Jeanmarie Simpson

Jeanmarie Simpson

Jeanmarie Simpson has been a working theatre artist since 1972 and has directed dozens of plays and musicals. She wrote and performed hundreds of times (including Off-Broadway) A Single Woman about Jeannette Rankin, the first US Congresswoman. She performed the piece at CalArts as Surdna Distinguished Guest Artist in 2005 and starred in the film version with Judd Nelson, the voices of Martin Sheen and Patricia Arquette, and Joni Mitchell's music. After winning the Sacramento News and Review's Best Theatrical Surprise award, A Single Woman toured 53 countries on five continents. Tony Award winner Zakes Mokae directed her as Elsa in his 2003 staging of The Road to Mecca, and in 2007, Leonard Nimoy directed her in the US premiere of Vern Thiessen's solo-tour-de force, Shakespeare's Will. She again toured the world with Coming In Hot, playing 19 military women. From 2011-19, she toured globally with her original solo performance HERETIC - the Mary Dyer story. In 2021, her play Pineapple and Other Options played in a Longbeach new works festival and was staged and filmed in Phoenix, and her play The Jewish Question won Honorable Mention by the New York-based Jewish Plays Project. In 2022, she won a Living History Foundation grant for Bambino Mio - Bright Little Flame about Maria Montessori. She is the recipient of six Sierra Arts Foundation, twelve Nevada Arts Council grants to artists, and a National Endowment for the Arts Theatre grant. Founding Artistic Director of Universal Access Productions/Arizona Theatre Matters, based in Arizona, Nevada, and on the company's YouTube channel, she served on the panel for the 2023 National Endowment for the Arts Theatre Grants for Arts Projects. Jeanmarie is a retired member of the Stage Directors and Choreographer's Society, the Dramatists Guild of America, Actors Equity Association and Screen Actors Guild/AFTRA




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First Show:

Hello Dolly!

Favorite Stories:



MOST POPULAR ARTICLES

Feature: Winding Road Theatre Ensemble Announces New Direction and 2024-2025 Season Lineup
Feature: Winding Road Theatre Ensemble Announces New Direction and 2024-2025 Season Lineup
March 26, 2024

Winding Road Theatre Ensemble is undergoing exciting changes for the 2024-2025 season. In a departure from tradition, the theatre is experimenting with a collective approach to artistic direction, replacing the role of Artistic Director with an Office of Artistic Direction.

Feature: A Public Fit - Unapologetically Theatrical
Feature: A Public Fit - Unapologetically Theatrical
November 18, 2022

I founded APF with the starry-eyed hope that someday I would be able to helm a company that paid its artists a living wage. In the 'entertainment capital of the world', this did not seem to be completely out of the realm of possibility.

BWW Review: THINGS I KNOW TO BE TRUE at A Public Fit
BWW Review: THINGS I KNOW TO BE TRUE at A Public Fit
April 3, 2022

Andrew Bovell's Things I Know to Be True at A Public Fit is staggeringly theatrical, exquisitely staged, and a joy to experience. 

BWW Feature: CODY DULL and Stage Left Productions
BWW Feature: CODY DULL and Stage Left Productions
April 27, 2021

Stage Left was founded in 2016. It's first production was 'Exit Laughing' the show opened in May of 2016. Stage Left's first home was Ventana Lakes Yacht Club in Sun City where it performed for two years, then Stage Left also partnered with Paradise RV resort Ballroom. In 2018 Stage Left signed a lease and began construction on its current location in the Bell Mar Plaza. The first show to open in its new space was an Arizona Premiere of Steve Martin's Musical 'Bright Star' in May of 2019 Since its inception stage left has produced 41 productions both adult and kids. We have served 15000 patrons have worked with over 500 actors and crew and has performed almost 300 performances. This year's holiday show 'Tuna Christmas' will be stage left's 50th production.

