Mimi Huntington, MFA '87, wins 2013 StageSource Theater Hero Award

Photo/A.R. Sinclair

Debra Wise (left) and Samantha Richert, MFA '11, in a scene from the 2012 Nora Theatre's production of 'The How and the Why.'

Mimi Huntington, MFA '87

Mimi Huntington, MFA '87, the founding artistic director of the Nora Theatre company, is the recipient of the 2013 StageSource Theater Hero Award. Huntington founded the Cambridge-based company the year she graduated from Brandeis; it was one of the first companies in Boston to focus on stories by and about women.

The Theater Hero Award is being presented to Huntington for her service, inspiration and role as a champion of the theater community, according to a statement released by the StageSource board of directors. She will receive it June 29 at the conclusion of the 2013 Boston Theater Conference. 

“It was clear to me from the beginning that Mimi was an extraordinary theatre person,” says Nora Associate Director Daniel Gidron, who was one of Huntington’s teachers at Brandeis. “Over the years I have been associated with the Nora Theatre Company, I was impressed by Mimi's selfless dedication and vision.  She founded the company, nurtured it, and shepherded it through its homeless period and on to its new home at the Central Square Theater. 

“Through all those years she kept an unswerving vision and dedication to artistic excellence and social justice, emphasizing plays with a female voice, new scripts and revivals of modern classics,” Gidron said. “The Nora's success created an environment where this kind of cutting edge experimentation became possible. That by itself makes Mimi Huntington a theater hero.” 

Huntington began her theater career as an actress in Off-off Broadway, regional, and summer stock productions.  While in New York City, she produced and performed in her own musical nightclub act. She is one of the leaders in the development of Central Square Theater, a cultural anchor of Cambridge. 

Huntington also is one of the architects of the Theatre Community Benevolent Fund. Established in 1999 TCBF is a non-profit theater community organization that provides financial relief to theater artists and organizations coping with extreme illness, catastrophic acts of nature or events such as vandalism and theft.