Alexis Williams Joins The Playwrights Realm as Company's First-Ever Associate Artistic Director
By: Julie Musbach Jun. 25, 2018
The Playwrights Realm (Katherine Kovner, Founding Artistic Director; Roberta Pereira, Producing Director) today announced that Alexis Williams, a former agent at Bret Adams Artists' Agency who has surefootedly assumed multiple roles within the theatre industry, will be joining the company's dynamic team as their first-ever Associate Artistic Director.
The Playwrights Realm Founding Artistic Director Katherine Kovner says, "During her time at Bret Adams, Alexis has been a tireless advocate for her clients and a respected champion for new voices. She is the perfect person to help foster the nurturing environment for playwrights that The Realm is always striving to create. The Realm is committed to early career playwrights and creating space for a new generation of voices, and Alexis' experience will prove invaluable in achieving that goal."
Williams brings to The Realm nearly a decade of experience representing individuals across the performing arts. At Bret Adams, her panoramic roster included over 100 playwrights, directors, composers, designers, and choreographers. In 2017, she was named one of the Interval's "Women to Watch," and in the accompanying interview, she emphasized the necessity of gender parity and inclusivity both in terms of performed work and who's given administrative roles that can open "real opportunity to instill...exciting change." She added, "Of the many hats I wear as an agent, I think my favorite is that of a new play shepherd." At The Realm, she will activate her experience "shepherding" new plays as she helps propel the development and presentation of new voices, on the staff of a company celebrated for having fostered the careers of breakout playwrights such as Sarah DeLappe (Pulitzer Prize finalist The Wolves), Lauren Yee (The Hatmaker's Wife), Jen Silverman(Crane Story, The Moors), Mfoniso Udofia (Sojourners), and Donja R. Love(Sugar in Our Wounds).
Prior to becoming an agent, Williams worked at the McCarter Theatre Center in Princeton, NJ; Contemporary Stage Company in Wilmington, DE; and served as Literary Manager for Detroit's Planet Ant Theatre. The roles she's assumed in the theatre world have included working as a director, a producer, a dramaturg, a teaching artist, and more. She has appeared on panels for the National New Play Network, the League of Professional Theatre Women, the NUEA, and the Musical Theatre Factory; has conducted roundtable discussions with the New School for Drama, InterAct's Core Writer's Group and Paragraph NY; and has served as a judge for the Strawberry Festival and the Samuel French Off Off Broadway Festival. Williams is on the advisory board of SPACE on Ryder Farm, is an alumnus of the Lincoln Center Director's Lab and is a graduate of Northwestern University.
About The Playwrights Realm
Hailed as "invaluable" by The New York Times' Ben Brantley, Obie-winning company The Playwrights Realm (Katherine Kovner, Founding Artistic Director; Roberta Pereira, Producing Director) is devoted to supporting early-career playwrights along the journey of playwriting, helping them to hone their craft, fully realize their vision and build meaningful artistic careers. To serve this mission, The Playwrights Realm provides comprehensive support to playwrights through its Page One Residency, Alumni Playwrights Program, Writing Fellowship, Scratchpad Series and, of course, productions. Previous productions by The Realm include Don Nguyen's Hello, From the Children of Planet Earth, Michael Yates Crowley's The Rape of the Sabine Women, by Grace B. Matthias, Sarah DeLappe's The Wolves (Pulitzer finalist in Drama 2017, Lortel, Drama League, Outer Critics Circle nominations, Obie award and Drama Desk special award for outstanding ensemble), Jen Silverman's The Moors, Mfoniso Udofia's Sojourners, Anna Ziegler's A Delicate Ship, Anton Dudley's City Of, Elizabeth Irwin's My Mañana Comes, Lauren Yee's The Hatmaker's Wife, Ethan Lipton's Red-Handed Otter, Jen Silverman's Crane Story, Gonzalo Rodríguez Risco's Dramatis Personae, Christopher Wall's Dreams of the Washer King, Anna Ziegler's Dov and Ali, and Anton Dudley's Substitution.
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