Stage Directors & Choreographers Foundation To Host Symposium 'Choreography In Collaboration'

The Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation (SDCF), the not-for-profit foundation of Stage Directors and Choreographers Society (SDC), will host a symposium entitled "Choreography in Collaboration" on Monday, June 10, 2019, from 11:00 AM - 5:00 PM at SDC, 321 West 44th Street, Suite 804.

This daylong event will focus on specific topics of interest that affect the creative and professional lives of directors and choreographers currently working on Broadway and in regional theatres across the country, offering practical knowledge, inspiration, and networking opportunities to attendees. The day will include:

11:30 AM - Panel Discussion: Joshua Bergasse, Kathleen Marshall, and Peter Pucci

So how does one create choreography? And what does collaboration look like?

1:30 PM - Afternoon Breakout Sessions:

Connor Gallagher and Nancy Renee Braun

The Choreography Team: Exploring the Relationship between Choreographer and Associate Choreographer

Spencer Liff and Alexandria Wailes

Choreographing For Hearing and Deaf Communities: A Collaboration on SPRING AWAKENING

3:15pm - Closing Event: A Conversation with Christopher Gattelli

Please note that there is a $5 fee to apply to attend the symposium, and all applications are due by May 17. If selected, applicants will receive an invitation to attend, and there is a $25 fee for invited attendees. Click here to apply to attend the symposium: https://sdcfoundation.slideroom.com.

If you have any questions, please send an e-mail to programdirector@sdcfoundation.org.

Founded in 1965, SDCF exists to foster, promote, and develop the craft and creativity of stage directors and choreographers. SDCF's goals are to provide opportunities to practice the crafts of directing and choreography, to gather and disseminate career information, to promote the profession to emerging talent, to provide opportunities for exchange of knowledge among directors and choreographers, to increase the awareness of the value of directors' and choreographers' work, and to convene around issues affecting theatre artists.

SDCF is committed to fostering an environment that is inclusive and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, disability, age, sexual orientation, or gender identity or expression in its programs or activities. www.sdcfoundation.org.

ABOUT THE PARTICIPANTS:

Joshua Bergasse is a New York-based choreographer as well as a master teacher. He has been a guest artist at New York University, Marymount Manhattan College, Indiana University, James Madison University, Shenandoah University, Kean University, Creighton University, and the University of California satellite program for Film/Television. Joshua won the Emmy Award for his choreography on NBC's musical drama SMASH. He also choreographed multiple segments on So You Think You Can Dance and PBS's Sinatra: A Voice for a Century. On Broadway, Josh choreographed the revival of On The Town, which opened to rave reviews. He received an Astaire Award and was nominated for TONY, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Awards. Also on Broadway, Josh choreographed the revival of Gigi and most recently choreographed the Broadway debut of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Off Broadway credits include Sweet Charity starring Sutton Foster, Cagney (Drama Desk, Astaire, Outer Critics Circle Award nominations for choreography), Bomb-itty of Errors, and Captain Louie. Joshua's other credits as a choreographer include West Side Story at the Stratford Festival, Little Me and It's A Bird... It's A Plane... It's Superman! at City Center Encores!, Pirates of Penzance at Barrington Stage Company, and Guys and Dolls and The Sound of Music at Carnegie Hall. As a director/choreographer, Joshua co-directed and choreographed the "Bombshell" on Broadway concert at the Minskoff theatre. He directed and choreographed Hazel, a new musical at the Drury Lane Theatre, and West Side Story at North Carolina Theatre.

Nancy Renee Brau has been working with Connor Gallagher as his associate for over a decade! Favorite shows together include their current Broadway debut, Beetlejuice (Winter Garden Theatre), The Robber Bridegroom (Roundabout Theatre), Beauty and the Beast, Tangled (Disney Cruise Lines), and Elf (Broadway National Tour). Nancy also works frequently in choreography for film/TV. Favorites include "Maniac," "The Week Of," (Netflix), "Blue Bloods," "Limitless," "Bull" (CBS), "Succession" (HBO), and "Rebel In The Rye" (IFC). Nancy attended Northwestern University and upon graduation made her Broadway debut as an actor in Patti LuPone's Gypsy (St. James Theatre). She has two beautiful children, Max (3 years old) and Shaina (10 months old), and she is proud to be a Broadway Baby Mama. www.nancyreneebraun.com

