Media contact: Noelle Lemoine, communications assistant; tele: (413) 597-4277; email: [email protected]
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass., April 11, 2006 — Williams College has announced that dancer, choreographer, and founder and artistic director of the African-American Dance Ensemble Charles “Chuck” Davis will be the principal speaker at the college’s 217th Commencement on Sunday, June 4.
The British-American actor and director of the Williamstown Theatre Festival Roger Rees will be the baccalaureate speaker on Saturday, June 3.
Commencement Speaker
Chuck Davis, born Charles Rudolph Davis in Raleigh, N.C. studied at Howard University before going to New York in 1958 to study dance. His first job as a regular member of a professional troupe came in 1959 when he joined the Klara Harrington Dance Company. He told Dance Magazine in an interview about his early career, “I attended the New Dance Group, where Alvin Ailey, Talley Beatty, and Donald McKayle were. I went to Syvilla Fort’s for Dunham technique and jazz.” He also studied briefly at the Martha Graham School of Contemporary Dance and learned timing and ensemble work with the Eleo Pomare Company.
His dance connection to Africa began with a performance of the Sierra Leone National Dance Company at the New York World’s Fair in 1964. Study in Africa came in 1977, when the company participated in an international exposition and celebration of African culture, held in Lagos, Nigeria.
In 1968, he organized his own dance troupe, the New York-based Chuck Davis Dance Company. In the early1980s, he became involved with the American Dance Festival and began a series of summer residencies with them in North Carolina, where he founded the African-American Dance Ensemble and the Alayanfe Children’s Dance Company. The African-American Dance Ensemble gave their first full concert in February 1984 and later premiered two works by Davis — “Saturday Night, Sunday Morning” and “Drought” — both of which were commissioned by the American Dance Festival. He is also the creator of the DanceAfrica festival, an annual event celebrating African dance held at New York’s Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM).
Davis’ honors include a North Carolina Award in Fine Arts as “the foremost teacher and choreographer of traditional African dance in America.” He was selected as Artist of the Year by Dance USA, received the 2002 National Governors Association Award for Distinguished Service to the Arts, a Bessie Award for dance and performance, the BAM Award for distinguished service to the arts, the Kathryn H. Wallace Award for Artists in Community Service, and a prestigious Dance Magazine Award for “his major and lasting contribution to the art of the dance.”
Baccalaureate Speaker
Welsh-born but now an American citizen, Mr. Rees, actor, director, teacher, and playwright, began his prolific career as a scenery painter, having studied painting and lithography at the Slade School of Art.
In 1967 he was accepted by the Royal Shakespeare Company and has been a member ever since. Rees gained international attention for creating the title role in the Royal Shakespeare Company’s landmark 8-hour production of “The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby,” which earned him Tony and Oliver awards and Emmy nomination.
Mr. Rees also created the leading roles in Tom Stoppard’s “The Real Thing” and in his own thriller, “Double Double,” co-authored with Rick Elice. Among numerous London credits are “Hamlet,” “Love’s Labour’s Lost,” “Cymbeline,” and “Much Ado About Nothing.”
Other memorable acting credits include Terrence McNally’s “A Man of No Importance,” “Indiscretions” (Tony nomination), John Robin Baitz’s “The End of the Day” (Obie award), “The Misanthrope,” and “Uncle Vanya.”
On television, Mr. Rees had recurring roles on “West Wing” as Lord John Marbury and on “Cheers” as Robin Colcord.
He has appeared in more than 50 films including “The Ebony Tower” starring opposite Lawrence Olivier, Mel Brooks’ “Robin Hood: Men in Tights,” “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” and Bob Fosse’s “Star 80.”
As director, Mr. Rees was associate artistic director for the Bristol Old Vic Theatre. In 2004, he was named artistic director of the Williamstown Theatre Festival. He began his association with Williamstown in 1997, when he directed Jon Robin Baitz’s “The Film Society.”
He has taught at Columbia University, Florida State University, and the University of California at Los Angeles.
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For building locations on the Williams campus, please consult the map outside the driveway entrance to the Security Office located in Hopkins Hall on Main Street (Rte. 2), next to the Thompson Memorial Chapel, or call the Office of Public Affairs (413) 597-4279. The map can also be found on the web at www.williams.edu/home/campusmap/
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Published June 3, 2006
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