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Moisés Kaufman

{{Short description|Venezuelan-American theater director, filmmaker and playwright}}

{{Infobox writer

| name = Moisés Kaufman

| birth_date = {{birth date and age|1963|11|21}}

| birth_place = Caracas, Venezuela

| death_date =

| death_place =

| occupation = theatre director, playwright

| nationality = American

| education = Metropolitan University
New York University (BFA)

}}

Moisés Kaufman (born November 21, 1963) is a Venezuelan American theater director, filmmaker, playwright, founder of Tectonic Theater Project based in New York City, and co-founder of Miami New Drama at the Colony Theatre.{{Cite web|title=OUR TEAM|url=https://www.colonymb.org/mind-team|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200711072131/https://www.colonymb.org/mind-team|url-status=usurped|archive-date=July 11, 2020|access-date=2020-07-30|website=colonytheatre|language=en}} He was awarded the 2016 National Medal of Arts by President Barack Obama. He is best known for creating The Laramie Project (2000) with other members of Tectonic Theater Project. He has directed extensively on Broadway and Internationally, and is the author of numerous plays, including Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde and 33 Variations.

Born and raised in Caracas, Venezuela, he moved as a young man to New York City in 1987.{{Cite news | last = Hurwitt | first = Robert | title = The 'Laramie' process | newspaper = San Francisco Chronicle | date = 2001-05-20 | url = http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2001/05/20/PK65537.DTL}}

Biography

Kaufman is of Romanian-Jewish and Ukrainian-Jewish descent, and was born in Caracas, Venezuela.{{cite news|author=Robert Myers|title=Nothing Mega About It Except the Applause|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1997/05/25/theater/nothing-mega-about-it-except-the-applause.html|work=The New York Times|date=25 May 1997|access-date=6 July 2009}} He is an alumnus of Venezuela's Universidad Metropolitana, where he began to study theatre.{{cite web |title=Obama condecorará al unimetano Moisés Kaufman UNIMET |url=http://www.unimet.edu.ve/obama-condecorara-al-unimetano-moises-kaufman/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180916093433/http://www.unimet.edu.ve/obama-condecorara-al-unimetano-moises-kaufman/ |archive-date=2018-09-16 |website=Universidad Metropolitana}} After immigrating to the United States, he went to college in New York and graduated from NYU.{{cite web | url=http://www.nyu.edu/about/news-publications/news/2016/september/ArtsAccoladesSeptember.html | title=NYU Racks up Arts Accolades }}

In 2005 he described himself in an interview by saying, "I am Venezuelan, I am Jewish, I am gay, I live in New York. I am the sum of all my cultures. I couldn't write anything that didn't incorporate all that I am."{{cite news|last=Orozco|first=Jose|title=True To Reality: An Interview with Moises Kaufman|url=http://www.morphizm.com/recommends/interviews/orozco_moises.html|access-date=6 August 2012|newspaper=Morphizm|date=March 21, 2005|quote=I am Venezuelan, I am Jewish, I am gay, I live in New York. I am the sum of all my cultures. I couldn't write anything that didn't incorporate all that I am.}}

Kaufman was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2002, following the premiere of The Laramie Project, which was based on extensive interviews with residents and commentators in and around Wyoming who were involved with the aftermath of the murder of gay student Matthew Shepard.{{cite web |url=http://www.gf.org/fellows/7637-moises-kaufman |title=Moisés Kaufman |access-date=2009-03-03 |publisher=John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation |year=2002 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110622020816/http://www.gf.org/fellows/7637-moises-kaufman |archive-date=2011-06-22 }}

He made his Broadway directing debut in the 2004 production of I Am My Own Wife by Doug Wright, for which he received a Tony Award nomination for Best Direction of a Play.

On September 22, 2016, Kaufman was awarded the National Medal of Arts and Humanities in a ceremony conducted by U.S. president Barack Obama. He is the first Venezuelan to receive the honor.

In 2022, Kaufman was included in the book 50 Key Figures in Queer US Theatre, profiled in a chapter written by theatre scholar Bess Rowen.{{Cite book |last=Rowen |first=Bess |title=50 Key Figures in Queer US Theatre |publisher=Routledge |year=2022 |isbn=978-1032067964 |editor-last=Noriega and Schildcrout |pages=113–117 |chapter=Moisés Kaufman}}

Stage credits

=As playwright=

=As director=

Film and television credits

Awards

See also

{{Portal|Theatre}}

References

{{Reflist}}

External links

  • [https://web.archive.org/web/20101125062028/http://jewish-theatre.com/visitor/article_display.aspx?articleID=1311 Interview: Moisés Kaufman], The Jewish Theatre
  • [http://www.tectonictheaterproject.org Tectonic Theater Project]
  • {{IMDb name|442229}}
  • {{IBDB name}}
  • {{iobdb name|1789}}

{{National Medal of Arts recipients 2010s}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kaufman, Moises}}

Category:Jewish dramatists and playwrights

Category:Jewish theatre directors

Category:American theatre directors

Category:American people of Venezuelan-Jewish descent

Category:American people of Romanian-Jewish descent

Category:American people of Ukrainian-Jewish descent

Category:Venezuelan Jews

Category:Venezuelan people of Romanian-Jewish descent

Category:Venezuelan people of Ukrainian-Jewish descent

Category:People from Caracas

Category:Gay Jews

Category:Venezuelan gay writers

Category:1963 births

Category:Living people

Category:Lambda Literary Award for Drama winners

Category:Stonewall Book Award winners

Category:Venezuelan emigrants to the United States

Category:Gay dramatists and playwrights

Category:Male dramatists and playwrights

Category:New York University alumni

Category:Venezuelan dramatists and playwrights

Category:United States National Medal of Arts recipients

Category:Universidad Metropolitana alumni

Category:Venezuelan theatre directors