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by Doug Jones
Mary Willard ‘s first play, the comedy, Elvis and Juliet, opened in February of 1994 and closed in December of 1994 having enjoyed a successful, sold out run at the Theatre at the Improv in Hollywood,California.
In June of 2007 Elvis and Juliet opened off Broadway at the Abingdon theatre and enjoyed a six week sold out run. The New Yorker Magazine called it a “zingy comedy of manners.” In October of 2009 it had a successful run at the Grove Theatre in Upland California Elvis and Juliet had staged readings in five countries and 15 cities on the anniversary of Elvis Presley’s 70th birthday.
Her eight women and two men play, An Occasional Sin, was produced by the Company of Angels Theatre in Los Angeles in 2005 and also produced at the Grove in 2007.
Deathtroupe was produced by the Grove Theatre in Upland, California in 2010. A Really, Really, Good Time, Holly Jolly, Christmas Carol was produced by the Grove in December 2012. It was so favorably received it will be revived in 2013 at the Grove .
In 1995 her short plays, Meanwhile, Back At The Ranch, At The Vanity Fair, The Old Folks At Home, The Wedding Waltz, A Little New York Romance, Murder, She Rewrote, and Chateaux Beaux Eaux were produced by the Burbage Theatre in Los Angeles as A Show Of Farce.
Her short play, A Hunka Hunka Santa Claus, was a winner in the Gallery Players new play festival and was produced by them in New York in June, 2004. Murder, She Rewrote, is performed from Dublin to Sydney. A collection of her short plays is in the Stanford University Library. Mary wrote Sammy! A Tribute To Sammy Cahn for the Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara, which starred Julie Harris and Peggy Lee.
Her musical comedy Moon Shine! with music and lyrics by Marty Stuart was produced at the Grove in May and June of 2004. It garnered three Inland Empire awards.
Moon Shine! was first presented at the ASCAP/Disney Musical theatre workshop at the Disney Studios in Burbank, in 2003. Moon Shine received aproduction at the Theatre Building in Chicago in 2006. A production of Moon Shine! in Los Angeles was nominated for 11 Artistic Director Awards in Spring of 2008, winning three “ADA’s”
Mary co-founded the Playwrights Group at the Company of Angels and was Playwright in Residence at the Cast Theatre for three years. She was playwright director for Women In Theatre and produced the Women in Theatre Sunday play readings for three years and additionally worked at the Stella Adler Theatre with playwrights.
For fifteen years, Mary and husband Fred Willard, have run a weekly comedy workshop, The MoHo Group. The MoHo Group perform a sketch comedy show each month at the Second City Theatre in Hollywood.
Mary has studied playwriting with Marsha Norman, Horton Foote, Romulus Linney and Doris Baizley. She has studied fiction writing at the prestigious Sewanee Writers’ Conference with such luminaries as Tim O’Brien, Alice McDermott,Tony Early, Ernest Gaines and Richard Ford.
Mary is a member of the Dramatists Guild,inc.
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