Name:
Daniel Alexander Jones
Unit and Program Area:
Playwriting/ Production
Classes you teach (have taught):
Playwriting II, Advanced Projects in Playwriting, Advanced Playwriting Lab, Directing New Work for Theatre.
What you enjoy most about being a part of the UT Department of Theatre & Dance:
I love the moments of alchemy that have happened when I have been working with student writers, actors, directors and dramaturgs in classes together. There is something magical about the collaborations — an alchemy takes place when the intense work done by students in each discipline flows into collective endeavor. I recognize what a privilege it has been both to witness and advocate for this kind of training and what a joy it has been to see it happen at UT. The department has taken the risk to embrace interdisciplinary approaches in tandem with more traditional models of training. The two roads work in concert - and that is a good thing!
Favorite things about Austin:
Town Lake, Deep Eddy, Long walks, Blackbirds, the Texas sun, great friends and collaborators, the sense of possibility in the air.
Current projects/research/interests/hobbies:
Completing my latest performance piece, The Book of Daniel, in collaboration with musician Walter Kitundu. Collaborating with Deborah Paredez on a performance piece about beds. Writing a new play, Hera. And completing the text for a new music cabaret piece for Helga Davis, entitled, A Black Girl considers Egon Schiele.
Interests:
Geeky Sci-Fi (Doctor Who, Farscape,) reading American history, my neighborhood in NY, Inwood, conversation, abstract aesthetics, visual art, weightlifting, yoga, cooking, my partner, and our dog named Red.
The biggest risk you have taken to date (can be career-related or not):
Saying yes, when everyone else says no.
Something about yourself that we wouldn't know from reading your professional biography:
I know an obscene amount of 70's and 80's R&B trivia and song lyrics. I cannot do math problems as quickly as I can, for example, sing you the entirety of Diana Ross's diana album. Hmmmmm.
