Madeline Sayet (born July 1, 1989) is an American director and writer. She grew up in Norwich and Uncasville, Connecticut.

Early life and education

Sayet was brought up on stories and traditions of the Mohegan tribe from her great-aunt Gladys Tantaquidgeon, former Medicine Woman, and her mother, Melissa Tantaquidgeon Zobel ( Melissa Jayne Fawcett), current Medicine Woman. Sayet holds ancestral ties to Fidelia Fielding who was the last fluent speaker of the Mohegan language, and died in 1908. These ties serve as an influence for much of her work. From an early age, oral traditions and storytelling all played a major role in her work. In high school, Sayet took part at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre Center's National Puppetry Conference. Post graduation, she went on to study under the

Atlantic Theater Company The Atlantic Theater Company is an Off-Broadway non-profit theater company based in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. Founded in 1985 by playwright David Mamet, actor William H. Macy, and a group of acting students, the compan ...

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private university, private research university in New York City, New York, United States. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded in 1832 by Albert Gallatin as a Nondenominational ...

as part of the

Tisch School of the Arts The New York University Tisch School of the Arts (commonly referred to as Tisch) is the performing, cinematic, and media arts school of New York University. Founded on August 17, 1965, as the School of the Arts at New York University, Tisch ...

. After receiving her BFA in Theater, she continued her studies as part of the graduate program, where she received her MA in Arts Politics and Post-Colonial Theory, at NYU's Gallatin School of Individualized Study. During this time, she co-founded and directed the Mad & Merry Theatre Company. Sayet adapted classical pieces to incorporate her own culture. She also has an MA in Shakespeare from The Shakespeare Institute in Stratford Upon Avon, UK.

Career

Madeline Sayet is currently the Executive Director of the Yale Indigenous Performing Arts Program. In 2018, she was named a Forbes 30 Under 30 in Hollywood & Entertainment for her work as a stage director, reimagining the classics. Early in Sayet's directing and writing career, she remade the

Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 23 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...

classic "

The Tempest ''The Tempest'' is a Shakespeare's plays, play by William Shakespeare, probably written in 1610–1611, and thought to be one of the last plays that he wrote alone. After the first scene, which takes place on a ship at sea during a tempest, th ...

" by incorporating Mohegan language and culture. This production served as her graduate thesis at New York University and was brought onstage at the Brooklyn Lyceum. While at NYU, Sayet launched The Mad and Merry Theatre Company, which completed three successful seasons of programming dedicated to reimagining classic stories before disbanding. During this time Sayet wrote "Daughters of Leda," a play that chronicles the stories of well-known mythological characters such as: Leda and The Swan,

Adam and Eve Adam and Eve, according to the creation myth of the Abrahamic religions, were the first man and woman. They are central to the belief that humanity is in essence a single family, with everyone descended from a single pair of original ancestors. ...

, Helen,

Clytemnestra Clytemnestra (, ; , ), in Greek mythology, was the wife of Agamemnon, king of Mycenae, and the half-sister of Helen of Sparta. In Aeschylus' ''Oresteia'', she murders Agamemnon – said by Euripides to be her second husband – and the Trojan p ...

Iphigenia In Greek mythology, Iphigenia (; , ) was a daughter of King Agamemnon and Queen Clytemnestra, and thus a princess of Mycenae. In the story, Agamemnon offends the goddess Artemis on his way to the Trojan War by hunting and killing one of Artem ...

, and

Electra Electra, also spelt Elektra (; ; ), is one of the most popular Greek mythology, mythological characters in tragedies.Evans (1970), p. 79 She is the main character in two Greek tragedies, ''Electra (Sophocles play), Electra'' by Sophocles and ''Ele ...

