Marc Acito
| Marc Acito | |
|---|---|
 Marc Acito | |
| Born |
January 11, 1966 Bayonne, New Jersey |
| Occupation | Playwright, novelist, and humorist |
| Education | Westfield High School |
| Alma mater | Colorado College |
| Spouse | Floyd Sklaver |
| Website | |
|
www | |
Marc Acito (born January 11, 1966 in Bayonne, New Jersey) is an award winning American playwright, novelist, and humorist.
He is openly gay and lives in New York City with his husband Floyd Sklaver.
Early life
Acito is a 1984 graduate of Westfield High School in Westfield, New Jersey. He studied acting in the musical theater program at Carnegie Mellon but left before graduation.[1] In 1990 he received a bachelor’s degree from Colorado College, which awarded him an honorary doctorate in 2009.[2]
Early career
Before becoming a playwright, Acito was a novelist and journalist. His comic novel How I Paid for College: A Novel of Sex, Theft, Friendship and Musical Theater won the Oregon Book Awards’ 2005 Ken Kesey Award for Best Novel,[3] and was voted a 2005 "Teens Top Ten for favorite young adult book" of the American Library Association.[4] In April 2008, Acito published Attack of the Theater People, a sequel to How I Paid for College.
He is also the writer of the syndicated humor column "The Gospel According to Marc", which ran for four years in nineteen gay publications. His humorous essays have appeared in many publications including The New York Times (April 3, 2006) and Portland Monthly magazine (January 2007, February 2007); as well as on NPR's All Things Considered (June, 2008 through February 2010)[5]
Theatrical career
In 2012, Acito won the The Charles MacArthur Award for Outstanding New Play for Birds of a Feather,[6] a comedy inspired by Roy and Silo, the same-sex male penguins in Central Park who raised a chick,[7] and Pale Male and Lola, the red-tailed hawks that nested on the ledge of a Fifth Avenue cooperative.[8]
Acito wrote the libretto for the musical Allegiance, which won the 2012 Craig Noel Award for Outstanding New Musical[9] after a record breaking run at San Diego’s Old Globe Theater.[10] ALLEGIANCE - A New Musical Inspired By A True Story opens on Broadway in November, 2015 and stars George Takei and Lea Salonga.[11]
In 2012, Acito also turned his novel How I Paid for College: A Novel of Sex, Theft, Friendship and Musical Theater into a "one-man monologue with songs" that premiered at the Hub Theater in Fairfax, VA.[12]
In 2014, his musical adaptation of E.M. Forster’s A Room With a View was presented in Seattle at the 5th Avenue Theater.[13] In 2015, Acito wrote the concert adaptation of Lerner & Loewe’s Paint Your Wagon for New York City Center’s Encores! series.[14]
He is currently working on the libretto for a new musical commissioned by the 5th Avenue Theater. The musical, Dutch Master, was awarded a development grant by the National Alliance for Musical Theater.[15] Also in the works is Chasing Rainbows, a musical based on the early childhood of Judy Garland, which premieres in December, 2015 at Flat Rock Playhouse in North Carolina.[16]
References
- ↑ "(1) popmatters.com".
- ↑ "(2) coloradocollege.edu".
- ↑ "(3) literary-arts.org".
- ↑ "(4) ala.org".
- ↑ "(5) npr.org".
- ↑ "(6) mdtheatreguide.com".
- ↑ Roy and Silo
- ↑ "(8) gothamist.com".
- ↑ "(9) playbill.com".
- ↑ "(10) utsandiego.com".
- ↑ "(11) deadline.com".
- ↑ "(12) playbill.com".
- ↑ "(13) seattletimes.com".
- ↑ Scheck, Frank (March 19, 2015). "(14) nypost.com". New York Post.
- ↑ "(15) namt.org".
- ↑ "(16) media.visitnc.com".
External links
- General
- Marc Acito.com - official website: columns, press reviews, excerpts, etc.
- Marc Acito profile at Random House
- Social Media
- Marc Acito - official Facebook fan page
- Marc Acito - official Twitter profile
- Interviews
- 2004 interview (by Dave Weich at Powells.com)
- 2004 interview (by Daulton Dickey at PopMatters)
- 2005 interview (by Andrew Hicks at PageAndAuthor.com)
- Misc
- Literature-Map for Marc Acito (JavaScript required)