Actor, Playwright Anna Deavere Smith Weaves Multiple Stories of Healthcare Struggles into New Solo Performance

We end today’s show with a more personal take on the health care debate. Over the past 8 years acclaimed actor, documentarian, and playwright Anna Deavere Smith has interviewed hundreds of people—doctors and patients, celebrities and regular folks, Americans and people from around the world—about their struggles with illness, pain, mortality, and the health care system. She has distilled a sampling of their emotionally-charged stories into her latest powerful solo show. Its called “Let Me Down Easy” and its playing at New York’s Second Stage Theater through December.

Anna Deavere Smith has won numerous awards, including two Obies, several Tony nominations, and a MacArthur genius grant. She is a professor at New York University’s Tisch School of Arts and is well known for her roles in television shows like The West Wing and Nurse Jackie. But she rose to prominence with her early theatrical productions. “Fires in the Mirror” and “Twilight: Los Angeles 1992” presented racially charged moments in contemporary American history using a multiplicity of voices, all based on interviews with real people–participants, observers, politicians, and activists.

Well, Anna Deavere Smith joins us now here in the firehouse studio.

Anna Deavere Smith, Award-winning actor, documentarian, playwright and professor. Her latest solo show is called Let Me Down Easy, playing at New York’s Second Stage Theater through December.

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