BWW Review: SLAUGHTER BROTHERS DIME CIRCUS - A Radio Fantasy at Baby Monster Productions
BWW Review: SLAUGHTER BROTHERS DIME CIRCUS - A Radio Fantasy at Baby Monster Productions
January 18, 2021

Equal parts Bugs Bunny and Guillermo del Toro, THE SLAUGHTER BROTHERS DIME CIRCUS - A RADIO FANTASY is a meta-theatrical reflection on the nature of power and revenge. A highly theatrical blend of low-end carnival, violent vaudeville, clowns with issues, and insectoid horror, elevated by original music by Sullivan and Matthew Reid that can best be described as the unholy spawn of ironic German cabaret, swampy rhythm and blues, and carnival music of the damned.

BWW Feature: Brelby Theatre Company Thrives In Spite of COVID-19
BWW Feature: Brelby Theatre Company Thrives In Spite of COVID-19
May 15, 2020

Brelby Theatre Company is a prolific, independent theatre located in the heart of Historic Downtown Glendale Arizona.

BWW Review: THE LAST ROMANCE at Stage Left Productions
BWW Review: THE LAST ROMANCE at Stage Left Productions
February 23, 2020

Heart-warming, indeed. It's in the writing, yes, but it's the great acting, deft direction and excellent production values that takes this production the distance.

BWW Interview: Joseph McGrath, Artistic Director of Tucson's Rogue Theatre
BWW Interview: Joseph McGrath, Artistic Director of Tucson's Rogue Theatre
July 10, 2019

There is tremendous support in our audience for bringing younger people into the theatre, and we're having some success in that regard. I'm positive, but I'm also unsure of where we are headed with digital technologies and what they mean for our industry and the larger culture. Our challenge, I suppose, is to be adaptive to what comes along without giving up the wisdom and glories of the past.

BWW Interview: Robert Encila - Heart and Soul
BWW Interview: Robert Encila - Heart and Soul
July 1, 2019

We can placate a certain segment of society by providing 'enrichment' courses in the arts, but it should no longer be a mystery that you can't achieve holistic education without a strong emphasis in the arts. The US Bureau of Economic Analysis recently released an astounding statistic that reports over $763 Billion of contribution by the arts sector to the US economy. That's around 5 million workers in the industry, which accounts for hundreds of billions of dollars in compensation. Yet here we are, still waiting for an increase in financial support for arts programs in the schools. You can talk about Broadway, Hollywood, and TV culture all day, but young people are tomorrow's audiences and we owe it to the industry to develop an enlightened culture of young participants and consumers of the arts.

BWW Interview: Tucson's Mark Klugheit
BWW Interview: Tucson's Mark Klugheit
June 26, 2019

Early in my acting career, I was represented by an agency that got me an audition for a recurring role in the series Breaking Bad. It clearly would have been the biggest break of my acting career. I had a short side of two pages to learn for the audition. Usually, I have a pretty photographic memory for lines, and I work hard to be sure I know them cold. But for this audition due to nervousness I could never get the lines solid, and sadly what the producers saw was not a potential character in their show, but an actor clearly struggling to remember the next word he was supposed to say. My biggest opportunity and worst audition all rolled into one disappointing 10-minute take.

BWW Interview: Alex Tuchi of POLYPHEMUS at B3 Productions
BWW Interview: Alex Tuchi of POLYPHEMUS at B3 Productions
June 27, 2018

It's really easy to write someone off as mentally ill when you don't understand them, and it's often easier to do this to yourself when you can't reconcile who you are and who you want to be.

BWW Interview: The Transcendent Kevin Fenderson
BWW Interview: The Transcendent Kevin Fenderson
November 10, 2017

As an artist, I always want to grow. That's part of why I took on the challenge of stage managing Depend on Me. It's given me a much broader perspective of theatre as a whole, and I'm SO grateful for that opportunity. As far as where I'd like to go artistically? Well, I can't do that alone. I love an artistic challenge, the chance to take a risk. I would love for more theatre companies to do the same. Specifically? Cast me as someone you wouldn't expect, given my size and/or gender. Give me a chance to blow a few minds. That's my dream.

