Cliffe College of Creative Arts announces “An Evening with Austin Pendleton”

The YSU Cliffe College of Creative Arts will present “An Evening with Austin Pendleton” Thursday, February 10, 2022 at 7:00 PM in the YSU Ford Theater, located in YSU’s Bliss Hall.

"Cliffe College has been fortunate to nurture positive and impactful relationships with our arts and culture colleagues throughout the region. The college has also worked to bring artists, performers, and others of note to Youngstown State University. Welcoming Austin Pendleton to Bliss Hall for an event to benefit Trumbull New Theatre speaks to the importance of our continued collaborations with our greater arts and cultural community,” dean of Cliffe College of Creative Arts Phyllis Paul said. “Mr. Pendleton is a legendary stage and film professional who cultivated his love for the arts as a child here in the Valley. ‘An Evening with Austin Pendleton’ will be entertaining, informative and fun.”

Proceeds earned during the event will benefit Trumbull New Theatre, an organization Pendleton, a Warren, Ohio native, has supported his entire life as an actor, director, and patron of the arts.

"We so appreciate the generosity and kindness offered by the YSU Cliffe College of Creative Arts and Austin Pendleton to benefit Trumbull New Theatre. TNT is proud to call Austin's mother, Frances, a founder of our theatre. We look forward to continuing the mission set before us by sharing our passion for theatre and fostering that same fervor within our community for years to come," Trumbull New Theatre president Melanie Lucas said.

Pendleton is an actor, director, and playwright who was born in Warren, Ohio. He earned his high school diploma from The University School in Shaker Heights, Ohio and graduated from Yale University in 1961.

Pendleton has made hundreds of appearances in film and television. His television credits include “Homicide,” “Oz,” and “Law and Order,” with film credits including “A Beautiful Mind,” “Finding Dory,” “Finding Nemo,” “Christmas with the Kranks,” and “Amistad.”

Onstage in New York Pendleton has acted on Broadway in “Choir Boy,” “The Diary of Anne Frank,” and “Fiddler on the Roof” and in productions off-Broadway and off-off-Broadway.

As a director Pendleton has been represented by the premiere productions of “A Thousand Pines” by Matthew Greene; “Between Riverside and Crazy” by Stephen Adly Giurgis, which went on to win the Pulitzer Prize; “Fifty Words” by Michael Weller with Elizabeth Marvel and Norbert Leo Butz; Chekhov productions at the Classic Stage Company such as “Three Sisters,” for which he won the Obie, “Ivanov,” which starred Ethan Hawke, and “Uncle Vanya” with Mamie Gummer; “A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur” by Tennessee Williams with Kristine Nielsen and Annette O’Toole; “War of the Roses”; “Hamlet”; and “The Little Foxes” on Broadway with Elizabeth Taylor and Maureen Stapleton, which earned five Tony nominations.

Pendleton has written three plays: “Orson’s Shadow,” which ran off-Broadway for a year and was then staged in London; “Uncle Bob,” which ran at the Mint Theatre in New York and was then produced in Paris; and “Booth,” which was staged in New York and starred Frank Langella. He has taught at HB Studio in New York since 1969.