We believe that our visiting artists and colloquium speakers serve to foster a sense of intellectual and artistic community on campus and in the St. Louis community. Through the Helen Clanton Morrin Lecture series we continue to teach our students that theatre does not simply entertain, but in fact emboldens us to make change.
Past Lectures
2023 – “Write What You Don't Know”
David Henry Hwang, Playwright, Producer, Writer and Professor (Columbia University).
Hwang is a Tony Award winner and three-time nominee, a three-time OBIE Award winner,
a Grammy Award winner who has been twice nominated and a three-time Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Drama.
He is a professor at Columbia University School of the Arts and a Trustee of the American Theatre Wing.
2018 – “A Conversation with Oskar Eustis”
Oskar Eustis, Artistic Director of the Public Theater in New York City.
Eustis has been dedicated to the development of new plays as a director, dramaturg and producer,
with involvement in such plays as Angels in America, Fun Home and Hamilton.
2015 - “Tennessee Williams and the Out-crying Heart”
JOHN LAHR, Theatre Critic, Writer, Biographer, has been awarded The National Arts Club Medal of Honour
for Achievement in the Theatrical Arts, the first critic ever to win the award.
2013 – “An Afternoon with Steven Sater”
STEVEN SATER, Playwright & Lyricist
Recipient of Tony Awards for Best Book of a Musical and Best Original Score for
Spring Awakening, along with the Drama Desk and Outer Critic Circle Awards for Best Lyrics
2013 – “Micro-essays on the Theater”
SARAH RUHL, Playwright
Recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship and the PEN/Laura Pels International Foundation for Theater Award for a distinguished American playwright in mid-career
2012 – “Plato and Modern Drama”
MARTIN PUCHNER, PhD
Byron and Anita Wien Professor of Drama and of English and Comparative Literature, Harvard University
2010 – “Bodies I Have in Mind: Adapting Ancient Texts for the Stage”
MARY ZIMMERMAN
Jaharis Family Professor of Performance Studies, Northwestern University
2009 – “The Witness Protection Program: Making Theatre, Everyday”
Tracy Davis
Barber Professor of Performing Arts, Northwestern University
2008 – “Shakespearean Romance & Epistolary Performances in the Age of Garrick”
Joseph Roach
Charles C. & Dorathea S. Dilley Professor of Theatre & English, Yale University,
Former Chair of the Performing Arts Department at Washington University in St. Louis
2006 – “Bartlett’s Familiar Shakespeare: The Pleasures and Pitfalls of Quotation”
Marjorie Garber
Professor of English and Director of the Humanities Center at Harvard University
2004 – “Hand in Hand to Hell: Richard III and Macbeth – An Actor’s Perspective”
Gareth Armstrong
Shakespearean Actor
2002 – “Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night: 400 Years on the Globe Stage”
Patrick Spottiswoode
Director of Education – Shakespeare’s Globe, London
2000 – “The Performing Arts at Washington University – Then and Now”
Sid Friedman
Professor of Theatre Arts, Boston University;
Former Associate Professor of English & Performing Arts &
Former Chair of the Performing Arts Area at Washington University in St. Louis
1999 – “Life in the Theatre”
Zoe Caldwell
Four Time Tony Award Winning Actress
1998 – “Shakespeare As I Knew Her”
Jane Lapotaire
Honorary Associate Artist of the Royal Shakespeare Company