The Central Region Equal Employment Opportunity Committee (EEOC) presented the annual Spirit, a Celebration of Diversity on Monday, March 18, 2013 at Chicago’s Smart Museum and at the award-winning Court Theatre.
Spirit, a Celebration of Diversity honors Central Region Members of Color, minority-based and focused theatres and theatres that make non-traditional casting a priority all season long.
The outstanding list of theatres include: About Face Theatre; Bailiwick Chicago; Black Ensemble Theater; Chicago Dramatists; Chicago Shakespeare Theater; Collaboraction; Court Theatre; Congo Square Theatre; Definition Theatre Company; Goodman Theatre; Pegasus Players; Porchlight Music Theatre; Remy Bumppo; Silk Road Rising; Southport Theatre; Steppenwolf; Teatro Vista; Teatro Luna; Urban Theatre Company and Victory Gardens.
In the central region, but outside of the office city, we honor and celebrate Writer’s Theatre (Glencoe, Illinois); 16th Street Theatre (Berwyn, Illinois); Marriott Theatre (Lincolnshire, Illinois); Drury Lane Oakbrook (Oakbrook, Illinois); Theatre at the Center (Munster, Indiana); the Detroit Repertory Theatre; Cincinnati’s Ensemble Theatre Company; Milwaukee’s Hansberry-Sands, Uprooted, Next-Act, and Renaissance Theatre Companies; the Human Race Theatre Company in Dayton, Ohio; Mixed Blood and Penumbra Theatre Companies in Minneapolis; the St. Louis Black Rep Theatre Company and the Unicorn Theatre in Kansas City.
The Kathryn V. Lamkey Award, named after the recently retired Central Regional Director and presented annually at the Spirit Celebration, honors those individuals and/or organizations that continue to open doors to all types of opportunities for central region Members of Color. Two long past due Kathryn V. Lamkey Awards were presented at this year’s celebration. One award went to Director, Theatre Instructor and Producer Sandy Shinner. The other went to Director, Playwright and Silk Road Rising Founder and Artistic Director Jamil Khoury.
Still honoring the EEO: One Voice brand, which was adopted by the Western, Central, and Eastern EEO Committees in 2009, Spirit, a Celebration of Diversity opened with (the now annual) performance of "One Voice," the dynamic and uniting song by Butch Stewart. "One Voice" was performed by the Central Region AFTRA Singers (Greta Pope, Paul Zimmerman, Kevin Smith, Wendy Morgan, Arlette Carr, Kebin Carr, and Barbara Martin).