Stephan Morrow is a proud veteran of the Off Off Broadway arena and an independent theater artist who produces, directs, and acts.
He is a frequent moderator of the Playwright/Directors Unit (PDU) of The Actors Studio, having been mentored into the unit by Elia Kazan in the mid-80s, and is a longtime member of both The Actors Studio East and West. Prior to that he studied acting privately with Wynn Handman, Uta Hagen, Bill Hickey, Mike Gazzo and received a scholarship to study with Stella Adler.
He later worked with Liz Dixon – acting and vocal coach extraordinaire.
As Artistic Director and Founder of The Great American Play Series he has had the pleasure of resurrecting neglected American classics
via "performances on book" such as ‘After the Fall’ by Arthur Miller with Rebecca De Mornay, Mark Rydell, Barry Primus, Lyle Kessler and
Sally Kirkland, ‘The Price’ with Paul Mazursky and Judith Light, and has had the honor of being personally backed by Arthur Miller for his work on ‘Incident at Vichy’ including a four year mission to get it to a major venue and ultimately staging four "performances on book"
with casts that included F. Murray Abraham, Richard Dreyfuss, Austin Pendleton, David Margulies, Fritz Weaver, Peter Weller and
Fisher Stevens amongst others.
Over the last ten plus years at Theater for the New City (TNC) and elsewhere, Morrow has amassed the following body of work:
In 2019 he wrote and directed ‘The Assassination of J. Kaisaar and the Rise of Augustus’ (https://youtu.be/tKk1tqyrDeU) – a Sopranos meet Mad Max retelling of Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra but set in a dystopian (vaguely) US future.
It won its first award in The American Filmatic Arts Awards in 2022.
In 2018, he was Dramaturg and Director of Anne Lucas' 'Recovery' which was submitted for The Pulitzer Prize by
Crystal Field, Executive Artistic Director of TNC.
Over the course of the prior seven years, he directed six productions for Mario Fratti (prolific playwright and author of ‘Nine’) that included ‘Trio’, ‘Quartet’, ‘Duo’, ‘The Suicide Club and Three Sisters and a Priest’, ‘The Vatican Knows – about that young woman’, ‘Six Passionate Women’ , ‘The Women' and ‘The Academy’ (in which he also acted the lead). He has had a long relationship with Mr. Fratti, with the first play in which Morrow acted for him being Fratti's acclaimed production of ‘The Cage’ at The Manhattan Theater Club.
In 2014, Morrow adapted his TNC stage production of John Steppling's dark play ‘Dogmouth’ into an independent film that became on Official Selection of ten independent film festivals, won seven awards, and garnered three more award nominations. It swept the Bergenfield Film Festival with the following accolades: Best Writer – John Steppling; Best Producing – Rob Hunkele; and Best Actor – Stephan Morrow.
(The film is available on Vimeo).
In 2012 he directed Claudio Angelini’s satiric musical comedy ‘Obama in Naples’ at The June Havoc Theater, which was received enthusiastically by audiences in NY, following which Morrow was greatly honored to be invited to stage it at The Italian Embassy in Washington DC. He also directed a second Angelini production – ‘My Wife in a Chador’ – at TNC.
In 2011, between two of his Fratti productions, Morrow stage directed a sold out run of ‘Triangle – The Shirtwaist Triangle Factory Fire’ by J. Gilhooley at 59E59 Theaters in the centennial year of the tragedy. He also worked with Murray Schisgal (who co-wrote ‘Tootsie’)
on two satires – ‘Wall St Fandango’ and ‘The Japanese Foreign Trade Minister’ – plus directed several staged readings of them.
In 2009 he portrayed Marion Faye and directed a month long run of "performances on book" of ‘The Deer Park – or Hollywood Goes to Hell’ by Norman Mailer at The Nuyorican Poets Café and was invited by Mailer to co-direct and act in a film of it. Morrow's long collaboration with Mailer began with his performance as Rod, “stuntman extraordinaire”, in ‘Strawhead – A memory play of Marilyn’ at The Actors Studio, which was written and directed by Mailer. He additionally can be seen in Mailer’s cult classic ‘Tough Guys Don’t Dance’, co-starring opposite Ryan O’Neal.
