Alice Rapoport Center for Education & Engagement Opens Today at the Goodman

Goodman Theatre, under the leadership of Artistic Director Robert Falls and Executive Director Roche Schulfer, becomes the first Chicago theater to establish a facility dedicated to education and engagement programs next when it opens the new Alice Rapoport Center for Education and Engagement ("the Alice") next month.

Goodman Theatre Chair Joan Clifford previously announced the Alice will open today, May 18, in conjunction with the Goodman-curated citywide Celebration of Chicago native playwright Lorraine Hansberry (A Raisin in the Sun, The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window, To Be Young, Gifted and Black).

The luncheon, hosted by Tony and Grammy Award winner Heather Headley, was co-chaired by Julie M. Danis, Kimbra Walter (Education and Engagement Committee Co-Chairs) and Renee Tyree and Lorrayne Weiss (Women's Board Education Co-Chairs).

The Alice will open on May 18; opening week festivities, which will include opportunities for audiences to experience programming in the Alice, will be announced soon. For more information about the Alice, Goodman Theatre's education and engagement programs and to contribute to the Catalyst Campaign fundraising effort for the Alice, visit www.GoodmanTheatre.org.

The Alice Rapoport Center for Education and Engagement is a $15 million expansion (including a $5 million fund to support future programming) effort that realizes the theater's 30-year commitment to using its art as education-using the process of artistic creation to empower and inspire youth and lifelong learners. Working with Wheeler Kearns Architects, the Goodman created the Alice by connecting its current facility with an adjacent upper-level space (above Petterino's restaurant), transforming 10,000 square feet into classrooms, a hands-on STEM learning lab, rehearsal spaces and more. The LEED certified new facility will enable the Goodman to impact hundreds more Chicagoans through its myriad education and engagement programs. Patrons will access the Alice though the Goodman Theatre, entering at the south end of the second-floor lobby. The Alice is named for Alice B. Rapoport, a Goodman Trustee and chair of the theater's Education and Community Engagement Committee, who passionately championed the theater's outreach efforts from 2000 until her death in 2014.

Artist, educator and activist Willa J. Taylor, Walter Director of Education and Engagement, has led the Goodman's programs since 2007. Taylor and her team of associates-Bobby Biedrzycki (Curriculum and Instruction Associate), Elizabeth Rice (School Programs Coordinator), Brandi Lee (Education and Community Engagement Associate) and Adrian Azevedo (Education and Engagement Assistant)-will collaborate with the Goodman's artistic and executive leadership to oversee programmatic efforts in the Alice.

Taylor began her career in arts education at Arena Stage where, under founding director Zelda Fichandler, she established the Allen Lee Hughes Fellows Program-one of the first theater-run apprenticeships designed to increase participation by people of color in professional theater. She then went to Lincoln Center Theater where she created The Urban Ensemble, a multidisciplinary project that served at-risk youth. This collaboration between Lincoln Center and New York University's Tisch School of the Arts and The Public Theater was cited by President Clinton's Council on the Arts and Humanities in its 1996 report, Coming Up Taller. At Lincoln Center, she consulted for New Victory Theatre, where she designed the arts education program for their inaugural season. Taylor also served as cultural director for Gay Games IV, where she oversaw the production of more than 200 cultural events, including the Broadway production of Sir Ian McKellen's A Knight Out. In addition to a longtime career in the arts, Taylor served for 12 years as a Russian and Arabic linguist in the US Navy. While overseas, she oversaw productions for the United Service Organization in Greece and managed Armed Forces Radio and Television in Turkey where she created the Profiles in Black history series. Following her graduation from Kendall College's culinary program in 2001, Taylor opened Taylor-Made Cuisine, a gourmet catering company as well as Home Café, a neighborhood bistro. In 2005, she helped open and served as the catering chef for Chicago's EatZi's Easygoing Gourmet, a chain of gourmet bakeries, take-out markets and restaurants based out of Dallas, Texas.

Called America's "Best Regional Theatre" by Time magazine, Goodman Theatre has won international recognition for its artists, productions and programs, and is a major cultural, educational and economic pillar in Chicago. Founded in 1925 by William O. Goodman and his family in honor of their son Kenneth (an important figure in Chicago's cultural renaissance in the early 1900s), Goodman Theatre has garnered hundreds of awards for artistic achievement and community engagement, including: two Pulitzer Prizes, 22 Tony Awards (including "Outstanding Regional Theatre" in 1992), nearly 160 Joseph Jefferson Awards and more. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Robert Falls and Executive Director Roche Schulfer, the Goodman's artistic priorities include new plays (more than 150 world or American premieres in the past 30 years), reimagined classics (including Falls' nationally and internationally celebrated productions of Death of a Salesman, Long's Day's Journey into Night, King Lear and The Iceman Cometh, many in collaboration with actor Brian Dennehy), culturally specific work, musical theater (26 major productions in 20 years, including 10 world premieres) and international collaborations. Diversity and inclusion have been primary cornerstones of the Goodman's mission for 30 years; over the past decade, 68% of the Goodman's 35 world premieres were authored by women and/or playwrights of color, and the Goodman was the first theater in the world to produce all 10 plays in August Wilson's "American Century Cycle." Each year, the Goodman's numerous education and community engagement programs-including the innovative Student Subscription Series, now in its 30th year-serve thousands of students, teachers, life-long learners and special constituencies. In addition, for nearly four decades the annual holiday tradition of A Christmas Carol has led to the creation of a new generation of theatergoers in Chicago.

Goodman Theatre's leadership includes the distinguished members of the Artistic Collective: Brian Dennehy, Rebecca Gilman, Henry Godinez, Steve Scott, Chuck Smith, Regina Taylor, Henry Wishcamper and Mary Zimmerman. Joan Clifford is Chair of Goodman Theatre's Board of Trustees, Swati Mehta is Women's Board President and Gordon C.C. Liao is President of the Scenemakers Board for young professionals.

Visit the Goodman virtually at GoodmanTheatre.org, and on Twitter (@GoodmanTheatre), Facebook and Instagram.

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