Kate Hamill is an American actress and playwright.
Kate Hamill | |
|---|---|
| Born | United States |
| Genre | Plays |
| Notable awards | "Playwright of the Year" |
Hamill is known for writing and acting in innovative, contemporary adaptations of classic novels for the stage, including Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice and William Makepeace Thackeray’s Vanity Fair.
In 2017, The Wall Street Journal[1] named Hamill "Playwright of the Year," and she has been named one of the most-produced playwrights by Theatre Communications Group (TCG) member theaters in America for three consecutive seasons by American Theatre[2] magazine, which is published by TCG.
Hamill grew up in a dairy farmhouse in Lansing, New York,[3] or as she puts it, in "a town with more cows than people.".[4] She was "a small, high-energy, highly emotional child" and "grew up in a household that prized reading and literature". Her bedtime reading featured Greek myths and classic novels, including Jane Austen's works.
She received a BFA in acting from Ithaca College.
Hamill creates stories that are female-centered and feminist.[citation needed] As a playwright, she has a playful and theatrical style that features absurdity while examining social and gender issues. As an actor, she "tends to play truth-tellers, oddballs, and misfits: complicated people who color outside the lines."[5]
Hamill's Sense and Sensibility premiered in a short run at New York City's Bedlam Theater Company in November 2014.[6] It had a longer run in 2016 directed by Eric Tucker, also at Bedlam.[7] Hamill played Marianne Dashwood.[7]
Vanity Fair was produced by Manhattan's Pearl Theater in 2017, with Hamill playing Becky Sharp.[8][9]
Hamill's adaptation of Pride and Prejudice premiered at the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival in 2017, directed by Amanda Dehnert.[3] The production, in which Hamill and her long-term partner, Jason O'Connell, play the leading roles of Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy, transferred to Manhattan's Primary Stages.[10] This play was published in script form by Dramatists Play Service INC.
In 2019, Hamill's adaptation of Little Women opened at the Cherry Lane Theatre, directed by Sarna Lapine.[11][12]