Sarah+Ruhl

Ruhl was born in [|Wilmette], [|Illinois]. She studied under [|Paula Vogel] at [|Brown University] (A.B., 1997; M.F.A., 2001) and did graduate work at [|Pembroke College, Oxford]. [1][2] Her play //Late: A Cowboy Song// was produced by [|Clubbed Thumb] in 2003 [3] Ruhl gained widespread recognition for her play [|//The Clean House//], a romantic comedy about a physician who cannot convince her depressed Brazilian maid to clean her house. It won the [|Susan Smith Blackburn Prize] in 2004. It was a [|Pulitzer Prize] finalist in 2005. [4]  Her play [|//Eurydice//] was produced [|off-Broadway] at New York's [|Second Stage Theatre] in June-July 2007. Prior to that it had been staged at [|Yale Rep] (2006), [|Berkeley Rep] (2004), Georgetown University, and [|Circle X Theatre]. [5][6]  Ruhl is also known for her [|//Passion Play//] [|cycle] that opened at Washington's [|Arena Stage] in 2005, and subsequently was produced by the [|Goodman Theatre] and [|Yale Rep]. //Passion Play// made its New York City premiere in Spring 2010 in a production by the Epic Theatre Ensemble at the Irondale Center in [|Brooklyn, New York]. [7] Each part of the trilogy depicts the staging of a Passion Play at a different place and during a different historical period: Elizabethan England, Nazi Germany, and the United States from the time of the Vietnam War until the present. [8]  Her play //Dead Man's Cell Phone// premiered in New York City at [|Playwrights Horizons] in 2008 in a production starring [|Mary-Louise Parker]. It had its world premiere at Washington D.C.'s [|Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company] in 2007. [9][10] It was produced at [|Oregon Shakespeare Festival] in 2009. Other plays include //Orlando// and //Demeter in the City//. In September 2006, she received a [|MacArthur Fellowship]. The announcement of that award stated: "Sarah Ruhl, 32, playwright, New York City. Playwright creating vivid and adventurous theatrical works that poignantly juxtapose the mundane aspects of daily life with mythic themes of love and war." [11]  In February 2009, her play [|//In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play)//] premiered at [|Berkeley Rep]. [12][13] The play opened on [|Broadway] at the [|Lyceum Theatre] with previews starting on October 22, 2009 and an official opening in November 2009. This marked Ruhl's Broadway debut. [14] "In the Next Room" was a finalist for the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Drama [4] and was nominated for the 2010 Tony Award for Best Play, Best Actress, and Best Costume. [15] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Ruhl)

**Original plays** [2] **Adaptations**
 * [|//Melancholy Play//] (2001)
 * [|//Virtual Meditations#1//] (2002)
 * [|//Passion Play//] (2003 and 2004)
 * [|//Eurydice//] (2003)
 * [|//Orlando//] (2003) [16]
 * [|//Late: A Cowboy Song//] (2003)
 * [|//The Clean House//] (2004)
 * [|//Demeter in the City//] (2006) [17]
 * [|//Dead Man's Cell Phone//] (2007)
 * [|//In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play)//] (2009)
 * //Lady with the Lap Dog//, and //Anna around the Neck// (adapted from [|Anton Chekhov] (2001) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Ruhl)

External Links: http://bombsite.com/issues/99/articles/2902 http://www.newdramatists.org/sarah_ruhl.htm http://www.pen.org/author.php/prmAID/502/prmID/1502