Guest Artist Series
Anna Deveare Smith
Actress, Playwright, Teacher, Author
and Pioneer in Documentary Theater
In Conversation with Ken Marks
Monday, December 7, 2026 – 7:00pm
Houghton Hall, 22 East 30th Street, Jefferson Studio
Acclaimed actor, playwright, teacher, and author Anna Deveare Smith joins Ken Marks and members of The Actors Center on Monday, December 7, 2026 at 7:00pm for an intimate evening of conversation exploring Anna’s creative process, her groundbreaking documentary theater work, and her legacy of activism through art.
The conversation will be followed by discussion and Q&A and will take place at Houghton Hall, 22 East 30th Street, in the Jefferson Studio. The event is free and open to the public by advance reservation.
Anna Deavere Smith is credited with having created a new form of theater. Her plays using the methodology of that form focused on contemporary issues, were composed of interview excerpts and represented multiple points of view. President Obama awarded Smith the National Endowment for the Humanities Medal. Other awards include the MacArthur Fellowship, several Obie awards, the George Polk Award in Journalism, the Dean’s Medal from Stanford University School of Medicine, runner-up for the Pulitzer Prize, two Tony nominations. Plays and films based on them include Fires in the Mirror, Twilight: Los Angeles, Let Me Down Easy, and Notes from the Field. Her play “This Ghost of Slavery” was written for The Atlantic. Acting for popular culture media includes: The West Wing, Nurse Jackie, Black-ish. Philadelphia, The American President, Rachel Getting Married, For the People, and Inventing Anna. Forthcoming are Netflix series The Boroughs (Fall 2026) and feature film Pendulum. She is currently a University Professor at NYU Tisch, and was an Eastman Professor at Oxford in 2023.
Hosting Anna in conversation is Ken Marks, award-winning actor and member of The Actors Center’s Resident Company. Ken made his Broadway debut in the Tony Award–winning Dancing at Lughnasa and went on to originate Bill Austin in Mamma Mia!, play the final Wilbur Turnblad in Hairspray, and spend three and a half years as Uncle Ben in Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. Other Broadway credits include Dead Outlaw, Present Laughter, Spring Awakening, Rock ’n’ Roll, and Airline Highway. Off-Broadway, he created the role of Charlie in Bethany, written by his wife, Laura Marks, and has appeared at the Public Theater in Suzan-Lori Parks’s Father Comes Home From the Wars and Tony Kushner’s A Bright Room Called Day, as well as in David Cromer’s acclaimed Our Town. He has played leading roles at theaters across the country, including the Mark Taper Forum, Yale Rep, and ART. His honors include a Drama Desk Award, a Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Award, and the Charles Bowden Award from New Dramatists. Television includes The Tick, Elementary, The Exorcist, The Good Wife, and Billions; films include Side Effects and The Wackness. He holds an MFA from the Yale School of Drama.