P.J. Gibson, Carol Hall & More Join WOMEN'S WORDS at Cherry Lane Theatre Tonight, 10/29

As part of the League of Professional Theatre Women's 30th Anniversary 30 Plays Celebrate 30 Years project, an evening dedicated to poetry written and performed by poets P.J. Gibson, Carol Hall, Anne Hamilton, Harriet Slaughter, Mira Spektor and Gayl Teller will be presented at the Cherry Lane Theatre tonight, October 29th at 7:30. Cara Reichel will direct. Melody Berger will provide incidental music.

Tickets are $20 which may be purchased through OvationTix https://web.ovationtix.com/trs/pr/918299. Harriet Slaughter, who is the League's 30th Anniversary Co-Chair, is producing the event as part of the League's mission to provide visibility to women . "Even in the 21st century , women know too well they are in a marginal position with regard to literary traditions. This is an evening is dedicated to life experiences as viewed through the lens of women poets," Slaughter stated.

The poets appearing are:

P.J. GIBSON is a wordsmith; her writing, publishing and productions embody the genres of poetry, fiction and she is most noted for her work as a playwright. Her publishers include: Samuel French, for her most noted and most often produced play LONG TIME SINCE YESTERDAY; Doubleday; Third World Press; Alexander Street Press in the Black Drama and Women's Drama Collections; ProQuest Information and Learning and her compilation of plays DESTINY'S DAUGHTERS – 9 VOICES OF P.J. GIBSON – 1st Books Library Publisher, to name a few. Recent poetry can be found in Artist and Influence, Volumes XXIV and XXV, Hatch-Billops Collection, Inc. She has been the recipient of many honors and grants including a Shubert Fellow - playwriting, a NEA Grant - playwriting, the Black Women Playwright Group's Whisper, Laugh, Shout Tell The Story Award, the Audelco VIV Pioneer Award, the National Black Theatre Festival's August Wilson Playwright Award, the Bushfire Theatre of Performing Arts Seventh Annual "Walk of Fame," two prestigious Audelco Awards for LONG TIME SINCE YESTERDAY, four PSC-CUNY Research Award grants, and seven playwriting commissions. She was the Celebrated Playwright at The Ensemble Studio Theatre's Going to the River festival. She is a Full/Tenured Professor of English at John Jay College of Criminal Justice – CUNY, where she has received a Teacher of the Year Award. Gibson has been an Artist in Residence at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, holds a Proclamation from the city of Trenton, New Jersey and a Key to the City from Indianapolis, Indiana. She holds a BA from Keuka College and a M.F.A from Brandeis University.

Carol Hall is a composer, lyricist and playwright. She wrote both music and lyrics for the TONY award-winning THE BEST LITTLE WHOREHOUSE IN TEXAS, and contributed to SESAME STREET, A... MY NAME IS ALICE, and the landmark children's classic FREE TO BE YOU AND ME. She also wrote the Off-Broadway musical TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN. Her most recent project has been contributing lyrics for a musical based on Truman Capote's classic story A CHRISTMAS MEMORY (book: Duane Poole, music: Larry Grossman). It premiered at Theatreworks in Palo Alto, CA, where it received rave reviews and broke attendance records. Carol is a Lifetime Member of the Dramatists Guild Council and Vice-President of the Dramatists Guild Fund. Her first non-musical work, THE DAYS ARE AS GRASS, consists of eight one-act plays and has just been acquired by Samuel French for publication.

ANNE HAMILTON is a poet, playwright, dramaturg, and the founder of Hamilton Dramaturgy, an international consulting firm. She publishes the ScriptForward! e-newsletter and is Host/Producer of TheatreNow!, a podcast series featuring important Contemporary Theatre women. AMERICAN THEATRE magazine published an article on the series in its October 2012 issue. Kathleen Chalfant starred in her one-woman play AND THEN I WENT INSIDE at the Cherry Lane Theatre in 2009. An expanded version named THE STACY PLAY - A LOVE SONG - VOLUME I appeared in TRANSITIONS, a juried international Virtual Event at Pen and Brush, Inc., the prestigious women's arts collective. In March, 2011, Hamilton Dramaturgy Press published two anthologies. ANOTHER WHITE SHIRT and Other Plays and Poetry and THE STACY PLAY - A LOVE SONG - VOLUME I which are now available through www.lulu.com. She has read her poetry at Columbia University, the Nuyorican Poets Cafe and the Harlem Writers Guild's 50th Anniversary Celebration at New School University. She is the past Co-Secretary of the League of Professional Theatre Women and holds an MFA from Columbia University SOA. (www.hamiltonlit.com)

