ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT

Lynn Nottage is a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and a screenwriter. She is the first female playwright to win the Pulitzer for Drama twice. Her plays have been produced widely in the United States, four times at Unicorn, and throughout the world. They include By The Way, Meet Vera Stark (Lily Award, Drama Desk Nomination), Ruined (Pulitzer Prize, OBIE, Lucille Lortel, New York Drama Critics’ Circle, Audelco, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle Award), Intimate Apparel (American Theatre Critics and New York Drama Critics’ Circle Awards for Best Play), Fabulation, or The Re-Education of Undine (OBIE Award), Crumbs from the Table of Joy, Las Meninas, Mud, River, Stone, Por’knockers and POOF!. She is currently developing a new play and multimedia performance installation based on two years of research and interviews conducted in Reading, PA. (w/ Oregon Shakespeare, Arena Stage & Labyrinth Theatre Company). In addition, she is working with composer Ricky Ian Gordon on adapting her play Intimate Apparel into an opera (commissioned by The Met/LCT).

Nottage is the recipient of a MacArthur "Genius Grant" Fellowship, Steinberg "Mimi" Distinguished Playwright Award, the Dramatists Guild Hull-Warriner Award, the inaugural Horton Foote Prize, Lilly Award, Helen Hayes Award, the Lee Reynolds Award, and the Jewish World Watch iWitness Award. Her other honors include the National Black Theatre Fest's August Wilson Playwriting Award, a Guggenheim Grant, PEN/Laura Pels Award, Lucille Lortel Fellowship and Visiting Research Fellowship at Princeton University. She is a graduate of Brown University and the Yale School of Drama, where she has been a faculty member since 2001. She is also an Associate Professor at Columbia School of the Arts.

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ABOUT MICHAEL GONZALES

Through consulting and speaking engagements Michael A. Gonzales helps corporations, non-profits and educational institutions realize the business imperative and/or take their diversity, inclusion & equity efforts to the next level in the areas of marketplace, workforce, workplace and community. At Hallmark Michael was responsible for it’s Corporate Diversity & Inclusion’s strategies and direction, Diversity & Inclusion’s, (D&I’s) internal and external collaborations, partnerships, support and compliance. Michael sustained the relevance of the company’s D&I business case while overseeing the company’s seven Employee Resource Groups, (ERG’s). He’s skilled in the areas of building critical relations, innovation and resourcing, business collaboration, employee relations, diverse and cultural understandings, compliance metrics and program management.

History and portfolio involvement include; board positions that reflect progress against an aggressive and iterative scorecards. Michael saw a need for D&I collaborative thought and best practice and so co-founded the Diversity & Inclusion Consortium, which grew from three members to over 200 in five years. He’s partnered in creating a Hispanic college student mentoring program. Michael was responsible for the creation of Hallmark’s Center for Diversity & Inclusion. He also was the project lead for Hallmark’s first summit on Diversity & Inclusion. He is a frequent resource to fellow D&I and Human Resource professionals from the business, non-profits and higher education communities on topics of Diversity & Inclusion and ERG’s.

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