Columbia College Chicago Theatre Department alum Anna D. Shapiro ’90, HDR ’15, winner of the 2008 Tony Award for Best Direction of a Play for the Broadway hit August: Osage County, is returning to Broadway as director of The Minutes, which begins previews April 2 at Studio 54 in New York City prior to a scheduled April 17 opening. Like August: Osage County, The Minutes is written by Tracy Letts, an ensemble member of Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre Company, where Shapiro is also a member and former artistic director. The cast includes Blair Brown, Jessie Mueller, Noah Reid (in his Broadway debut), Jeff Still, and Steppenwolf members Letts, Austin Pendleton, Sally Murphy, K. Todd Freeman, Cliff Chamberlain, and Shapiro’s husband Ian Barford. The Minutes previously played at Steppenwolf Theatre in 2017-2018. For tickets t0 the Broadway production, click here.

Anna D. Shapiro (Photo: Frank Ishman)

As previously reported in this blog, Shapiro, who received her BA degree from Columbia College in 1990, was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Arts from the college in 2015 when she spoke at that year’s commencement ceremony.

Tony Award-winning director and Columbia College alum Anna D. Shapiro ’90, HDR ’15, and Columbia College Chicago President Kwang-Wu Kim at the Columbia College Theatre Reunion Oct. 20, 2018, at the Getz Theater Center. (Photo: Jonathan Mathias ’10)

When the Columbia College Theatre Department held its first-ever Theatre Alumni Reunion in October 2018, she was a featured speaker at the event.