Director Jerry Lesch
Jerry was last seen as George in David Mamet's The Duck
Variations at
IFCC. For Mt. Hood Rep he was Roy Bensinger in 2005's
The Front Page, Anthony Kirby, Sr. in 2004's
You Can't Take It With You,
Senator Hedges in Born Yesterday,
Uncle Silas in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
(also at NW Children's Theatre),
in Our Town as Dr. Gibbs, and as
James Thurber in A Thurber Carnival.
He also appeared (was heard) in several Sunday Night by the Philco
productions. Jerry serves on the Board of Directors of Mt. Hood Repertory
Theatre Company.
About The Playwright
Brian Friel was born in Omagh, County Tyrone
(Northern Ireland) on January 9, 1929. Widely acknowleged as one of Ireland's most prominent
playwrights, Friel has also written short stories; screenplays; film, TV and Radio
adaptations of his plays; and several pieces of non-fiction on the role of
theatre and the artist.
Friel's father was a native of Derry and a primary school principal. His
mother was a school teacher from Donegal and Friel spent many holidays there.
In 1939 the family moved to Derry, where Friel's father had a teaching position
at the Long Tower school. Friel attended the
Republic of Ireland's national seminary, Saint Patrick's College, near
Dublin but instead of going on to the priesthood, he took a post-graduate
teaching course in Belfast. He started teaching in Derry in 1950 and wrote in
the meantime. His first radio play A Sort of Freedom aired on BBC in
1958. In 1959 his first short story, "The Skelper," appeared in the New Yorker
and his first stage play, The Francophile, was performed at the Group
Theatre, Belfast. In 1960 he retired from teaching to write full-time.
Friel's early life had a strong influence on his writing. Though his
father was a teacher, his grandparents, whose first language was Irish, were
illiterate peasants from County Donegal whose first language was Irish.
Thus his own family exemplifies the divisions between traditional and modern
Ulster and Ireland, a recurring theme for Friel.
Friel was awarded an honorary doctorate by Rosary College in Chicago,
Illinois in 1974; in 1989, BBC Radio devoted a six-play season to his work,
the first living playwright to be so distinguished. Friel received a lifetime
achievement award from the Irish Times in 1999. He is a member of the
American Academy of Arts and Letters, the British Royal Society of Literature
and the Irish Academy of Letters.
Friel co-founded (together with Stephen Rea, Tom Paulin, Seamus Heaney and
Seamus Deane) the Field Day Theatre Company, where many of his pieces premiered.
Friel continues to live in Donegal, which he moved to from Derry in 1967
"partly to get into the
countryside and partly to get into the Republic."
Sources:
Wikipedia
Emory University
Umea University
Director Jerry Lesch
