hat)
Anna D. Shapiro was awarded the 2008 Tony Award for Best Direction of a Play for August: Osage County (Steppenwolf, Broadway, London). She became an ensemble member at Steppenwolf in 2005, where her other directing credits include A Parallelogram by Bruce Norris, Up by Bridget Carpenter, Arthur Miller's The Crucible, The Unmentionables by Bruce Norris (also at Yale Rep), the world premiere of Bruce Norris' The Pain and the Itch (also in New York), Robert Anderson's I Never Sang for My Father, the world premiere of Tracy Letts' Man From Nebraska, Purple Heart by Bruce Norris (also in Galway, Ireland), The Drawer Boy by Michael Healey, Warren Leight's Side Man (also in Ireland, Australia and Vail, Colorado), Richard Greenberg's Three Days of Rain and the world premiere of Bruce Norris' The Infidel. Other credits include A Number (American Conservatory Theater); The Drawer Boy with ensemble member John Mahoney (Paper Mill Playhouse); Iron (Manhattan Theatre Club); and The Infidel (Philadelphia Theatre Company). Shapiro is a graduate of the Yale School of Drama and Columbia College and the recipient of the 1996 Princess Grace Award. She is a full professor in Northwestern University's Department of Theatre and has served as the director of the MFA in Directing program since 2002.

Daniel Sullivan (The Merchant of Venice)
Daniel Sullivan: For The Public Theater, Mr. Sullivan directed Twelfth Night, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Stuff Happens, and The Merry Wives of Windsor. Among his Broadway credits are Time Stands Still, Accent on Youth, The Homecoming, Prelude to a Kiss, Rabbit Hole, After the Night and the Music, Julius Caesar, Brooklyn Boy, Sight Unseen, I'm Not Rappaport, Morning's at Seven, Proof, the 2000 production of A Moon for the Misbegotten, Ah, Wilderness!, The Sisters Rosensweig, Conversations With My Father and The Heidi Chronicles. Among his off-Broadway credits are Intimate Apparel, Far East, Spinning into Butter, Dinner With Friends and The Substance of Fire. From 1981 to 1997, he served as artistic director of Seattle Repertory Theatre. Mr. Sullivan is the Swanlund Professor of Theatre at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. has created indelible stage roles each decade since: as the iconic Emcee in Cabaret (1966, Tony Award®), as song and dance man Shanley’s A Fool and Her Fortune (NY Stage and Film, 1992) and in the Roundabout Theatre production of