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 | | Marsha L. Grant |
| | | As a playwright I was an early starter and late bloomer . My initial effort was a half-hour script about Abigail Adams, a history project in my 6th-grade class in Arlington, VA. The teacher was sufficiently impressed that she arranged for it to be presented on a local educational radio station. This was in the very early days of TV when viewers watched test patterns during the daylight hours. That makes me an ancient mariner to most of you reading this.When I told my high school guidance counselor that I wanted to be a forest ranger or marine biologist, I was told that girls need not apply.
That set my course and angst for life. A lifetime later when I started writing plays again, women's issues were a recurring theme: "Lacey Summer," "Maggie's Choice," and especially "Saint Susan," which tells the story of Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton's fight for coeducation of the sexes, a female's right to choose a profession, and ultimately, women's suffrage. Ghost Story was written as pure entertainment (no moral message), but the facts about the notorious ghosts were researched and documented.I continued writing - news articles, theatre reviews, radio continuity - all through my high school and college years and for a short while afterwards. My love of the theatre began in high school and has never waned. In 1958 I was awarded a scholarship from the Washington D.C. chapter of the National Arts and Letters Society, and in 1960 received a Bachelor's degree in Fine Arts in Drama from the University of Oklahoma. Later I returned to the classroom both as a teacher and a student and received a Masters in Education from Butler University in Indianapolis.I recently retired after 35 years in the classroom, the last 25 as an instructor in Communication Studies at Indiana University/Purdue University in Indianapolis, and began writing plays full time. I have two adult sons, two teenage grandchildren, and have been married to my first husband for 45 years. Indianapolis is a vital cultural community, and I've taken an active part in the theatre community for almost 40 years as an actor, director, costume and technical designer, and producer. I never write a play that I can't produce myself on the community theatre stage, often with zero budget dollars.When I'm not at a theatre in rehearsal, or at the computer developing a new script, you'll find me puttering in my gardens, or taking one of our greyhounds to a meet and greet. After reading about the unconscionable circumstances under which these beautiful, gentle racers were retired, I joined a rescue group and have adopted 4 over the past 10 years. A few years ago my gardens were featured on PBS's Victory Garden series.Thanks to the folks at Epilogue Players, and more recently, Oaklandon Civic Theatre, I have had 10 full-length plays and two reader's theatre scripts produced. Retirement gives me more time for the fun things, life is more precious than ever, and I've never been busier. | |
| | | Visit Marsha L. Grant's web page: http://members.iquest.net/~grantr/ | | | Plays by Marsha L. Grant with Heuer Publishing: | | GHOST STORY | |
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