lee phenner

Lee Phenner is a playwright, book writer, lyricist, and voice actor. An Oregon Shakespeare Festival Black Swan Lab writer for A Pint of Understanding (music by Joel LaRue Smith and Joseph Smith), works include the dramatic monologue Synaptic Fires produced by Brave New World Rep, screenplay Celia Now and Then (quarterfinalist, MORE Women in Film Screenplay Contest,) and the concept and text of “Circle of the First,” a choral work with music by Robert D. Terrio.  Lee holds an MFA in creative writing from Emerson College where she received Duprey awards for screenwriting and poetry and was selected for the Ploughshares International Fiction Seminar at Kasteel Well, Netherlands. She is a member of StageSource, New Play Exchange, Honor Roll, and an associate member of the Dramatists Guild of America.

WEBSITE AND SOCIAL MEDIA
Website: https://pintmusical.com/
Instagram: @leephenner
Facebook: @lee.phenner
Twitter: @leephenner
LinkedIn: @leephenner

MORE ABOUT ME
The production that changed my life was Sunday in the Park with George (original Broadway cast). Sondheim accelerated his trajectory of weaving exceptional lyrics with inventive yet inevitable music, and with James Lapine’s book and direction, explored themes including artistic vision and “seeing" (which remains a fixation of mine), the business of art, passion and commitment, and connection in ways that still move me to tears. 

WHAT I'M WORKING ON
A Pint of Understanding - a musical (book & lyrics) Music by Joel LaRue Smith and Joseph Smith. Summary: It’s 2012 — a pivot point, with racial tensions in America escalating and about to explode. When white police officer Tim O’Connor arrests African American scholar Chester Washington III while investigating an alleged burglary at his home, two very different stories emerge, and the media erupts. The U.S. president invites them to have a beer at the White House and tasks them with leading a national listening tour about race in America. The professor’s daughter, Chloe Washington, films the tour, and she, Tim and Chester prove to be a radioactive trio as they question their very identities and their worldviews — and their lives — are put on the line. A jazz-inspired multi-genre score drives this examination of racism, white supremacy, individual perspectives, collective blindspots — and hope.

KEYWORDS
​political, social, social justice, racism, racial justice, equity, diverse, diversity, white supremacy, white privilege, unconscious bias, implicit bias, musical, intergenerational, lesbian, queer