Biography

Biography
Chelsea became involved with theatre at the age of eight, after a children’s community theatre troupe was founded in her small hometown of Jennings, Louisiana. She continued to act and write throughout high school and college, completing dual degrees in Theatre Performance (BA) and Creative Writing (BA) at Louisiana State University in 2005. After being awarded a Masters Degree by LSU in 2006, Chelsea moved to Chicago to pursue a life in professional theatre. After nearly six years in Chicago, Chelsea married professional sound designer Miles Polaski, and the couple moved to Abingdon, Virginia to begin working at the Barter Theatre.

In Chicago, Chelsea has been an active self-producer of her own work, most notably the (a)Symmetry Cycle of plays that ran at the Viaduct Theatre in 2010. She has also worked with The Hypocrites (Mud, TheThreepenny Opera), The Side Project (Cut to the Quick Festival Fall 08 and Spring 09), Collaboraction (Sketchbook 9, Sketchbook 11, G.I.F.T), State Theatre of Chicago (Crowded House, Voodoo Chalk Circle), Point of Contention (ChAos Festival 09 and 10), the Inconvenience (Dealing, Devour), Rascal Children’s Theatre (Annalee Jones and the Meanie Genie), Hobo Junction (the 2010 Hobo Robo Festival), the Mercury Theatre (Transference), the Bailiwick Director's Festival (Open), and R7Co (The Tiniest Sound in Recorded History, Round Earth’s Imagined Corners), of which she was a founding member.

Her work has received awards from The Women’s Theatre Alliance of Chicago, Collaboraction, The Chicago Union League Civic and Arts Foundation, and inclusion in festivals across the city. She has been written up as an exemplary self-producing playwright by TimeOut Chicago (2010) and Dramatists Magazine (2011). She is a member of the Dramatists Guild of America.

For more specific production information, see the Vita & Awards page.

Upcoming Projects : Workshop and Staged Reading of STUNT with Steep Theatre in Chicago (March 2012) and in New York City (May 2012), Young Frontier with The State Theatre of Chicago (Spring 2012), and Even Longer and Farther Away with The Rogoff in Brooklyn NY (Summer 2012).

Name:

Chelsea Maureen Marcantel

Age: 28

Hometown:

Jennings, Louisiana

Current Location:

Abingdon, VA

Education:

Louisiana State University

Summa Cum Laude

MEd Secondary English

BA Theatre Performance

BA Creative Writing

Contact:

chelsea.marcantel

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