from the female perspective, which was produced as part of the Women Center Stage Festival, the Dream Up Festival, and Dixon Place's Works-In-Progress. She is the recipient of the White House Champion of Change Award for Native America for her work as a director, writer, performer and educator. In 2015 Sayet made her opera debut when she directed a new production of The Magic Flute for the Glimmerglass Opera,. In 2015 she also launched the Native Shakespeare Ensemble at American Indian Artists, Inc. (Amerinda) with productions of Macbeth and The Winter's Tale. Sayet also directed "Sliver of a Full Moon" by Mary Kathryn Nagle, which is a play about the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) that pays tribute to the re-authorization that occurred in 2013. It aims to get the audience to see Native women that were affected by violence to be seen as human beings rather than symbols. In Mohegan, her job is called "Kutayun Uyasunaquock" which means "Our Heart She Leads Us There." She is currently a TED Fellow, MIT Media Lab Director's Fellow, and National Directing Fellow. In 2021, she served as the transitional Co-Artistic Director of Red Eagle Soaring: Native Youth Theatre. She served as the Resident Artistic Director at Amerinda from 2013 to 2016, the Artistic Director of the Mad & Merry Theatre Company from 2011 to 2014, and has been a Van Lier Directing Fellow at

Second Stage Theatre Second Stage Theater is a non-profit theater company that presents work by living American writers both on and off Broadway. It is based in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, and is affiliated with the League of Resident Theatres. Founded in 1979 ...

, and a Creative Community Fellow at National Arts Strategies'. In 2019, she performed her solo performance piece "Where We Belong," at Shakespeare's Globe in London, making her the first Native American playwright to have her work performed in that space. "Where We Belong" was then produced as a film adaptation by Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, in association with the Folger Shakespeare Library in 2021, followed by a national tour of the production, directed by Mei Ann Teo. For the Chicago run of Where We Belong at The Goodman Theatre, Sayet was nominated for the Jeff Award for Best Solo Performance.

Awards

* Forbes 30 Under 30: Hollywood & Entertainment * TED Fellow * MIT Media Lab Director's Fellow * National Directors Fellowship * Leo Bronstein Homage Award— New York University * White House Champion of Change Award for Native America

Works

Directing

* ''Whale Song'', by Cathy Tagnak Rexford * ''

L'incoronazione di Poppea ''L'incoronazione di Poppea'' (Stattkus-Verzeichnis, SV 308, ''The Coronation of Poppaea'') is an Italian List of operas by Claudio Monteverdi, opera by Claudio Monteverdi. It was Monteverdi's last opera, with a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Buse ...

'', by

Claudio Monteverdi Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi (baptized 15 May 1567 – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, choirmaster and string instrument, string player. A composer of both Secular music, secular and Church music, sacred music, and a pioneer ...

* ''

The Winter's Tale ''The Winter's Tale'' is a play by William Shakespeare originally published in the First Folio of 1623. Although it was grouped among the comedies, many modern editors have relabelled the play as one of Shakespeare's late romances. Some criti ...

'', by

William Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 23 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...

* ''

The Magic Flute ''The Magic Flute'' (, ), K. 620, is an opera in two acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. It is a ''Singspiel'', a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue. The work premiered on ...

'', by

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 1756 – 5 December 1791) was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period (music), Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition and proficiency from an early age ...

/ Emanuel Schikaneder, English translation by Kelley Rourke * '' Powwow Highway,'' by William S. Yellow Robe, Jr. * ''Miss Lead,'' by Mary Kathryn Nagle * '' Uncommon Women and Others,'' by

Wendy Wasserstein Wendy Wasserstein (October 18, 1950 – January 30, 2006) was an American playwright. She was an Andrew Dickson White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University. She received the Tony Award for Best Play and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1989 ...

* ''

,'' by Shakespeare

Writing

*''Antigone or And Still She Must Rise Up'' *''Where We Belong'' *''Up and Down the River'' *''Daughters of Leda'' *''Who Flies Apart'' *''The Pants'' *''"''When The Whipporwill Calls''"'' in ''Dawnland Voices: Writing from Indigenous New England''

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sayet, Madeline 1989 births Living people American opera directors American theatre directors American women dramatists and playwrights Female opera directors New York University Gallatin School of Individualized Study alumni Tisch School of the Arts alumni American women theatre directors Mohegan people 21st-century American dramatists and playwrights 21st-century American women writers Native American women writers Native American people from Connecticut