Mildred Lewis

Assistant Professor, Instructional Faculty

Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences; Department of English

Office Location: Smith Hall 08A

Office Hours: M/W 12-1 p.m., 2:30-3:30 p.m.; F 12-2 p.m.

Education:: Oberlin College, Bachelor of Arts
University of California, Los Angeles, Master of Arts
University of California, Los Angeles, Master of Fine Arts

Biography

Mildred Lewis is a produced and published playwright and screenwriter. She most recently wrote and directed a short film comedy, Can Also Play, which screened at Outfest Fusion 2018. Currently she is part of Humanitas' PLAY LA (https://www.humanitasprize.org/play-la/) and Playground-LA. In 2018, her plays have been produced at the Breath of Fire Latina Theatre Ensemble (Santa Ana, CA), Ensemble Studio Theatre-Los Angeles, Everyday Inferno Theatre (NYC), Rockford New Play Festival (Rockford, IL), "Think Outside the Cage" on KPFK-FM (Los Angeles, CA), and the William Inge Theatre Festival (Independence, KS).

Her poetry has been published in anthologies including "Ella, Stamped" in Ella @100 which celebrated jazz singer Ella Fitzgerald's centennial. She most recently read her poems at Boca de Oro: OC Art & Literature Fringe Festival.

A strong believer in interdisciplinary work, she teaches writing, film theory, West African and Caribbean literature.

Recent Creative, Scholarly Work and Publications: We Jump Broom. Samuel French Off Off Broadway Festival 2022. Grand Jury Award, Fusion Theatre (Albuquerque, NM).; Smith & Kraus, Best of 10-Minute Plays, 2022; /kom'plisit/ published by Broadway Play Publishing, 2022; We Wuz Robbed, in Extra Innings: 10 Short Plays about Baseball; The Museum Annex, world premiere, Central Works (Berkeley, CA); /kom'plisit/ Staged readings.; Commissioned to write Juked, an adaptation of Sophocles' Electra. World premiere in 2023.; Meets Prince, Loves Frog Podcast for Feminist Fairytales series; $10 Dollars and a Tambourine fiction podcast part of Antaeus Theatre's Zip Code series. The series was nominated for a 2022 Ambie Award.; Ghosts of Blackness. Virtual/hybrid project commissioned by the Lucille Lortel Theatre, National Black Theatre and Harlem9.; $10 and a Tambourine. Audio podcast commissioned by the Antaeus Theatre.; The Peace of Home. Play. L.B. Williams Award from the New Circle Theatre (NYC). Produced by the New Circle Theatre and by The Road Theatre Summer Playwrights Festival 2021.; We Jump Broom. Play. Produced by Playground-LA and Towne Street Theatre. Selected for Best of Playground LA. Towne Street Theatre; The Gift, Broadway Play Publishing, 2021 Semi-finalist, Bay Area Playwrights Festival 2021; Finalist, Seven Devils New Play Conference 2021; Semi-Finalist, Theatre503, Theatre503 International Playwriting Award; "CowGirls," Feels Blind Literary Magazine; "The Last Ride" one act play. TomorrowLAnd Festival.; "Vacuum Seal" one act play. New Play Series.; "The Secret Life of LA Freeways" full length play. Rogue Lab Reading Series.; Can Also Play (2018). Wrote and directed short comedy film. Screened at the Outfest Fusion Festival and 2018 Outfest Festival.; Cycled, one act play. Broadcast live on "Think Outside the Cage" on KPFK-FM (90.7), Pacifica Radio.; Sons of Fox, Daughter of CNN, full length play, staged reading, executive produced by Humanitas. Presented by the Rogue Machine Theatre.; CowGirls, one act play. One Act Play Festival, Ensemble Studio Theatre.; the end of everything, full length play. Ensemble Studio Theatre, staged reading.; Poetry Reading, Boca de Oro at Chapman's Centro Comunitario de Educación. Read ten poems from my "Los Angeles" series.; Every Drop. one act play. produced at the West Side Show Room as part of the Rockford New Play Festival.; Turn On, Tune In, one act play. PlayGround LA, staged reading.; CowGirls, one act play, PlayGround LA, staged reading.; Visitation was produced in the Athena Cats' New Works Festival in Santa Monica, CA.; "Transforming Silences" an essay in the Stages of Resistance series hosted by the Lark Theatre, an international theatre lab.; Competitively selected for the 2017-8 Writers' Pool. Will write four new pieces for the company.; Bleed Black Bleed Blue Bleed Bleed was produced by the Smoked Apple Theatre Group in Louisville, KY in November 2016; Bleed Black Bleed Blue Bleed produced by the DC Black Theatre Festival at the Andrew Foster Theater (Galludet College) The play was also accepted for the 2015 LIC One-Act Festival (Secret Theatre) but I had to decline because I was not able to attend the mandatory performances.; Not Peace But A Sword was produced at Women’s Playwriting Festival (Two Muses Theater in Bloomfield, MI).; Accepted to the Vagrancy Theatre playwrights group to write a new full length play, The Boiler Room.; Contributed to a devised theatre piece,THE BOX, which was produced by the Sacred Fools Theatre in Los Angeles.; Those Who Visit, play produced by The Stage Left Theater for its Fast and Furious Festival.; Not Peace But A Sword, play produced for the Rockford New Play Festival.; Daily Habits Mask Pain, play produced at the Secret Theatre for the LIC One Act Play Festival.; The Etiquette Show, a comedy web series that I wrote, co-directed and co-produced was released in Summer 2013. The show has been released in Korea through HearSay English, and reviewed by the Independent Critic and in Blaze and the WebVee Guide. The show was also presented at Big Screen Little Screen at the Screen Actors Guild's James Cagney Theater. The show was invited to the HollyWeb festival.; Staff Writer, www.ARGN.com. Wrote articles about transmedia artist Lance Weiler, Alcatraz (Fox), Disneyworld's Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom, and Failbetter games.; Wrote the end of everything, a full length play, staged reading Alliance of Los Angeles Playwrights.; Wrote, co-directed and produced four webisodes for HBO's True Blood web site www.vamps-kill.com. (2011); Directed Pedestrian, a new play by Rita O'Farrell, as part of the Hollywood and Minneapolis Fringe Festivals during summer 2011.; Directed a fully staged reading of Roger Mason's Onion Creek at the Ensemble Studio Theatre-Los Angeles as part of their annual Winterfest 2010. Directed the revised play for Sunday Best series in spring 2011.; Book reviews of Brian Neve's Elia Kazan and Cinephilia in the Age of Digital Reproduction: Film, Pleasure, and Digital Culture, vol. 1 in Scope, a peer-reviewed online journal of the Institute of Film & Television Studies at the University of Nottingham.; Directed Maria Irene Forne's Conduct of Life at the William Alderson Theatre in Los Angeles. Summer 2009. Included Chapman University acting student and design major.; I began a blog about politics and culture in 2009, Lifting As We Climb (http://liftingasweclimb.wordpress.com). In 2011, cultureweekly.com and epochlips.com began syndicating its content.

Mildred Lewis

Biography

Recent Creative, Scholarly Work and Publications

Faculty Directories by School or College