Nancy Keystone
Nancy Keystone is an inter-disciplinary artist working in theatre, film, visual art, and education. She is the founding Artistic Director of the collaborative ensemble, Critical Mass Performance Group in Los Angeles, and a recipient of a Doris Duke Artist Award.
With CMPG her work encompasses a wide range of forms including epic historical projects, adaptations of classic texts, intimate interactive salons, public happenings, and social practice art. Known for exuberant theatricality and surprising collisions of ideas, CMPG was named 2013’s Best Theatre Company by the LA Weekly. Ms. Keystone is the honored recipient of a Doris Duke Performing Artist Award, and United States Artists Hoi Fellowship.
In her roles as CMPG’s chief investigator, writer, director, and scenic designer, Keystone has recently helmed Ameryka (2010-18) mounted at Center Theatre Group’s Kirk Douglas Theatre. Ameryka is a kaleidoscopic journey of the universal human longing for freedom and justice, illuminating the promises and betrayals of democracy through the lens of the United States astonishing relationship with Poland (named Production of the Year, and Best Ensemble by Stage Raw; nominated for 7 Ovation Awards, including Best Original Play and Best Production). Her adaptation of Alcestis (2012-13), a deconstruction of Euripides’ play about love and sacrifice, began development at the Getty Villa Theatre Lab, and premiered at The Theatre @ Boston Court in Pasadena (3 Best Adaptation Awards from LA Drama Critics Circle, LA Weekly, and Arts in LA, and was named one of 2013’s 10 Best Plays by LA Weekly). From 2002-2009, with CMPG, she created the company’s epic, historical trilogy Apollo, which explored the US space program, its relationship with Nazi rocket scientists, and the surprising intersection with the Civil Rights Movement. Parts 1 & 2 premiered at Center Theatre Group’s Kirk Douglas Theatre in 2005, and Part 3 premiered at Portland Center Stage in 2009 when the entire trilogy was produced for the first time (Garland award for playwriting and Drammy award for scenic design). The production is prominently featured in Stephanie Arnold’s The Creative Spirit: An Introduction To Theatre (McGraw Hill, 2011). In 2000, with CMPG, she created and directed the award-winning The Akhmatova Project, a movement-based piece, inspired by the life and writing of Russian poet, Anna Akhmatova. Other Critical Mass Productions: adaptation of Antigone, for Portland Center Stage; Parataxes From the Near Side of the Heart, for the Stage Raw Digital Play Festival Polish theatre exchange; Bread: An Exploration of the Staff of Life, an interactive performance-salon commissioned by Cornerstone Theater Company; Bad Medicine, commissioned by Heretick Theatre, live-streamed as part of the Noir Project; Sun Song and Stories Of The Sun, community-based, multi-media festival performances; Shakespeare’s Measure For Measure, named one of 10 Best Productions by the LA Reader; Aphra Behn’s The Rover (performed in a house); Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus (performed in a bar); Brecht’s Baal (performed in a basement room).
As a freelance artist Ms. Keystone has directed and designed award-winning productions at theatres across the country, including Portland Center, Center Theatre Group, Denver Center Theatre, East West Players, Theatre @ Boston Court, Actor’s Express, Georgia Shakespeare Festival, San Francisco Shakespeare Festival. Other directing forays include opera (Long Beach Opera, Musica Angelica, San Luis Obispo Mozart Festival, Cal State Long Beach) and film. As a visual artist, Ms. Keystone works in mixed media, creating paintings and collages, and unique scenic environments for her productions. In 2006 she was design consultant, with Peter Maradudin, for Portland Center Stage’s new theatre in the historic Portland Armory, designing four lobby spaces.
She is the recipient of Theatre Communications Group’s Alan Schneider Director Award, and was named one of the “Faces to Watch ” by the Los Angeles Times. Other grants and fellowships: Los Angeles Institute for the Humanities Fellow at USC, MacDowell Colony, NEA, APAP/Doris Duke Ensembles Collaborations grant, TCG/Pew Charitable Trusts’ National Theatre Artists Residency Program, Center for Cultural Innovation, Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Drama League of New York, California Community Foundation, Flintridge Foundation, among others. She earned an MFA in directing from Carnegie Mellon, and a BA in Theatre Arts from UCLA, is on the visiting faculty at UCLA, and a frequent university guest lecturer, and an instructor in arts-in-education programs.