“I'm so in love with Black people that I want to give other people the chance to fall in love with us too,” she says. Throughout her early career, Curtis-Newton courageously risked being barred from production spaces or resources because she challenged the status quo. Photos by Nate Watters (left) and Chris Bennion. “I have watched her mentor students and junior faculty (including myself), always with an eye towards excellence.” Curtis-Newton has directed many noteworthy productions in Seattle, including (left) Nina Simone: Four Women at Seattle Repertory Theatre in 2019 and (right) Wedding Band at Intiman in 2016. “She is kind, outspoken, and cares deeply about the success of the School of Drama,” says Performance Studies Professor Jasmine J. Inserting Black playwrights into the curricula has been a sustained effort, recognizing gaps not only in theater education but in attaining equitable resources for staging stories borne of Black communities. Undeniably her leadership in the School has made a significant impact, though challenges remain. She recently directed Suzan-Lori Parks’ Father Comes Home from the Wars, Parts 1, 2 & 3 at UW’s Floyd and Delores Jones Playhouse, which brought together a cast of local actors and crew with faculty, alumni, and students comprising the largest Black cast in a School production since her arrival at the University. At right, she stands in front of a portrait of Lorraine Hansberry at the Guthrie Theater in 2016.Ĭurtis-Newton’s work with local and national communities offers a meaningful presence in the UW community for prospective and current students alike. “ has been a force for many years,” said Phillips. “Her sense of history that surrounds Black theater specifically has enhanced our understanding of the necessity to have authority over our own stories.” At left, Curtis-Newton performs in Hartford, Connecticut circa 1993. These resource structures have supported opportunities for unemployed union actors to work with small independent theaters and companies, while securing livable artist wages for non-union actors. This collaborative effort shifted the theater landscape in ways that didn’t exist for Curtis-Newton when she started out. Since 2012, The Hansberry Project has mainly operated as a resource for play development and theater productions within the local Black theater community. Their mission was to support artists and stage Black theater productions, beginning with an early residence at ACT Theatre that lasted six years. In 2006 they co-founded The Hansberry Project, named after A Raisin in the Sun playwright Lorraine Hansberry. She acted by partnering with the local powerhouse theater artist Vivian Phillips. The few Black community artists Curtis-Newton knew sympathized with her circumstance. She began teaching at UW in 1998, and quickly learned that inserting Black playwrights into the curriculum would be a hard-won effort. Living in what was at the time the fifth whitest city in the country meant she was different from most professors, students, and theater practitioners. In those early years she experienced the discomfort of cultural isolation and scarce opportunities to work in the plays she was interested in. As life would have it, she fell in love and later married her wife, Kim Powell, confirming her destiny as a Seattle resident.
Photo by Joshua Huston.Īfter years of working in theater including as Artistic Director for The Performing Ensemble of Hartford, Curtis-Newton enrolled in the MFA program at UW, expecting to return to the East Coast after graduating. She grew up as an Air Force kid in Hartford, Connecticut, enchanted by the power of storytelling and intimacy of the theater, an experience she originally sought out as a way to connect with community, or as she puts it, “to find my people.” She started acting just over 40 years ago and turned to directing while an undergraduate. Curtis-Newton is a nationally recognized Seattle-based theater artist and activist who serves as a director, professor, and Head of Directing and Playwriting at the UW School of Drama. She stirs up “good trouble” and courageously unmasks uncomfortable truths while sharing stories on the stage as a call for us to do the same. Valerie Curtis-Newton (MFA ‘96) has dedicated her entire adult life to the theater.