Lee Breuer

Esser Leopold "Lee" Breuer (February 6, 1937 – January 3, 2021) was an Obie Award-winning and Pulitzer-, Grammy-, Emmy- and Tony-nominated American playwright, theater director, academic, educator, filmmaker, poet, and lyricist. Breuer taught and directed on six continents. Since the birth of the company, Breuer worked with Mabou Mines.

In 2013, Breuer directed the La Divina Caricatura: Part I The Shaggy Dog which was co-produced by Mabou Mines. Of the September 2005 New York City premiere, the New York Times critic wrote "...theater as sorcery; it is a crossroads where artistic traditions meet to invent a marvelous common language. It is a fairy tale, a puppet play and a chamber opera… amazing work."

Mabou Mines Dollhouse, a deconstruction of the Ibsen classic, won 2004 Obie Awards for Best Director and Best Performance. The production toured nationally and internationally. Breuer directed high definition video adaptation of stage production for Arte television France, which was aired throughout Europe. These include his Obie-winning adaptation of three works by Samuel Beckett: Play, Come and Go and The Lost Ones.

Breuer authored/directed Mabou Mines' trilogy, Animations, including The B Beaver, The Red Horse and The Shaggy Dog Animation, which was awarded the Obie for Best Play in 1978. In 1980, Breuer received two Obies for writing and direction of his play, A Prelude to a Death in Venice. He also wrote and directed An Epidog, the winner of the President's Commission Kennedy Center-American Express Award for Best New Work. It premiered at the Brooklyn Academy of Music's "Next Wave Festival". It was later performed on Broadway at the Lunt-Fontanne Theater in 1988 for which he was nominated for a Tony Award. The production received numerous awards, including a Pulitzer Prize nomination (1988), an Obie Award for Best Musical (1984), and an Emmy. The Gospel at Colonus would go on to performances worldwide (Paris, Spoleto, Edinburgh, Moscow, Barcelona, London, Avignon). It was recreated for the 70th Anniversary of New York's legendary Apollo Theater for two weeks in the fall of 2004 starring Charles S. Dutton and Jevetta Steele.

Productions In 1981, with Ruth Maleczech, Lee Breuer directed The Tempest for Joseph Papp's Shakespeare in the Park, starring Raul Julia. Breuer and Maleczech's daughter Clove Galilee played "Young Miranda" in the production.

Breuer's music-theater collaborations with Bob Telson include Sister Suzie Cinema (featuring 14 Karat Soul), which premiered at The Public Theater and was televised on the PBS series Alive from Off Center; and The Warrior Ant, which premiered at BAM in 1988.

Breuer has directed 13 Obie Award-winning productions over a period of more than 40 years including: David Warrilow in The Lost Ones (1974); Bill Raymond in A Prelude to Death in Venice (1979); Ruth Maleczech in Hajj (1986); Yoshida Tamamatsu in The Warrior Ant (1990); Ruth Maleczech, Isabel Monk, Karen Kandel and Greg Mehrten in Mabou Mines Lear (1991); Karen Kandel in Peter and Wendy (1997); and Maude Mitchell in Mabou Mines Dollhouse (2004). His involvement outside of the U.S. includes directing Yi Sang Counts to Thirteen by Sung Rno, which had its debut in South Korea at the Seoul Theater Festival 2000.

Lee taught an acting workshop in New Delhi, India during the summer of 2011 where he wrote and directed a workshop production of La Divina Caricatura''. Divina is a Bunraku pop-opera that uses puppetry and draws from the traditional format of Indian epics such as the Mahabharata.

Personal life Breuer was born in Philadelphia. He studied English at the University of California, Los Angeles. and three grandchildren.

2004 OBIE Award for 'Direction' for MABOU MINES DOLLHOUSE

1997 OBIE Award for 'Best Production' to PETER AND WENDY

1994 Fund for New American Plays Award, Best American Play, for THE EPIDOG (Breuer)

1986 OBIE Award for 'Sustained Achievement' to Mabou Mines

1995 Asian Cultural Council - China, Teaching at Dramatic Institute in Beijing

1993 Japan-United States Friendship Commission - Japan, Research and Tour Planning

1992 Asian Cultural Council - China

1992 Arts International - China, Teaching and Travel

1992 Arts International - Bali, Rehearsal and Travel

1990-91 CIES Counsel for International Exchange of Scholars - North and South India

1985 Rockefeller Foundation Playwriting Fellowship

1984 McKnight Foundation Playwriting Fellowship

1983 Japan-United States Friendship Commission Exchange Fellowship

1982 National Endowment for the Arts Playwriting Fellowship

1979 Rockefeller Foundation Playwriting Fellowship

1978 Creative Artists Public Service (CAPS) Fellowship

1978 National Endowment for the Arts Playwriting Fellowship

1977 Guggenheim Fellowship

Teaching 2011 Towsen University, Baltimore Maryland, Development workshop

2011 Duke University, North Carolina, Development workshop

2010 Master Classes, Moscow and St. Petersburg

2010 National Theatre of Scotland, Glasgow

2009 National Theatre of Scotland, Edinburgh

2009 Guest Faculty Shanghai University

2006 Guest Lecturer University of Thessaloniki

2004-06 Guest teaching, Yale University School of Drama, Brown University

1986-89 co-chair of Directing Department, Yale University School of Drama

1995-99 Professor of Theater, Stanford University 1995-99 Associate Professor

1994 UC Santa Cruz

1992-93 Associate Professor, Arizona State University West

1977-80 Associate Professor, Yale University School of Drama

1981 Harvard University Extension (Writers & Directors Seminar)

1981 Experimental Wing, New York University