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| Elizabeth Emmons |
While Elizabeth Emmons, SOA'07, was studying with Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Suzan-Lori Parks at the Wilma Theatre in Philadelphia in 1999, Parks suggested that Emmons produce her own plays. Heeding Parks' advice, Emmons and her husband, David Marcus, founded Blue Box Productions. That work led to Emmons being named recipient of the 2004–2005 Liberace Scholarship.
"I am so happy and proud to have received this scholarship," she says. "Without it I would not have been able to attend Columbia. I know my future as a playwright is sounder because of it. It gives me courage to persevere as a playwright knowing I have the support of the Liberace Foundation."
Emmons and Marcus produced their first Blue Box show in 2000, with Emmons wearing almost every creative hat, including executive producer and artistic director. The first-year playwriting student now serves as the resident playwright, executive director and curator of the Sticky @ Belly Series.
The Sticky Series, one of the company's most successful programs, offers readings of 10-minute plays before an unlikely audience: bar patrons. Emmons describes it as a cross between stand-up comedy and theater. The series is produced monthly at Belly, a low-key lounge on the Lower East Side. More than 50 artists participated in the series during its two-year run in Philadelphia from 2000 to 2002. Emmons's other theatre credits include: At the Seashore, Arrested, Little Angel Baby Mine, and Act 5, Scene 0.
Since its incorporation in 1976, the Liberace Foundation for the Performing and Creative Arts has provided more than $4.5 million in scholarship grants to over 100 institutions in music, theatre, dance and the visual arts, benefiting more than 1,400 students. |