MIRA J SPEKTOR is a composer, poet & lyricist - Born in Europe, she is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College. She studied poetry with: David Ignatow, Colette Inez, Stephen Spender & Ruth Whitman. She is a member of BMI , Dramatist Guild , League of Professional Theater Women . Since 1975 she has been the Producing Artistic Director of THE AVIVA PLAYERS. Her Musicals & Chamber Operas include: THE HOUSEWIVES' CANTATA, LADY OF THE CASTLE, THE PASSION OF LIZZIE BORDEN, GIVE ME TIME, VILLA DIODATI and GIOVANNI THE FEARLESS. Her songs have been performed throughout the United States and Europe in English, French & German in both recital and cabaret settings. She has recorded on Westminster, Concert Hall, Guilde International du Disque, Original Cast Records, Capstone, AirPlay and has composed music scores for feature films and PBS-TV. Her poems appear in small presses including: California State Quarterly, Comstock Review, Haworth Press, a chapbook: FROM SEASIDE HOUSES and a book: THE ROAD TO NOVEMBER. Her CDs and book are available www.BookHampton.com; email: mirajspektor@earthlink.net; web: www.miraspektor.com and www.theavivaplayers.com).

Harriet Slaughter has participated in all aspects of the arts during her career as an actress, singer, dancer, artist, poet and labor relations executive. She currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Pen and Brush in New York City and has exhibited in their juried shows and poetry presentations. As a member of the Poets of Nassau, she participates as a featured reader in venues in Long Island. In 2012 she received a citation for her poetry from the Amy Kitchener Angels Without Wings Foundation as New York Senior Poet Honor Scroll Award winner and her poetry was published in BARDS ANNUAL ANTHOLOGY, WHISPERS AND SHOUTS and PERFORMANCE AND POETS ASSOCIATION LITERARY REVIEW. Her art work appeared on the cover and within the 2012 poetry collection, LIFE THROUGH MY GLASSES by Herbert Siegel. In previous years her poetry has appeared in numerous poetry collections. As a member of the League of Professional Theatre Women .she is serving as Co-Chair for their 30th Anniversary and this past spring she curated the League's Oral History Photographic Exhibit, Celebrating Our Legacy at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. She is a recipient of the New York Women's Agenda Galaxy Award and the League's Lee Reynolds Award. She holds a BFA in theatre and dance from the University of Texas and a MFA from New York University in arts administration.

GAYL TELLER was Nassau County Poet Laureate for 2009-0011. Her poetry collections are At the Intersection of Everything You Have Ever Loved, Shorehaven, Moving Day, One Small Kindness( finalist for Blue Light Poetry Award) and most recently, Inside the Embrace, selected in national competition and published by WordTech/Cherry Grove Collections in 2010. She is the editor of Toward Forgiveness, an anthology of poems (Writers Ink Press, 2011) which was a culmination of her workshops/anthology project that features 99 Long Island poets, including five poets laureate under a New York State Council on the Arts Decentralization Grant. For the past sixteen years, she has been the director and founder of the Poetry Reading Series, at the Mid-Island Y JCC, in Plainview, NY under the auspices of the New York State Council on the Arts, where she reviews the works of feature poets and judges the annual poetry contest for children teens, and adults. She originated "Stray Feet," a roving poetry show visiting schools, senior and rehab cents, nursing homes and libraries. She has served as a judge in the Poetry Out Loud National Recitation Contest which encourages the nation's youth to learn about great poetry through memorization and performance. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Poetry Place, the Long Island Poetry Archival/Arts Center. Her work has received the Edgar Allan Poe Prize, the Peninsula Library Poetry Prize, a National Federation of State Poetry Societies Prize, a National League of American PEN Women Prize, and The Connecticut Writer Prize; In 2011, she received the North Sea Poetry Scene Recognition Award and in 2012, the Special Service Award from the Mid-Island Y JCC. Her poems are widely published and anthologized and her reviews of poetry books have appeared frequently in Small Press Review. She has been teaching English at Hofstra University since 1985. She received an MA from Columbia University and another MA for Queens College, CUNY. Her website is www.gaylteller.com.

Cara Reichel is a writer and director, and serves as the Producing Artistic Director of the NYC-based non-profit Prospect Theater Company. Over the past decade, she has co-created 11 new musicals with writer Peter Mills, as well as collaborating with many other writers to develop new musical theater works. Recent Prospect productions include: IRON CURTAIN, I MARRIED WYATT EARP, GOLDEN BOY OF THE BLUE RIDGE, ILLYRIA and HONOR. She also directed ONCE UPON A TIME IN NEW JERSEY at the Surflight Theatre in NJ (2012), IRON CURTAIN at the 2009 NAMT Festival of New Musicals and the O'Neill Theatre Center (2008), and OTHELLO for Oberon Theatre Ensemble (2010). She studied directing in the M.F.A. Program at Brooklyn College. Cara is a member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, and the League of Professional Theatre Women. www.carareichel.com

Photo Credit: Genevieve Rafter-Keddy

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