Education[edit]
Rauch (born 1962) graduated from Harvard College in 1984 with a B.A. in English & American Literature and Language, where he was a recipient of the Louis Sudler Prize for Outstanding Graduating Artist.
Cornerstone Theater[edit]
Rauch co-founded the community-based, touring Cornerstone Theater Company in 1986 with Alison Carey, where he directed more than 40 productions, most of them collaborations with diverse rural and urban communities across the United States, and served as artistic director from 1986 to 2006.[4] He oversaw an additional 25 commissions of new work.
Their first adapted production was The Marmarth Hamlet, set and staged in Marmath, North Dakota as a Wild West musical.[5] In 1989, Cornerstone created a Romeo and Juliet in Port Gibson, Mississippi, with 11 members of the company and over 50 local residents as cast and crew. It starred Amy Brenneman as Juliet and local high school senior, Edret Brinston as Romeo.[6] In 1994, they staged the medieval morality play, Everyman, at Santa Monica Place and "Death chases Everyman in the shadows of Victoria’s Secret."[7] In 2004, Rauch collaborated with playwright José Cruz González to adapt Washington Irving's story, "Rip Van Winkle" into Waking Up in Lost Hills.[8]
Other Directorial Work[edit]
Rauch directed several OSF plays at other theaters, including Equivocation, All the Way and The Great Society at Seattle Rep; The Pirates of Penzance at Portland Opera; Mother Road, Equivocation, A Community Carol, and Roe at Arena Stage; Roe at Berkeley Rep; Othello, Fingersmith, and All the Way at the American Repertory Theater for which he twice won the Independent Reviewers of New England (IRNE) award for Best Director. All the Way then moved to the Neil Simon Theatre on Broadway in 2014, where it won the Tony Award for Best Play and Rauch also earned Drama Desk[18] and Outer Critics Circle Award nominations for directing.[19] The Great Society moved to the Vivian Beaumont Theater on Broadway in 2019 and opened October 1, 2019.[20]
Rauch has directed a number of world premieres, including Naomi Wallace's Night is a Room at New York's Signature Theatre;[21] The Body of an American at Portland Center Stage[22] which, along with All the Way, was co-winner of the inaugural Edward M. Kennedy Prize for Drama Inspired by American History;[23] The Clean House at Yale Repertory Theatre; and Living Out and For Here or To Go? at the Mark Taper Forum. He directed the world premiere of Peace by Culture Clash at the Getty Villa, an adaptation of Aristophanes's play of the same name. He also directed the New York premiere of The Clean House at Lincoln Center Theater.[24] Work elsewhere includes productions at South Coast Repertory, Guthrie Theater, Long Wharf Theater, Pasadena Playhouse, Great Lakes Theater Festival, Touchstone Theater, and En Garde Arts.
Broadway[edit]
In 2014, Rauch directed the Broadway production of All the Way by Robert Schenkkan, after commissioning and directing the play at OSF in 2012. The limited-engagement production opened on March 6, 2014 at the Neil Simon Theatre and concluded on June 29, 2014.[25] The production won two Tony Awards, the 2014 Tony Award for Best Play and the 2014 Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Play, which went to Bryan Cranston.[26] The play also won the Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Play. Rauch was nominated for both a Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Award for his direction.
In 2019, Rauch again worked with Schenkkan on The Great Society, the sequel to All the Way, which ran for a twelve week limited-engagement on Broadway at The Vivian Beaumont Theater, beginning September 6, 2019.[27] The play starred Emmy-winner Brian Cox as President Lyndon B. Johnson.
Ronald O. Perelman Performing Arts Center[edit]
In February 2018, Rauch was named the inaugural artistic director of the Ronald O. Perelman Performing Arts Center (PACNYC), a new, flexible midsize performance space at The World Trade Center that will produce theater, dance, music, and chamber opera.[28] The PACNYC opened in September 2023.[29] Rauch's first show that he is directing there is Cats: The Jellicle Ball, which he is co-directing with Zhailon Levingston and will premiere in June 2024.[30]
Service to the Arts[edit]
Rauch has served as an adviser, keynote speaker, commencement speaker, and advocate for the arts.
In 1999, Rauch testified to the U.S. Congress on behalf of the National Endowment for the Arts. He said of Cornerstone, "'By bringing together people face to face to create community-based theater, we build bridges across differences of racial, economic and religious backgrounds.'"[31]
In 2019, he delivered the keynote address at the Association for Theatre in Higher Education conference. It was later published in the journal, Theatre Topics.[32]
Teaching[edit]
Rauch has taught at University of California, Los Angeles, University of Southern California, and California State University, Los Angeles. From 2005-2007, he was Claire Trevor Professor of Drama and Bren Fellow at University of California, Irvine.
Rauch launched the Cornerstone Institute, an international model for training activist artists that "teaches participants its community-engaged aesthetic by mounting an original production".[33]