Juilliard voice teacher dies

The death has become known of Eve Shapiro, voice and directing teacher at Juilliard for quarter of a century. Eve was 92.

From her Juilliard CV:
Born in South Africa, at the age of 17 she won an award for best amateur theatrical production of the year. Encouraged by praise, she ventured to London for further training and was given a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA). Upon completion of her studies, she was asked to join RADA’s faculty as a director and teacher. During her fourteen years at RADA, she trained Alan Rickman, Jonathan Pryce, Imelda Staunton, Henry Goodman, and Tom Courtney, among many other artists of subsequent recognition.

In England, Eve directed the York Theatre Royal, the Bournemouth Rep, and The Leeds Playhouse. In York, she directed a production of T.S. Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral in York Minster to celebrate the cathedral’s restoration.

In the late seventies, Alan Schneider, then artistic director of Juilliard Drama, invited Shapiro to come to New York to direct a production of Richard III. The success of that association led to a permanent appointment in the Drama Division where she directed many wide-ranging productions: Another Part of the Forest, The Seagull, Uncle Vanya, Hedda Gabler, Heartbreak House, Man and Superman, Undiscovered Country, Top Girls, A Month in the Country, Six Characters in Search of an Author, A Winter’s Tale, Richard II, and The Importance of Being Earnest, among them.

In the late ’80s, she directed a highly regarded production of the opera, The Crucible, in Juilliard’s Opera Center and Così fan tutte. She has since joined the Opera Division where she directed The Rape of Lucretia—a production still fondly remembered, Susannah, La Cenerentola, Eugene Onegin, Die Fledermaus, The Bartered Bride, and Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.