His initative in PPTG
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I am a former chair of the New York State Council on the Arts Theatre Panel and was elected to membership in The National Theatre Conference in 2009. I teach course in Shakespeare, Acting, Text Analysis, New Play Development, Prison Theatre, and the Arts in Incarceration. At Cornell I have collaborated in community-based projects with the Lehman Alternative Community School, John O’Neal, Roadside Theatre, Urban Bush Women, Michael Keck, and members of the American Festival coalition. I have co-taught a course in community engagement with Scott Peters, former Co-Director of Imagining America and faculty member in Development Sociology and Shorna Allred, faculty member in Natural Resources, and a fellow recipient of Cornell’s Engaged Scholar award.
I am the lead facilitator for the Phoenix Players Theatre Group, an organization founded by incarcerated men at Auburn Maximum Security Prison. I have been with the group eight years, meeting with them weekly, assisting them on their journey of transformation through the use of theatre techniques. I assisted in devising five original pieces that the group has performed for invited audiences. Inside/out, the group’s first piece was performed in 2011. Maximum Will, the groups’ second piece was performed in April of 2012 at Auburn Correctional facility and its development is the basis for the feature documentary Human Again. The group expanded its membership in 2013 and in May of 2014 performed their third original piece titled, An Indeterminate Life. With additional new members, PPTG performed its fourth show: This Incarcerated Life in May of 2016 and its most recent performance: The Strength of Our Convictions: The Auburn Redemption in 2018. www.phoenixplayersatauburn.com
Collaborators
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In 2016, Levitt was the inaugural recipient of Cornell’s Engaged Scholar Prize. He holds a Ph.D. in Theatre from the University of Michigan. He is the co-author of several articles and the subject of a number of interviews focused on his work with the Phoenix Players. His 2018 film, TONY, made with collaborator, Peter Carroll won “Best Documentary” in both the 2019 Top Shorts Film Festival and the NYC Short Documentary Film Festival.
Dr. Levitt has had a distinguished career as a freelance director in New York and regionally, and has been involved with the development of dozens of new plays in the United States, Canada, and Europe. He has directed for four seasons at Ft. Worth’s Shakespeare in the Park. Levitt’s production of The Puppetmaster of Lodz for Stageworks Theatre near Albany, New York in September of l997 was listed among the ” ten best productions” for the New York, Connecticut, and Berkshire regions. While on sabbatical in New York City during the 1995-1996 academic year, Professor Levitt chaired the New York State council on the Arts Theatre Panel. In June of l996 he began his association with The Heart of America Shakespeare Festival and, through the 2001 season, served as it’s Producing Artistic Director, staging productions of Romeo and Juliet, Richard III, Love’s Labour’s Lost, Measure for Measure, Macbeth, and King Lear.Most recently, Levitt served as an NEA panelist for “Shakespeare in American Communities,” an ambitious project to send professional touring productions ofShakespeare to all fifty states. Professor Levitt teaches several levels of acting classes, text analysis, solo performance, and directing. He has also served as Faculty Chair of the Cornell Council for the Arts. Other Cornell productions include Cocoanuts, The Three Sisters, The Cherry Orchard, The Glass Menagerie, Strider, A Lie of the Mind, and the American premier of David Edgar’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
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