Richard Ridge Moderates SAG Conversation with Judith Light Tonight, 8/17

Tonight, August 17, The Screen Actors' Guild Foundation will feature a two-hour, moderated career Conversations event with Judith Light. The event is et to take place at the NYIT Auditorium on Broadway at 7:00 PM, and will be moderated by BroadwayWorld's ownRichard Ridge. For additional information, visit: http://www.sagfoundation.org.

In June of 2012, Judith Light was awarded the prestigious Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play for Other Desert Cities. She also won a Drama Desk Award for "Best Featured Actress" for the same play. Produced by Jon Robin Baitz, Other Desert Cities is centered on a daughter played by Rachel Griffiths who presents her family with a memoir she is about to publish. Judith played the role of Silda Grauman, the alcoholic aunt who is known to make snide remarks.

Judith was nominated for a Tony Award for "Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Play" in 2011, for her performance in "Lombardi", the American play by Academy Award winner Eric Simpson. Directed by Tony nominee Thomas Kail, the play was based on the best-selling biography When Pride Still Mattered: A Life of Vince Lombardi by Pulitzer-winning author David Maraniss. Judith stared in the play as Marie Lombardi alongside Dan Lauria who played sports icon Vince Lombardi.

Judith’s television career began with her two-time Best Actress Emmy award-winning turn as Karen Wolek on "One Life to Live". She then went on to play Angela Bower on the hit comedy series "Who's the Boss?" Up until 2010, she was seen on the Emmy Award-winning ABC-TV series "Ugly Betty", for which she received an Emmy nomination playing the character of Claire Meade. Simultaneously, she co-starred on NBC’s long-running drama "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" in the recurring role of Supreme Court Judge Elizabeth Donnelly. Judith has also starred in "Phenom" (created by James Brooks), "The Simple Life", created by long-time manager/producer Herb Hamsher, "The Stones" (created by Max Mutchnick, David Kohan and Jenji Kohan) and in over 15 television movies, including her role as Ryan’s mother, Jeanne, in "The Ryan White Story".

Judith has starred in three independent films, "The Shoemaker" with Danny Aiello, "Ira & Abby" by Jennifer Westfeldt, with Robert Klein, Fred Willard, and Frances Conroy - which was voted Best Comedy at the 2007 HBO comedy festival; and "Save Me" with Chad Allen and Robert Gant, a film which she also produced with Herb Hamsher through their Production Company, Tetrahedron Productions, in conjunction with GKE and Mythgarden Productions. "Save Me" had its US premiere at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival, followed by screenings at both NYC’s NewFest and LA’s Outfest, as well as a screening and panel discussion aboard RSVP vacations Queen Mary 2 transatlantic crossing. "Save Me" was released theatrically nationwide in the summer of 2008 by First Run Features.

In 2005, Judith returned to her performing roots in theater, opening at The MCC Theatre in New York in the production of Laura Wade’s "Colder Than Here". Judith showcased her musical abilities in 2004 in the role of Joanne in Steven Sondheim’s "Company" at the Freud Theatre in LA as part of Reprise! Judith also appeared in Athol Fugard’s "Sorrows and Rejoicings" in 2002 at the Second Stage Theatre in New York and the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles.

In 2001, Judith opened in Washington, DC at The Shakespeare Theater portraying the title character in the Henrik Ibsen classic "Hedda Gabler". In 1999 she also took to the stage at the Union Square Theater, starring as the brilliant and uncompromising "Dr. Vivian Bearing" in the critically acclaimed and Pulitzer Prize winning Off-Broadway play "WIT". Originally directed by Derek Anson Jones, "WIT" is a heartbreaking and at times very funny play about how ‘Dr. Bearing’ copes with ovarian cancer, and how it transforms her and her views of life. A university professor who has always treasured her independence and lack of personal connections, ‘Dr. Bearing’ is forced to change her stance when she undergoes radical chemotherapy. Judith performed in New York until January 2000 and then toured with WIT nationwide, in such cities as Boston, Washington (at the Kennedy Center), and San Francisco. For her outstanding performance, Judith received the Helen Hayes Award in Washington, DC, as well as the Elliot Norton Award in Boston.

A graduate of Carnegie Mellon University with a BFA, Judith has worked in repertory theaters throughout the United States and Canada as well as a USO Tour of "Guys and Dolls" with William Atherton and Paula Wagner throughout Europe. Judith’s Broadway debut was in "A Doll’s House" with Liv Ullmann and was followed by a season at the Eugene O’Neil Playwright’s conference.

Judith is a Board Member and advocate for many organizations and charities representing AIDS-related and Human Rights issues including: Broadway Cares: Equity Fights AIDS, The Names Project/The AIDS Memorial Quilt, The AIDS Memorial Grove, CDC’s Business Responds to AIDS/Labor Responds to AIDS, Hollywood Health and Society, Faith in America, Project Angel Food, The Matthew Shepard Foundation, The National Aids Memorial Grove, The Point Foundation, The Rome Chamber Music Festival, and The Trevor Project.

Judith lives in New York and Los Angeles and is married to writer/actor, Robert Desiderio.

*This event will be moderated by Richard Ridge of Broadway World.

Richard Ridge fell in love with the theatre at the age of five when he went through his parents record cabinet and stumbled upon their original cast album collection and the rest is history.He has toured the world as a performer and for twenty years he was the host of the weekly television program Broadway Beat and now, his new half hour sit down program BACKSTAGE WITH Richard Ridge at Broadway World where he has sat with the likes of Nick Jonas, Marlo Thomas, Kristin Chenoweth, Jonathan Groff, Hunter Parrish, Elaine Paige, John Lloyd Young, Reeve Carney, Ramin Karimloo, Jeremy Jordan, John Kander and Hugh Dancy.

Photo Credit: Walter McBride / Retna Ltd.