ABOUT THIS ARTIST
On stage, Mr. Owens recently appeared on Broadway in Romeo and Juliet (with Orlando Bloom). Other credits include Oscar Wilde’s Salome (with Al Pacino), the Chicago premiere of David Mamet’s Race (at the Goodman Theatre), Opus and As You Like It (as ‘Jaques’) at Two River Theatre, and Julius Caesar (as ‘Casca’) at the Shakespeare Theater Company in Washington, D.C. Most recently, he has appeared at CSC Rep in Mother Courage (directed by Brian Kulick) and Doctor Faustus (directed by Andre Belgrader). He has done roles—including Romeo, Richard the Third, Othello and Puck—at numerous theaters (including the New York Shakespeare Festival, the Long Wharf Theater, the Hartford Stage Company, and the Williamstown Theater Festival) with directors such as Joseph Papp, David Leveaux, A.J. Antoon, James Lapine, Mark Lamos, Joe Dowling, Derek Anson Jones, Jonathon Moscone, Michael Sexton, and Estelle Parsons.
On film, Mr. Owens has appeared in Wilde Salome (directed by Al Pacino), Stonebrook (with Seth Green), The Paper (directed by Ron Howard), Play the Game (with Andy Griffith), and Dreams. He will also appear in the soon-to-be-released Youth in Oregon (with Frank Langella). His television credits include “The Cosby Show” and “Built to Last”, as well as appearances on “The Slap”, “The Leftovers”, “The Affair”, “Deadbeat”, “Without a Trace”, “Boston Legal”, “Medium”, “Journeyman”, “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia”, “Las Vegas”, “The Wedding Bells”, “Law and Order”, “Law and Order: SVU”, “The Guiding Light”, “That’s So Raven”, “The Secret Life of the American Teenager”, “Flash Forward”, and “Friends of the People”. He has recently been seen as ‘Gerald’ on HBO’s “Divorce” and on episodes of “Bluebloods” and “Lucifer.
As a director, Owens has staged productions of King Lear, Much Ado About Nothing, The Taming of the Shrew, Richard III, As You Like It, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, and Tartuffe, as well as one-act plays by Chekhov, Overruled by Shaw, Mamet’s American Buffalo, Athol Fugard’s Statements Made After an Arrest Under the Immorality Act and William Mastrosimone’s Tamer of Horses. In Los Angeles, he directed Macbeth for the Circus Theatricals Theatre Company and co-directed (with Lee M. Cohn) the popular show Inside Private Lives. He recently directed a 21-member cast in Irwin Shaw’s Bury the Dead at the HB Playwrights Foundation, Linda Means To Wait (by and starring Linda Sithole) for the New York Fringe Festival, and Henry VI, Part II at the NYU Tisch School. He recently directed Kristen Greenidge’s play The Luck of the Irish at Fordham University.
As well as developing and leading a private weekly Shakespeare workshop, Mr. Owens has taught Shakespeare and Acting at the Herbert Berghof (HB) Studio, Columbia University, Yale University, the Gene Frankel Studio, the FSU/Asolo Conservatory for Actor Training, the Adult School of Montclair, and Pace University (where he taught Shakespeare and Modern Drama). He has also worked as a guest teacher at Two River Theatre, Bergen County Community College, Montclair High School, the Cicely Tyson School for the Arts, the Plainfield Academy of the Arts, the Savannah Arts Academy, and Shorter University. He is the founder and artistic director of The Brooklyn Shakespeare Company and is the recipient of the BACA Brooklyn Bridge Award and the Danny Kaye Award. He studied acting with Uta Hagen, Nikos Psacharapoulos, Austin Pendleton, and Bart Teush. For most of the past 25 years, he has served as a semi-finalists judge of the National Shakespeare Competition at Lincoln Center.
PUBLISHED BOOK #1, " 'TWAS HALLOWEEN NIGHT ",
NOW AVAILABLE EVERYWHERE!
This is a Halloween story (in rhyming verse) in which a seven-year-old bi-racial girl goes on an exciting adventure and discovers the value of sharing and friendship.
Parents/guardians/teachers can read it to kids as young as four or five. And older kids (6 - 11) can enjoy reading it by themselves. “With sweet artwork and a moral point about sharing, ‘Twas Halloween Night’ is a seasonal book that children will want to read all year round.”
-- Steven Leslie Johnson, Minister
“’Twas Halloween Night’ is likely to become part of the annual tradition of many families, and a marvelous gift to share with young readers who will enjoy it year after year.”
-- Kimberley Cetron, Ph.D. Educator
“Brilliantly written, it juxtaposes the darkness of Halloween against the light of friendship, acceptance and kindness.”
-- Joy Gregory, M.Ed.
“The rhymes are clever… But more importantly, the main character, Jorlyn, learns to empathize with others, making the night more than just about the pursuit of candy.”
-- Bradley Detrick, Teleios Journal