NO. 7: KEVIN LANE DEARINGER - ELEANOR ROBSON BELMONT, a Theatrical Life

Art Throb

Episode No. 7 of the Art Throb Podcast features Kevin Lane Dearinger who will talk about his most recent publication, a theatre history titled Eleanor Robson Belmont - a Theatrical Life, as well as his other plays and poetry.​
Author Kevin Lane Dearinger, a Woodford County native, is a former teacher and retired professional actor and singer. He has written an assortment of books and plays. His publications include four theatre histories, four poetry chapbooks; his plays; Regarding Mrs. Carter, Naked on Request, **Four Squares: a Kentucky Quilt, and Expiation,; as well as two memoirs, On Stage with Bette Davis and Bad Sex in Kentucky. After forty-seven years in Manhattan, he returned to live and write in Kentucky. Kevin’s essays peeking behind the curtain for the Lexington Theatre Company have appeared online, and he has worked on several radio dramas for the much-lamented Athens/West Company. He writes for hours every day, most often in Lexington’s coffee shops, although he has never had a cup of coffee in his life. His work attempts to keep time with his Kentucky heritage, his love of family, his LGBTQ identity, and his own erratic pulse.
**A play in one act and four voices. Four monologues exploring Kentucky sounds in the heart and on the fringes of the LGBTQ community
When Mrs. August Belmont died in 1979, just before her 100th birthday, she was remembered as a philanthropist and advocate for the arts, especially the Metropolitan Opera--but before her triumphs as Mrs. Belmont, she had dignified the American stage for 13 glorious years as Eleanor Robson, actress. Her splendid voice, understated style, and always-evident intelligence thrilled legions of theatregoers and enthralled the best playwrights of her time, including Israel Zangwill, Clyde Fitch, and George Bernard Shaw.
Despite the brevity of her career, Eleanor Robson stands as a prototype for many actresses who followed her--women who sought to control their own careers and demanded artistic respect and freedom, and who, by the twenty-first century, would confidently call themselves not actresses, but actors. This is the first book-length biography of her, focusing especially on her theatrical career.
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