Ellen Maddow on Indie Theater Now

Ellen Maddow was born in Los Angeles to a screenwriter and a modern dancer. She attended Hollywood High and received a BA in theatre from Antioch College. She has been working in the theatre in New York as a writer, composer, and performer for forty years. Most of that time has been spent with theater companies that create new works. A former member of the Open Theatre, she is a founding member of the Talking Band. Works she has written include: The Peripherals, Panic! Euphoria! Blackout, Flip Side (published in Plays and Playwrights 2010), Delicious Rivers, Painted Snake in a Painted Chair, The Necklace, (Episodes 3 And 7), Tilt, Brown Dog Is Dead, Fern And Rose, and five pieces about the avant-garde housewife, Betty Suffer. In addition to writing music for most of the works above, she wrote the scores for the Talking Band’s production of The Walk Across America For Mother Earth (by Taylor Mac), New Islands Archipelago, Radnevsky's Real Magic, Imminence (with Peter Gordon), Belize, The Parrot, Black Milk, The Plumbers Helper, New Cities, and Star Messengers. She also composed music for Liz Duffy Adams’ play, The Buccaneer, commissioned by The Children’s Theatre Company of Minneapolis.

Ellen is the recipient of an OBIE Award, a McKnight Playwriting Fellowship, the Frederick Loewe Award in Musical Theatre, and a NYFA Playwriting Fellowship. She was a participant in the NEA/TCG Theatre Residency Program for Playwrights, and received a NYTheatre.com People of the Year Award. She is an alumnus of New Dramatists.