Kaiulani Lee will perform her celebrated one-person play
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass - Veteran thespian Kaiulani Lee will perform her celebrated one-person play based on the life and works of Rachel Carson, biologist and author of the seminal environmentalist work "Silent Spring," in Brooks-Rogers Recital Hall at Williams College at 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 14. The event is free and open to the public.Titled "A Sense of Wonder," the play has been touring the United States -- covering more than 100 universities, the Smithsonian Institute, the Albert Schweitzer Conference at the United Nations, the Department of the Interior, and a congressional audience at Capitol Hill -- in the 16 years since Lee wrote it. Earlier this year it was released as a film, shot by Oscar award-winning director Haskell Wexler at Carson's cottage on the coast of Maine.
On the day of the performance, Lee will join community members at a lunch discussion on the relevance of Rachel Carson in today's environmental movements. The event will take place at noon in Driscoll Dining Room; participants are invited to get their lunch from the dining hall then join the discussion upstairs.
Carson is often called the mother of the modern environmental movement. She graduated from the Pennsylvania College for Women (now Chatham College) in 1929 and completed an M.A. in zoology from Johns Hopkins University. In 1936 she was hired by the Bureau of Fisheries as a junior biologist and in the next 15 years rose to become chief editor of all publications for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. After 1952 she decided to devote all her time to writing and completed her most famous book, "Silent Spring" in 1962.
Lee has over 35 years of experience in theatre, film, and television, having starred in over a dozen Broadway and off-Broadway plays, guest starred in numerous television series, and acted in 15 feature films. In addition to an OBIE Award for outstanding achievement off-Broadway and a Drama Desk Award on Broadway nomination, she received critical acclaim for her starring role in the PBS film "A Midwife's Tale."
Lee's performance has been praised by critics as "spiritual" and "moving." Seymour Chapman, professor of rhetoric and film at the University of Berkeley, wrote, "Carson's foresight and courage in defending the environment is ripe for celebration and the stage play which Ms. Lee has written and so beautifully performed is a brilliant reminder of this."
Carson is a powerful influence and inspiration for Lee, who grew up in the region of Maine where Carson studied nature. Although Carson is best known for her pivotal 1962 book that sounded the alarm on chemical pesticides, she was also a great poet and an American Book Award winner. "A Sense of Wonder" intertwines these and other strands in two acts: the first takes place in Carson's summer home as she is fighting cancer, and the second is set amidst the uproar following the publication of "Silent Spring."
Lee received her B.A. from American University, holds an honorary doctorate of the arts from Bowdoin College, and has studied with Lee Strasberg, Sandy Meisner, Jerry Grotowski, and Uta Hagen. She has taught Introduction to Acting and Modern Acting at George Mason University.
