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The award will be presented at the 26th annual awards event celebrating the 2015-16 theater season, at 7:30 p.m. Monday, June 13 at the Hartford Stage, co-hosted by Hartford’s TheaterWorks.
The event is free and open to the public.
Keefe was a longtime stage manager at New Haven’s Long Wharf Theatre and at various Broadway venues.
Fresh out of college, Keefe began her career as a stage manager at the McCarter Theatre in Princeton, N.J. in the late 1960s. From 1973 to the late ’90s, Keefe worked as a production stage manager and production supervisor at Long Wharf Theatre, where many of its shows moved to New York, beginning with the American premiere of David Storey’s "The Changing Room" in 1973. She was 27 and the only female stage manager on Broadway.
Keefe’s Broadway credits include "Death of the Maiden," "Watch on the Rhine," "Night Must Fall," and "Hamlet" starring Ralph Fiennes.
Beginning in 1999, she and friend Joanne Woodward began working together, programming the Westport Playhouse’s 2000 season. They also worked together to develop plans to save the historic theater from demolition, and in 2003 construction began on the $30 million transformation of the theater and its grounds that converted it into a year-round, multi-purpose facility. It re-opened in 2005, its 75th anniversary year.
Keefe’s roles at that theater included artistic associate and interim co-artistic director with Woodward. She is now curator and director of the Playhouse’s “Script in Hand” series. Keefe is married to Weston playwright David Wiltse.
The Tom Killen Award is given in recognition to years of extraordinary achievement and service to Connecticut theater.
Previous winners of the award include Lloyd Richards, Michael Price, Gordon Edelstein, Michael Wilson and Lucille Lortel. Last year’s recipient was Carmen de Lavallade.
For more information, click here or call 860-527-5151.
The Hartford Stage is at 50 Church St.
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