Arizona artistic director to lead new play projects at Florida Studio Theatre
Sean Daniels, the artistic director of Arizona Theatre Company in Phoenix since 2019, will join Sarasota’s Florida Studio Theatre as associate director next spring and leading a new effort focused on addiction and recovery.
Richard Hopkins, producing artistic director of FST, said Daniels will be a resident director on all five of the company’s stages, and will help launch The Recovery Project, which intends to use new plays, theater education and outreach to end the stigma of addiction and recovery issues.
In a statement, Daniels describes himself as “a person in long-term recovery and an arts leader, I know that telling stories, changing hearts and minds and creating empathy is what our art form does best. It’s time to use all of these tools to change the narrative around a disease that kills someone every five minutes. This is where I want to be spending my time.”
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Daniels “brings three decades of professional experience and excellent proven skills as a director, playwright, play developer and fundraiser,” Hopkins said in a statement. “He knows how to lead; he knows how to follow; and most importantly, he knows how to collaborate.”
In Sarasota, he will also oversee the FST’s New Play Development program and the Stage III series, which focuses on more provocative work than the company’s mainstage productions.
Hopkins said the theater’s commitment to new work has grown in the last few years through a number of commissions. “We need someone with Sean’s experience and energy to take our program to the next level,” he said.
Daniels has directed productions at the Manhattan Theatre Club, The Kennedy Center, Cleveland Playhouse, Milwaukee Rep, Long Wharf and Alliance theaters. He was also co-founder and artistic director of Dad’s Garage, the Atlanta-based theater company known for its improv shows that have been featured regularly at FST’s Sarasota Improv Festival.
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Daniels also is the author of the play “The White Chip,” about a stage director battling alcoholism, which has been staged off-Broadway and at theaters around the country.
Daniels said Hopkins’ “offer to not only invest in a community, but to create new work that will address the public health crisis of addiction was a once in a lifetime opportunity to do everything I love.”
He will move to Sarasota next spring with his wife, actor Veronika Duerr and daughter, Vivien.
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This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Arizona director to join Florida Studio Theatre
