Culture
Prudence Wright Holmes to Perform ‘Call Me William’
< < Back to prudence-wright-holmes-to-perform-call-me-william-the-life-and-loves-of-willa-catherActor/author Prudence Wright Holmes will perform her one-woman show, Call Me William, the Life and Loves of Willa Cather one night only, Oct. 6 at 7:30 p.m. at The Black Box Theater at The Ohio State University at Newark.
This event is open to the public and a donation of $5, toiletries or canned good is appreciated. Proceeds will benefit the Center for New Beginnings.
Willa Cather dared to dress like a man in a small Nebraska town in the late 1880s and was almost expelled from The University of Nebraska for her love affair with another woman. She went on to have a successful career in publishing, wrote best-selling novels like My Antonia and Death Comes for the Archbishop, and won a Pulitzer Prize for Literature for her novel One of Ours in 1923. In spite of her achievements, her personal life was fraught with conflict. Ultimately, Cather’s work became her refuge and helped her to transcend the problems that beset her.
Prudence Wright Holmes is the author of the plays Call Me William; Mrs. Lincoln’s Dressmaker; The Secret Servant; Duncan and Vanessa; Leave the Drama on Fire Island; Beat Chick, which was produced by the Workshop Theatre; and Bexley, OH!, which was produced by New York Theatre Workshop.
She also wrote Monologue Mastery (Applause Books), The Voice and Speech Warm Up and Workout (Drama Book Publishers) and Voices of Thinking Jewish Women (Biblio Press).
As an actor, she has appeared in featured roles in the films Sister Act I and II with Whoopi Goldberg, Kingpin with Woody Harrelson, In Dreams with Annette Bening, My Own Love Song with Renee Zellweger, After Life with Liam Neeson, God’s Pocket with Philip Seymour Hoffman and Boardwalk Empire with Steve Buscemi.
On Broadway she appeared in Happy End with Meryl Streep, Lettice and Lovage with Maggie Smith and Inherit the Wind with George C. Scott and The Light in the Piazza at Lincoln Center and on the National Tour.
She has appeared in numerous off-Broadway shows including the original casts of Godspell and Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You. She wrote and performed her solo show Bexley, OH! at New York Theatre Workshop.
The Black Box Theater is located in LeFevre Hall on the shared campus of Ohio State Newark and Central Ohio Technical College (COTC), 1199 University Drive, Newark, OH 43055.