Matthew Spangler
Encyclopedia
Matthew Spangler is an American playwright and director.
(staged reading), the National Steinbeck Center, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and the Avignon Theatre Festival. He has written fourteen plays, but is best-known for his adaptation of Khaled Hosseini
’s novel The Kite Runner
, which received five San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Awards: Best Original Script, Best Overall Production for a 300+ seat theatre, as well as awards for Lighting Design, Set Design, and Sound Design.
His other plays include one-person shows of James Joyce
’s Dubliners
and Finnegans Wake
; A Paradise It Seems, an adaptation of John Cheever
’s short stories; Mozart!, a musical theatre adaptation of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
’s letters, and stage adaptations of John Steinbeck
’s fiction, Ernest Hemingway
’s short stories, Thomas Wolfe
’s The Lost Boy, Clyde Edgerton
’s Where Trouble Sleeps, and T.C. Boyle’s Tortilla Curtain.
Some of Spangler’s recent directing credits include an adaptation of T.C. Boyle’s short story “Killing Babies” for Word for Word Performing Arts Company at the Z Space in San Francisco; Martin McDonagh’s The Lieutenant of Inishmore for San José State University; Judy’s Veramendi’s The Empty Chalices, a play based on the writing of Uruguayan poet Delmira Augustini, which he co-directed at the Next Theatre in Evanston, Illinois; and David Mamet’s Glengarry Glen Ross for the San Jose Stage Company.
From 1999 to 2005, Spangler was Artistic Director of Wordshed Productions, a not-for-profit theatre company in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, dedicated to presenting adaptations of literature, oral histories, and intercultural performances. During his time with Wordshed, the company received several year-end critics’ awards for its performances, and Spangler was a finalist for the Triangle Theatre Artist of the Year Award in 2002.
, The Biographical Dictionary of Southern Writers, The Art of Elizabeth Bishop, and Performing the Crossroads: Critical Essays in Performance Studies and Irish Culture.
in Northern California.
Body of Work
Matthew Spangler's plays have been performed by the San Jose Repertory Theatre, Arizona Theatre Company, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Cleveland Playhouse, La Jolla PlayhouseLa Jolla Playhouse
La Jolla Playhouse is a not-for-profit, professional theatre-in-residence on the campus of the University of California, San Diego. -Background:...
(staged reading), the National Steinbeck Center, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and the Avignon Theatre Festival. He has written fourteen plays, but is best-known for his adaptation of Khaled Hosseini
Khaled Hosseini
Khaled Hosseini , is an Afghan-born American novelist and physician of ethnic Tajik origin. He is a citizen of the United States where he has lived since he was fifteen years old. His 2003 debut novel, The Kite Runner, was an international bestseller, selling more than 12 million copies worldwide....
’s novel The Kite Runner
The Kite Runner
The Kite Runner is a novel by Khaled Hosseini. Published in 2003 by Riverhead Books, it is Hosseini's first novel, and was adapted into a film of the same name in 2007....
, which received five San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Awards: Best Original Script, Best Overall Production for a 300+ seat theatre, as well as awards for Lighting Design, Set Design, and Sound Design.
His other plays include one-person shows of James Joyce
James Joyce
James Augustine Aloysius Joyce was an Irish novelist and poet, considered to be one of the most influential writers in the modernist avant-garde of the early 20th century...
’s Dubliners
Dubliners
Dubliners is a collection of 15 short stories by James Joyce, first published in 1914. They were meant to be a naturalistic depiction of Irish middle class life in and around Dublin in the early years of the 20th century....
and Finnegans Wake
Finnegans Wake
Finnegans Wake is a novel by Irish author James Joyce, significant for its experimental style and resulting reputation as one of the most difficult works of fiction in the English language. Written in Paris over a period of seventeen years, and published in 1939, two years before the author's...
; A Paradise It Seems, an adaptation of John Cheever
John Cheever
John William Cheever was an American novelist and short story writer. He is sometimes called "the Chekhov of the suburbs." His fiction is mostly set in the Upper East Side of Manhattan, the Westchester suburbs, old New England villages based on various South Shore towns around Quincy,...
’s short stories; Mozart!, a musical theatre adaptation of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
’s letters, and stage adaptations of John Steinbeck
John Steinbeck
John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. He is widely known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden and the novella Of Mice and Men...
’s fiction, Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American author and journalist. His economic and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the...
’s short stories, Thomas Wolfe
Thomas Wolfe
Thomas Clayton Wolfe was a major American novelist of the early 20th century.Wolfe wrote four lengthy novels, plus many short stories, dramatic works and novellas. He is known for mixing highly original, poetic, rhapsodic, and impressionistic prose with autobiographical writing...
’s The Lost Boy, Clyde Edgerton
Clyde Edgerton
Clyde Edgerton is an American author and English literature professor.Born in Durham, North Carolina, his books are known for endearing characters, small-town Southern dialogue and realistic fire and brimstone religious sermons...
’s Where Trouble Sleeps, and T.C. Boyle’s Tortilla Curtain.
Some of Spangler’s recent directing credits include an adaptation of T.C. Boyle’s short story “Killing Babies” for Word for Word Performing Arts Company at the Z Space in San Francisco; Martin McDonagh’s The Lieutenant of Inishmore for San José State University; Judy’s Veramendi’s The Empty Chalices, a play based on the writing of Uruguayan poet Delmira Augustini, which he co-directed at the Next Theatre in Evanston, Illinois; and David Mamet’s Glengarry Glen Ross for the San Jose Stage Company.
From 1999 to 2005, Spangler was Artistic Director of Wordshed Productions, a not-for-profit theatre company in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, dedicated to presenting adaptations of literature, oral histories, and intercultural performances. During his time with Wordshed, the company received several year-end critics’ awards for its performances, and Spangler was a finalist for the Triangle Theatre Artist of the Year Award in 2002.
Awards
2009 San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Awards: Best Original Script, Best Overall Production - The Kite RunnerEducation
Matthew Spangler holds a bachelor's degree from Northwestern University in Performance Studies, an M.Phil. in Theatre from Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland, and a Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.Author credits
Matthew Spangler's writing has been published in Theatre Journal, Text and Performance Quarterly, The James Joyce Quarterly, The New Hibernia Review, SIAR: The Journal of the Western Institute of Irish Studies, The South Atlantic ReviewSouth Atlantic Review
The South Atlantic Review is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal published by the South Atlantic Modern Language Association. It was established in 1935 and publishes articles and reviews in the fields of language and literature. Its editor-in-chief is Matthew Roudané....
, The Biographical Dictionary of Southern Writers, The Art of Elizabeth Bishop, and Performing the Crossroads: Critical Essays in Performance Studies and Irish Culture.
Current employment
Matthew Spangler is currently an Associate Professor of Performance Studies at San Jose State UniversitySan José State University
San Jose State University is a public university located in San Jose, California, United States...
in Northern California.