Maria Manuela Goyanes, artistic director of Washington DC’s Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, is a theatrical force of nature. She arrived from New York City’s Public Theater in 2018 where she had been Director of Producing and Artistic Planning. Her role there included planning and supervising programming at all of the Public’s five main stages, as well as Shakespeare in the Park and Joe’s Pub. She did all this in addition to teaching and mentoring theater artists as well as volunteering for the job of executive producer for 13P--a collective of mid-career playwrights who each wrote and directed one play which would get a full-scale production which Maria supervised. Did I mention that while she was at the Public she was also associate producer for Fun Home, Straight White Men and Hamilton? A first-generation Latina-American, Maria Manuela Goyanes is an ideal fit for Woolly Mammoth which is known for producing new plays that are edgy, challenging, and thought-provoking. It’s a mid-sized theater with large footprint that nurtures talent and takes chances. It’s adventurous theater—unafraid of making audiences uncomfortable and tackling social issues head-on--challenging both its artists and audiences in ways that are sometimes fun, sometimes difficult but always interesting. In this podcast, Maria discusses what makes Woolly Woolly, how she brings the fullness to her background to her role as artistic director, and the challenges and opportunities this moment offers theater in general and Woolly in particular. Maria is a born raconteur—smart, engaging and engaged, with wonderful insights about theater.
Itunes keywords: Maria Manuela Goyanes, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Pandemic, theater, equity