Oberlin's Women: A Legacy of Leadership & Activism

Julie Taymor

Julie Taymor (1952-present, OC 1974) is a playwright and stage and theater director. She was interested in theater from a young age. As a child, she joined the Boston Children’s Theatre and later took part in theater workshops during high school. After attending Jacque Lecoq’s mime school in Paris for one year, she enrolled at Oberlin College. While on campus, she joined the KRAKEN theater company. She graduated in 1974. That same year, Taymor received the Thomas J. Watson Foundation Fellowship and travelled abroad to study theater. Living in Bali, Indonesia under a Ford Foundation Foundation grant, Taymor founded Teatr Loh. Working with puppeteers, musicians, actors, and dancers from a wide range of backgrounds, she began developing her own work. Moving back to New York City in 1980, Taymor restaged many of her plays in the U.S. and began collaborating with composer Elliot Goldenthal. She also began to direct plays and films in the 1990s. In 1997, she was chosen to design the Broadway production of The Lion King. For her costume designs, Taymor won a Tony Award in 1998. She has received numerous awards for her work, including the Dorothy B. Chandler Performing Arts Award (1989), a Muse Award from the New York Women in Film & Televisions (2007), a Guggenheim fellowship for creative arts (1989), and a MacArthur fellowship (1991).

Sources:
Gardner, Elysa. “Julie Taymor on the Lasting Legacy of The Lion King.” Broadway Direct. November 6, 2017. https://broadwaydirect.com/julie-taymor-lasting-legacy-lion-king/

“Julie Taymor.” Encyclopaedia Britannica. Accessed June 25, 2020. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Julie-Taymor

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