Mary Eliott is a UK theater director who has won numerous national and international awards for her successful theatrical performances.
Biography
Mary Elliott was born on December 27, 1966 in London.
Father - Michael Eliott, British theater and television director, founder and director of the Royal Exchange Theater in Manchester.
Mother - actress Rosalind Knight, granddaughter of the famous English actor Esmond Knight, hero of the Second World War.
The Eliott family moved from London to Manchester when Mary was 8 years old. Mary's education took place in Aldery Edge, Cheshire, England, at St Hilary's School, a private day school for girls aged 2-18, combining kindergarten, elementary and secondary education functions.
After graduating from high school, Mary Elliott continued her education at Stockport Gymnasium - the second best school in the north of England after Lancaster Royal Grammar School.
Despite the fact that since childhood Mary hated everything connected with the theater, she studied dramatic art at the University of Hull - a state research university at Kingston Upton Hall, in the East Riding of Yorkshire. Fleeing from theater lectures, Mary often attended lectures on the history of England, finding them more interesting.
Mary's father died while the girl was still a teenager. According to Mary herself, she would never have connected her life with the theater if her father was alive. The fact is that Mary's father was such a good director that her daughter would never have come out of her parent's shadow.
Mary Elliott made the decision to become a director at the age of 20, 10 years after her father's death.
In 2002, Mary married actor Nicky Siddi. The couple have a daughter.
Career and creativity
After graduating from university, the young lady did not immediately go to work in the theater. She worked as casting director and television secretary at ITV Granada, then as assistant director at Regent's Park. It was the last position that pushed her towards a theatrical career.
In 1995, Mary joined the Royal Exchange Theater. The one in which her father was the founder and artistic director for many years.
One of Mary's first mentors was Greg Hersov, a British theater director who graduated from Bryanston School and Mansfield College, Oxford. During his 10 years of work under his leadership, he has had a great influence on Mary.
Greg Hersov, with the participation of Mary Elliott, directed two of his most outstanding works: As You Like It (2000) and the world premiere of the English playwright Simon Stevens "Port". The Portal Script debuted in 2002 and won the theater a Pearson Award, and the lead actor Andrew Sheridan a Men Award.
Greg Hersow and Mary taught the Young Writers program at the Royal Court Theater for many years, then worked as artistic directors of the Hammersmith Lyric Theater.
In the United States, plays by Harper Regan, Motortown, Weswater and Birdland have been staged at the Steep Theater Company in Chicago.
Mary Elliott's compositions, co-written by her with Greg, are widely performed throughout Europe. Together with the works of Dennis Kelly and Martin Krimp, they are considered the most popular English-speaking writers in Germany.
In 2002, Mary Eliott was invited by English theater director and producer Nicholas Heathner to London's National Theater. According to Eliot, Hitner valued her talent more than his own.
As a director, Mary made her debut on the stage of the National Theater with the production of Pillars of Society based on the work of the same name by Ibsen.
The success of Pillars of Society led to Mary being invited to work on a production of Saint Joan with Anne-Marie Duff in the title role. For her work on this project, Mary Elliott received the 2008 Olivier Revival Award.
When Nicholas Hitner became artistic director of the National Theater, he made Mary Elliott his deputy.
Mary has directed a series of important, influential and successful theatrical productions, including The War Horse and The Curious Case of the Dog at Night.
Eliot left the National Theater in 2017 to work on another project.
In 2016, Mary Eliott formed Eliott & Harper Productions with theater producer Chris Harper. Their first production was Simon Stevens' drama Heisenberg in the West End at the Wyndham Theater in 2017. In this production, for the first time in the history of English theater, Mary Eliot played the role of a bobby policeman.
In 2018, Eliott & Harper co-produced Angels in America at the National Broadway Theater. Angels in America is a gay fantasy with national themes starring Andrew Garfield, Nathan Lane and Russell Tovey.
In September 2018, Eliott & Harper opened the Gielgud Theater. Its leadership includes Rosalie Craig and Patti LuPone. The premiere of the new adaptation of "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" took place on the stage of this theater. On January 27, 2018, the theater became known as the West Yorkshire Theater or West Yorkshire Playhouse.
British playwright Simon Stevens speaks highly of Mary Eliot as a theater director. Mary Elliott, actress Anne-Marie Duff and designer Bunny Christie are the team behind Curious Nighttime Dog Incident, which won a record seven Oliviers awards and staged 800 shows on Broadway.
Awards
In 2011, Mary Elliott won the Tony Award for Best Director in War Horse. The prize was awarded after the premiere of the play on Broadway in New York in 2011, despite the fact that the same production made its debut in London back in 2007.
In 2013, Mary won the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Director for A Curious Case of a Dog at Night, which debuted in London in 2011 and on Broadway in 2014.
In 2015, the same production earned Elliott another Tony Award for Best Director for an Opera. The play also earned the actor Alex Sharpe a Tony Award for Best Actor.
Mary Elliott has won Best Director in London and The Evening Standard Thetre twice: first in 2006 for Pillars of Society, and second in 2018 for directing Stephen Sondheim's band at Gielgud.
On December 27, 2018, Mary Elliott's birthday, she was named an Officer of the Order of the British Empire for her service to the theater.