IG: @nancyreneebraun

Connor Gallagher most recently choreographed the Tony-nominated Broadway production of Beetlejuice, directed by Alex Timbers. He directed and choreographed a new adaptation of Beauty and the Beast for Disney Creative Entertainment, which recently received the Brass Ring Award. Other projects include The Robber Bridegroom (Roundabout Theatre Company, Astaire Award, Calloway nominee), Found (Philadelphia Theatre Company), Elf (13 companies worldwide including Madison Square Garden and The Kennedy Center), The Twelve (Denver Center), and The Magic School Bus (director, National Tour). Connor collaborated with Jessica Stone on Spelling Bee (Bucks County Playhouse), Dancing at Lughnasa (Two River Theater), and Vanity Fair (Shakespeare Theatre Company and American Conservatory Theater) and with Gordon Greenberg on The Fabulous Liptones (Goodspeed), South Pacific (The Maltz Jupiter), and the world-premiere stage adaptation of Tangled (Disney Creative Entertainment). Other favorite productions include Westport Country Playhouse, Goodspeed Opera House, Theatreworks, and Northern Stage. Connor was associate director for Into the Woods at The Public Theater starring Amy Adams, Donna Murphy, and Denis O'Hare. Connor's work has been seen in commercials for Hanky Panky, Glidden Paint, and Luxottica Eyewear. A former competitive gymnast, Connor spent a year on Broadway as a dancing rug. www.connorgallagher.com.

Christopher Gattelli received the 2012 Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards for his choreography of Newsies. Additional Broadway choreography credits include The King and I (Tony Award nomination), South Pacific (Tony and Outer Critics Circle Award nominations), Sunday in the Park with George, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, Casa Valentina, Amazing Grace, Godspell, The Ritz, Martin Short: Fame Becomes Me, 13, and High Fidelity. Off-Broadway credits include: Altar Boyz (Lucille Lortel and Calloway Awards), Bat Boy: The Musical (Lucille Lortel Award), tick, tick...BOOM!, 10 Million Miles, and Adrift in Macao. West End and London credits include South Pacific, Sunday in the Park with George, and tick, tick...BOOM! National and international tour credits include Altar Boyz, Godspell, Grease, and Pooh's Perfect Day (world premiere by Disney Theatricals). Christopher choreographed South Pacific at the Sydney Opera House, directed and choreographed SILENCE! The Musical (named in Time magazine's top 10 theater of 2011) off-Broadway, the world premiere of Jim Henson's Emmet Otter's Jug-Band Christmas, Departure Lounge (The Public Theater), and In Your Arms (New York Stage and Film and The Old Globe). He choreographed the Coen brothers' film "Hail, Caesar!" and recently has choreographed SpongeBob the Musical, and My Fair Lady, directed by Julie Andrews at the Sydney Opera House.

Spencer Liff has earned two Emmy Nominations for Outstanding Choreography for his work on the hit FOX TV series So You Think You Can Dance, where he has been a resident choreographer for the past nine seasons. His other TV credits include One Day at a Time (Netflix), Best Time Ever with Neil Patrick Harris (choreographer & co-producer), Dancing with the Stars, How I Met Your Mother, Parks and Recreation, Mike and Molly, 2 Broke Girls, Happyland, The Latin Grammy Awards, and The Emmy Awards. His film credits include the feature film "Speech & Debate" adapted from the Roundabout Theatre play written by Stephen Karam.Spencer's most recent Broadway show was the Lincoln Center Theater revival of the groundbreaking musical Falsettos. After receiving rave reviews, the limited engagement production was filmed for television and will air this fall on PBS. Spencer was the choreographer for the critically acclaimed Broadway revival of Spring Awakening. This re-imagined production originated in Los Angeles with Deaf West Theater. He was nominated for a Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle, and Astaire Award for the show's run on Broadway and won both the Los Angeles Ovation Award and The Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award.

