Professor Anne Bogart To Be Inducted Into The Theatre Hall of Fame

Theatre Professor and Head of the Directing Concentration Anne Bogart will be inducted into the Theatre Hall of Fame at its 54th annual ceremony this fall at the Gershwin Theatre. The celebration of her lifetime achievement reflects her indelible impact on theatre as an art form. 

While Bogart is known at Columbia as a devoted mentor and educator, she is best known in the theatre world as the co-founder of the avant-garde maverick SITI Company and the popular Viewpoints actor method.

Bogart founded SITI Company in 1992 with Japanese director Tadashi Suzuki. "[The company] gained a reputation for innovative, physical productions and staged both new plays and reinventions of classic works," wrote Sarah Bahr in The New York Times. SITI was originally named the Saratoga International Theatre Institute, but the company changed its name after quickly establishing a presence in New York City and beyond.

When SITI closed in 2022, Bogart told The New York Times, "So many people are sad that the company won’t continue as a producing organization with offices and a rehearsal space. But we’ve created a very particular way of working together — without exaggerating, hundreds of young theater companies looked up to us — and now we’re looking to share what we learned with others.”

With Tina Landau, Bogart adapted the Viewpoints theory to become a pillar of actor training. Rather than build a performance solely off the script, Viewpoints creates narrative through movement. "The technique engenders an environment of exploration, spontaneity, and collaboration, challenging the traditional hierarchies and rigid structures often found in theatrical productions," Jennifer Bustance wrote in Backstage.

As Columbia students know, Bogart's legacy is more, even, than her groundbreaking theatre company and Viewpoints training. Bogart has mentored actors, directors and playwrights who have gone on to leave their own marks on the world of the performing arts. Acclaimed artists who have trained with her, such as the hotshot writer-director and Playwriting alum Celine Song '14, often cannot help but mention Bogart's influence on their work years after studying with her.

Song recently honored Bogart on NPR during a press tour for her A24-produced hit Materialists. "There is this incredible piece of wisdom that I got from my directing professor. I was studying there as a playwright, but my directing professor in my theater school at Columbia is Anne Bogart, who is an—one of the most important experimental theater artists of all time. And she has it in this book, the four rules in anything, anything that we have to do as people, which is: show up, pay attention, speak from the heart and have no expectations," Song told Wild Card with Rachel Martin. Song made history with her debut film, the heartwrenching, instant classic Past Lives—which she wrote and directed—when she became the first Asian woman nominated for an Oscar in screenwriting in 2024.

Directing alums Ivan Talijancic '98 and Erika Latta '97—the founders of the legacy performance group WaxFactory—spoke to Brooklyn Rail about Anne's influence on their 20-year run. "We found the time spent studying with Anne to be deeply transformative and, as our artistic practice evolves over the years, she remains an invaluable presence in our lives, a continued source of inspiration and advice."

The Theatre Hall of Fame presents eight lifetime achievement awards annually. To qualify, awardees must have at least twenty five years of professional experience in American theatre, with at least five major American stage credits, or be a pioneer of Off-Broadway or regional theatre. Its 597 members include George Abbott, Stella Adler, Irene Worth, Jerry Zaks, and now, Anne Bogart.