BWW Review: MEET ME IN ST LOUIS at the Hale
BWW Review: MEET ME IN ST LOUIS at the Hale
October 13, 2017

The Hale's newest offering is a holiday confection - sweet and delicious - like a freshly shaken up, edible snow globe. Director Cambrian James has put together his finest (thus far) staging of the season. On the marvelous arena stage in Gilbert, the tight, swift-paced send up of the classic 1944 film is enchanting, from overture to finale.

BWW Review: DEPEND ON ME at Brelby
BWW Review: DEPEND ON ME at Brelby
October 9, 2017

Depend on Me is feels like a sitcom filmed before a live audience, until just before intermission, when it takes a turn and feels like late M*A*S*H, when they dropped the laugh track and things got dark. There's a surprise ending and much entertainment in the two-act play.

BWW Feature: The Anatomy of a Critic
BWW Feature: The Anatomy of a Critic
October 9, 2017

As a columnist and critic, I get a lot of feedback, some of it not altogether pleasant, some of it rather negative, and some downright hateful. We learn, early on, that there will be people who vehemently disagree with our opinions - there's simply no accounting for taste. We also learn - and it's hard to accept - that we will get hate mail from people who are furious that our WRONG criticism has been published for all the world to see.

BWW Interview: Alexis Green of SEVEN GUITARS at BTT
BWW Interview: Alexis Green of SEVEN GUITARS at BTT
October 6, 2017

BWW Interview: Alexis Green of SEVEN GUITARS at BTT

BWW Feature: Black Theatre Troupe's SEVEN GUITARS
BWW Feature: Black Theatre Troupe's SEVEN GUITARS
November 1, 2017

'The themes in this play, as in all in the Cycle, are universal. Unfortunately some of those themes and challenges are still relevant today. It is imperative that as a cast we explore and examine these themes before we even begin to tackle the language. Fortunately enough August Wilson's language succinct and inspiring. His characters are so clearly and powerfully structured that the journey for a cast to 'know' and 'find' these people. They are richly drawn,' Hemphill concluded.

BWW Interview: Carolyn McBurney
BWW Interview: Carolyn McBurney
September 29, 2017

Of course, we can continue to produce our own work- and there is a growing amount of that being done in the Valley. Some of the companies in town have had their awareness awakened to this issue and have started choosing scripts by and for women- some even have roles for women our age! There are also groups of women forming to address the issue - Arizona Women's Theatre has expanded its mission to that express purpose and mounted Eve Ensler's 'Necessary Targets' at MET in September. The Bridge Initiative is focusing on works by and for women. What concerns me is how we approach it. I hope that rather than be bitter and becoming entrenched, we find ways to work within the system to change it. We all need to challenge ourselves to be more proactive in ferreting out scripts that represent those not being represented- not just 'women of a certain age', but disabilities, cultures, creeds - and when we select those scripts - casting from those populations.

BWW Interview: Ricky Araiza
BWW Interview: Ricky Araiza
September 26, 2017

Being out there, in nature, learning what many consider classic or ancient forms of performance, was almost a step back in time. It was a place to strip down theatre to its purest form, the actor/poet in space. It taught me to never take theatre for granted and to understand that it is a sacred practice and should be treated as such.

BWW Interview: Scott Hyder
BWW Interview: Scott Hyder
September 25, 2017

I have seen Scott this year in two different productions of Gypsy. He played the character Herbie in both of them. I'm inordinately fond of that show and have been a little in love with Herbie since I first saw the film sometime in the late '60s, with Karl Malden in the role. There have been many fine Herbies along the way, but none hit as many of the character's emotional and dramatic notes as did Scott in both productions, even surpassing Malden, in my view.



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