NEA Big Read: The Onassis Foundation and The Center for Fiction Present Become a Monster, a God and a Hero with Live from Mount Olympus

Sunday, 11:00 am EDT May 19, 2024

The Center for Fiction

As part of our 2024 NEA Big Read of Circe, The Center for Fiction is partnering with the Onassis Foundation on two workshops for kids, ages 10–12, based on the award-winning adventure podcast Live From Mount Olympus. Here’s what’s in store:

11:00–12:30pm Acting Workshop: Cast members of Live from Mount Olympus, including Libby King, Sean Carvajal, and Nedra Marie Taylor, will lead a highly interactive session that will get kids on their feet and let them morph into their own mythical characters.
12:30–1:00pm: Lunch Break
1:00–1:45pm: Writing Workshop: Explore the art of bringing mythological characters to life and writing for the ear with Julie Burstein, the creator and showrunner of Live From Mount Olympus, and Nathan Yungerberg, head writer on the show.

Parents/guardians: you are welcome to stay in the auditorium and observe the workshop(s), read in our upstairs members’ lounge, or shop in the bookstore. We request that you stay in the building for the duration of the workshop(s).

About Live from Mount Olympus

Award-winning podcast “Live from Mount Olympus” weaves timeless Greek myths with the artistry of foremost contemporary theater-makers and the imaginative power of audio. “Live from Mount Olympus” is an adventure for tweens and listeners of all ages and is available free on-demand on all major podcast platforms. The podcast just launched its fourth season, “Prometheus” on April 9th!

Peabody Award-winning showrunner Julie Burstein created the series, which is directed by Tony Award-winner Rachel Chavkin (“Lempika,” “Hadestown”), Zhailon Levingston (“Tina: The Tina Turner Musical,” “Chicken and Biscuits”), and Keenan Tyler Oliphant (“Hadestown,” “The Broken Ear Setlist”). Tony-, Emmy-, and Grammy-Award winner André De Shields (Hadestown, the Wiz) returns as Hermes, host of this “GodsPod,” to tell the story of an unlikely friendship between Zeus and the young Titan Prometheus, played by Ato Blankson-Wood (Cabaret, Hamlet, Slave Play). New episodes of Live from Mount Olympus: Prometheus will drop every Tuesday until May 7, consisting of five episodes, and resume for part two in October 2024.

Featuring

Libby King

Libby King

Libby King is a queer theater artist, actor, writer, mom, and, recently, professor. Libby teaches acting and devised theater at the University of Washington, and splits her time between Seattle and Brooklyn. Libby has been a member of The TEAM since 2006.
Sean Carvajal

Sean Carvajal

Sean Carvajal’s acting credits including the following productions. Broadway: King Lear, American Buffalo. Off-Broadway: Richard II; Halfway Bitches Go Straight to Heaven, Tell Hector I Miss Him; Jesus Hopped the ‘A’ Train (Lucille Lortel, Obie, Drama Desk, Clarence-Derwent Awards); Seven Spots on the Sun; Ghetto Babylon, Lissabon. Regional: Water by The Spoonful, Seven Spots on the Sun, Between Riverside and Crazy. TV: New Amsterdam; Crashing. Film: Red, White, and Water.
Nedra Marie Taylor

Nedra Marie Taylor

Nedra Marie Taylor recently starred as a series regular in the second season of the Apple TV+ sci-fi series, Invasion. Nedra’s television credits include recurring and guest starring roles in Orange is The New Black, NCIS: New Orleans, HBO’s Random Acts of Flyness, Instinct, Netflix/Marvel’s Jessica Jones, Evil, Bull, Elementary, Blue Bloods, Law & Order: SVU, 30 Rock, and more. With a theater career in New York City spanning 20 years, Nedra’s Broadway credits include The Book of Mormon and Marvin’s Room. Off-Broadway includes Adam Bock’s A Life and Anne Washburn’s Mr. Burns at Playwrights Horizons, The Underlying Chris (Second Stage), The House That Will Not Stand (New York Theatre Workshop) and Lost Lake (Manhattan Theater Club). Please visit nedramarietaylor.com and @nedramarietaylor to learn more.
Julie Burstein

Julie Burstein

Julie Burstein is a Peabody Award-winning audio producer and author who has spent her life working with creative people and cultural institutions—probing, guiding, and creating live events and audio programs about them and their work. In her book Spark: How Creativity Works, she maps out some of the coordinates of creativity in a way that can help us find more of that dimension within ourselves, and put it to good use. Her TED talk, “4 Lessons in Creativity,” has been viewed more than 2 million times. In 2000, Julie created public radio’s premiere arts program Studio 360 with Kurt Andersen.

Julie has loved creating Live from Mount Olympus with this remarkable creative team! The show has special resonance because she first learned how to craft engaging stories while listening to her parents read D’Aulaires’ Book of Greek Myths to her when she was growing up. Her well-loved childhood copy is on her desk right now.
Nathan Yungerberg

Nathan Yungerberg

Nathan Yungerberg is a versatile storyteller and Afrosurrealist, skilled in writing for TV, scripted podcasts, and theater. He serves as a freelance writer for Sesame Street and the head writer for the podcast Live from Mount Olympus, co-directed by Rachel Chavkin. Nathan’s plays have been showcased and developed by various prestigious theater institutions, including The Cherry Lane Theatre, JAG Productions, and Alliance Theatre, among others. He has received several honors and fellowships for his outstanding work in playwriting and storytelling.

About Our Partners

The Onassis Foundation, established by Aristotle Onassis in 1975, is dedicated to creating the conditions, exploring the ideas, and sparking the discussions that lead to a better society. Based in Athens, the Foundation promotes Greek culture worldwide, focusing on culture, healthcare, and education. The Onassis Foundation has awarded more than 7,500 scholarships to young people worldwide since the late ’70s and presents countless cultural events each year. Likewise, the Onassis National Transplant Center and the Onassis Cardiac Surgery Center advance healthcare access in Athens. Through programs like Onassis AiR, the Foundation supports artistic research, while Onassis Culture, centered around Onassis Stegi, encourages dialogue on social issues. Stegi Radio and the Onassis YouTube Channel serve as platforms for cultural exchange and exploration. In the US, the Onassis Foundation supports cultural programming across various art forms and creative endeavors. Onassis USA, based in New York, includes Onassis ONX for Extended Reality, a joint initiative between Onassis USA and New Museum’s NEW INC: an accelerator, a subsidized workspace, and an exhibition gallery located in the Onassis Gallery of Olympic Tower in Manhattan.

Founded in 2004, the TEAM is a Brooklyn-based experimental theater collective spirited by some of the wildest and deepest artists working today. Once described by The Guardian as “theatrical excavators of American culture, American dreams, and the American psyche,” the TEAM collaboratively creates new works about the experience of living in the United States today to generate dialogue about our nation’s past, present, and future through production and touring. They believe how they make is as important as what they make, and their producing practices strive to embody values of collective liberation. Over the years, the award winning theater collective has produced 12 original works, which have been showcased in various venues across the United States and internationally, including Public Theater in NYC, PS122, National Theater, Barbican, Hong Kong Arts Festival and many more. Currently, the TEAM is involved in supporting six new works through its Petri Projects lab and is developing “Reconstructing (Still Working but the Devil Might Be Inside),” a new piece exploring intimacy between Black, POC, and white artists navigating the legacy of slavery. https://theteamplays.org/