MEDIA ADVISORY-Tony Kushner, Pulitzer Prize-winner for "Angels in America," to speak at Vanderbilt

Tony Kushner, a playwright who won the Pulitzer Prize and two Tony Awards for his two-part stage work "Angels in America" and critical acclaim for his prescient "Homebody/Kabul," which explores geopolitics in Afghanistan, will appear at Vanderbilt University for an upcoming address.

Terryl Hallquist, associate professor of theatre at Vanderbilt, will conduct "A Conversation with Tony Kushner" on Wednesday, Nov. 12, at 6 p.m. in Benton Chapel at the Vanderbilt Divinity School. A reception with Kushner will precede the lecture at 5 p.m. in the Divinity School Faculty Reading Room. Both events are free and open to the public and sponsored by Vanderbilt’s Chancellor’s Lecture Series.

Kushner’s 1993 play "Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes" is set in 1986 and explores how AIDS, at the height of the epidemic, affects the intertwining lives of a handful of people. Kushner has adapted "Angels in America" into a screenplay for HBO Films. The pay-television channel will air the six-hour film version, directed by Mike Nichols and starring Al Pacino, Meryl Streep and Emma Thompson, in December.

WHAT: "A Conversation with Tony Kushner"

WHERE: Benton Chapel at the Vanderbilt Divinity School 411 21st Ave. S.

WHEN: Wednesday, Nov. 12. Reception at 5 p.m. Conversation at 6 p.m.

Media contact: Kara Furlong, (615) 322-NEWS Kara.c.furlong@Vanderbilt.edu

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