LAByrinth Theater Company Honors Bennington with Dave Hoghe Award

LAByrinth Theater Company will honor Bennington College with its Dave Hoghe Award on October 29, 2007 in New York City. The award, which recognizes people or organizations demonstrating “artistic courage” and dedication to the LAByrinth Theater Company, has previously been given to pop icon Madonna, and the Tony Award winning director, George C. Wolfe, among others.

Led by Academy Award winner Philip Seymour Hoffman and actor John Ortiz, LAByrinth has been described by the New York Times as “one of the pre-eminent downtown theatrical ensembles in New York.” Akin to the unique educational approach at Bennington, LAByrinth is best known for developing new work through a unique process that allows its ensemble members to take on all the roles involved in creating new theater—with much of this work sprouting and nurtured on Bennington’s campus.

Bennington College has served as the summer home for LAByrinth for the past few years; during which ensemble members live on campus and stage upwards of 70 private readings in the studios and stages of the College’s Visual and Performing Arts Center. These retreats are greenhouses for new work with every new play that LAByrinth produces first being presented at the Summer Intensive.

The relationship between LAByrinth and Bennington began when Bennington drama faculty member Dina Janis invited New York playwrights to lend their plays-in-progress to a Bennington acting class called New Works Ensemble. “Working with living, breathing playwrights would help the students feel a sense of obligation that’s really healthy, I thought” says Janis. The relationship grew when the playwrights encouraged students to contact them throughout the term and later came up to Vermont to see their works interpreted.

“Bennington is deeply honored that the members of LAByrinth, an organization of incredible artistic merit and accomplishment, has recognized the College with The Dave Hoghe Award,” said President Elizabeth Coleman. “We are absolutely thrilled.”

The Dave Hoghe Award will open this year’s highly anticipated, annual Celebrity Charades Benefit which brings together a star-studded cast of characters including actors Billy Crudup, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Richard Kind, Julianna Margulies, Christopher Meloni, Tim Blake Nelson, John Oritz, Cythia Rawley, and George Wendth, among others to compete in three rounds of charades over the course of 90 minutes.