Last year, Paula Abreu, of McCarter Theatre Center, pulled off a huge performing arts “get” — booking the iconic Patti Smith to kick off the mainstage season — by offering Smith’s agent something no other venue could.
Through McCarter Theatre’s Arts & Ideas initiative, co-sponsored by the Humanities Council, Smith would engage with Princeton University students in a public conversation facilitated by a Princeton professor and a Princeton graduate student prior to her evening concert.
“Patti told me herself on the phone that she was humbled by the opportunity to talk with students,” said Abreu, in a story on the University homepage. “I was completely dumbfounded.”
In partnership with the Council, the McCarter initiative was developed to curate programming at both the theater and in classrooms and venues across the University campus. Artists on McCarter’s stage – from Patti Smith to Laufey to Alan Cumming – are intentionally linked with students and professors from Princeton. More than 50 programs have been held across campus, including artist/scholar panels, public conversations, workshops, and curated academic course experiences.
“Arts & Ideas has lit the flame for artists to consider coming to McCarter,” said Debbie Bisno, McCarter’s director of University and artistic partnerships. “The normal conversation we have with the artists and their reps shifts when we describe the opportunity to connect with campus.”
Performances, conversations, and collaborations this fall include an event with Latin Grammy-winning artist Natalia Lafourcade in conversation with PLAS director Gabriella Nouzeilles (Spanish and Portuguese); a conversation at McCarter between satirist Andy Borowitz and Eliza Griswold (The New Yorker), director of the Humanities Council’s Program in Journalism; and collaborations with the Princeton University Ballet, Mariachi los Tigres de Princeton, and the improv group Quipfire!
Read the full story on the University homepage and learn more about the Arts & Ideas initiative on the McCarter Theatre Center website.
