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Eugene O'Neill Theater Center facts for kids

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This page is about the theater in Waterford, Connecticut. For the theater in Manhattan, New York, see Eugene O'Neill Theatre.
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Eugene O'Neill Theater Center
EOTC HammondMansion.jpg
The Hammond Mansion, "Ironsides", in 2017
Address 305 Great Neck Road
Waterford, Connecticut
United States
Type Regional Theater
Opened 1964
Website
Walnut Grove
Eugene O'Neill Theater Center is located in Connecticut
Eugene O'Neill Theater Center
Location in Connecticut
Eugene O'Neill Theater Center is located in the United States
Eugene O'Neill Theater Center
Location in the United States
Area 40 acres (16 ha)
Built 1822
Architectural style Federal, Gothic Revival, et al.
NRHP reference No. 05001044
Added to NRHP September 21, 2005

The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in Waterford, Connecticut, is a 501(c)(3) non-profit theater company founded in 1964 by George C. White. It is commonly referred to as The O'Neill, seating just over 1,000 guests. The center has received two Tony Awards, the 1979 Special Award and the 2010 Regional Theatre Award. President Obama presented the 2015 National Medal of Arts to The O'Neill on September 22, 2016.

The O'Neill is a multi-disciplinary institution; it has had a transformative effect on American theater. The O'Neill pioneered play development and stage readings as a tool for new plays and musicals. It is home to the National Theater Institute (established 1970), an intensive study-away semester for undergraduates. Its major theater conferences include the National Playwrights Conference (est. 1965); the National Critics Conference (est. 1968), the National Musical Theater Conference (est. 1978), the National Puppetry Conference (est. 1990), and the Cabaret & Performance Conference (est. 2005). The Monte Cristo Cottage, Eugene O'Neill's childhood home in New London, Connecticut, was purchased and restored by the O'Neill in the 1970s and is maintained as a museum. The theater's campus, overlooking Long Island Sound in Waterford Beach Park, has four major performance spaces: two indoor and two outdoor. The O'Neill is led by Executive Director Tifanni Gavin.

The estate, also known as Walnut Grove or Hammond Estate, was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 21, 2005, for its architectural significance, and its associations with Revolutionary War Colonel William North and Edward Crowninshield Hammond, a wealthy railroad tycoon who frequently had the young O'Neill thrown off of the property when he owned it.

Major works

The following is a list of plays, musicals, and performance pieces first developed at the O'Neill that have gone on to further success.

National Playwrights Conference
  • Slave Play - Jeremy O. Harris (2018)
  • I'm Gonna Pray For You So Hard – Halley Feiffer (2014)
  • The Nether – Jennifer Haley (2011), Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, 2012
  • The Receptionist – Adam Bock (2006)
  • Fuddy Meers – David Lindsay-Abaire (1998)
  • Trueblinka – Adam Rapp (1997)
  • Seven Guitars – August Wilson (1994)
  • The Piano Lesson – August Wilson (1986)
  • Joe Turner's Come and Gone – August Wilson (1984)
  • Fences – August Wilson (1983)
  • Danny and the Deep Blue Sea – John Patrick Shanley (1982)
  • Ma Rainey's Black Bottom – August Wilson (1982)
  • Agnes of God – John Pielmeier (1979)
  • FOB – David Henry Hwang (1979)
  • Bent – Martin Sherman (1978)
  • Uncommon Women and Others – Wendy Wasserstein (1977)
  • A History of the American Film – Christopher Durang (1976)
  • Madmen and Specialists – Wole Soyinka (1970)
  • House of Blue Leaves – John Guare (1966)
National Musical Theater Conference
Cabaret & Performance Conference
  • The Story of My Life (2006)
  • title of show (2005)
National Critics Conference
  • Chelsea on the Edge: The Adventures of an American Theater – Davi Napoleon

Notable O'Neill alumni

National Theater Institute
Conference Playwrights

See also

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