Spencer provided the exciting musical staging for the Tony Award-winning revival of Hedwig and the Angry Inch starring Neil Patrick Harris. He reinvented the choreography for each of the Hedwig's that followed: Andrew Rannells, Michael C. Hall, John Cameron Mitchell, Darren Criss, and Taye Diggs. Hedwig is currently rocking her way across America on a national tour.

Kathleen Marshall's Broadway credits include Living on Love, Nice Work If You Can Get It; Anything Goes; The Pajama Game; Wonderful Town; Grease; Little Shop of Horrors; Follies; Seussical; Kiss Me, Kate; 1776; and Swinging on a Star. Her Off-Broadway and regional credits include Two Gentlemen of Verona (NYSF), Saturday Night (Second Stage Theater), My Paris (Goodspeed Opera House), Ever After (Paper Mill Playhouse), Diner (Signature Theatre), Living on Love (Williamstown Theatre Festival), and The Unsinkable Molly Brown (Denver Center for the Performing Arts). She was the Artistic Director of City Center Encores! for four seasons, where she directed and choreographed The Band Wagon, I'm Getting My Act Together and Taking It on the Road, Bells Are Ringing, Carnival, and Babes in Arms, among others. She choreographed the musical sequences in the film My Week with Marilyn. For ABC/Disney, she directed and choreographed "Once Upon a Mattress" and choreographed "The Music Man" (Emmy nomination). She has received three Tony Awards (out of nine nominations), three Drama Desk Awards, three Outer Critics Circle Awards, the Astaire Award, the "Mr. Abbott" Award, the Smith College Medal (her alma mater), the Pennsylvania Governor's Award for the Arts, and has been named a Distinguished Daughter of Pennsylvania.

Peter Pucci is a Drama Desk Award nominee for Outstanding Choreography and a Lucille Lortel Awardee for Outstanding Choreographer for his work on Queens Boulevard. Pucci also received a Drama Desk Award for his work on The Orphans' Home Cycle. Peter is currently working on a new production of Curse of the Starving Class, directed by Terry Kinney at Signature Theatre, and Kurt Elling's The Big Blind at Jazz at Lincoln Center. Recent theatrical productions include: Age of Innocence directed by Doug Hughes at Hartford Stage, Master Harold and the Boys directed by Athol Fugard at Signature Theatre; Incognito directed by Doug Hughes Off-Broadway at the Manhattan Theatre Club; Desire, directed by Michael Wilson Off Broadway at 59E59; One Man, Two Guvnors, directed by Gregory Boyd at Alley Theater, Houston. Additional credits include: Antony and Cleopatra directed by Emily Mann at the McCarter Theatre, Money Shot directed by Terry Kinney at Manhattan Classic Company, and two dance films: Swag n' Bach: A Path to Choreography and In the Garden for the Dance on Film series at the Jacob Burns Film Center. Pucci is known as a Choreographer/Movement Director who works exceptionally well with actors, dancers, opera singers, models - both those with movement experience and those with no movement training. He is able to collaborate closely with Directors to create theatrically appropriate movement for the performers that capitalizes on their innate movement quality while staying true to the vision of the production - giving the actors/dancers/singers/models or anyone he works with movement that is appropriate for their characters as well as for their abilities. Pucci refers to his way of working as "ability appropriate movement for the moment".

Alexandria Wailes, Director of Artistic Sign Language (DASL), is a multi-hyphenated artist. She was the DASL for the Broadway revival of Children of a Lesser God andThe Public Theater's 40th anniversary of Runaways, and currently, her work can be seen in King Lear at the Cort. Acting credentials include Broadway: Deaf West's Spring Awakening and Big River (Tony Honoree for Ensemble). NY/Regional: Mother Courage, A Kind of Alaska, Gruesome Playground Injuries, Love Person, Sleeping Beauty Wakes (LA Ovation nominated), Playwrights Horizon's I Was Most Alive With You, and Pasadena Playhouse/Deaf West Theatre's production of Our Town. On TV: Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Nurse Jackie, Conviction. On film: "The Hyperglot" and "Always Chasing Love". On webseries: "High Maintenance" and "Don't Shoot The Messenger". Previous DASL work on Wonderstruck, Netflix's Master of None, Sundance Now's This Close seasons one and two, Quantico season three. www.alexandriawailes.com

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