Hagen to lead student drama workshops

Tony Award-winning actress Uta Hagen plans to do a workshop forstudents during her visit next week to accept an honorary degree.

Up to 200 people may watch Hagen work with students on monologues and scenes during the session, 12-2 p.m. Friday, May 19, in Mitchell Theatre, Vilas Hall, 821 University Ave.

Hagen made her stage debut during high school in Noel Coward’s “Hay Fever” in the Bascom Hall Theatre in 1935. She has acted in “A Streetcar Named Desire,” “Key Largo,” “The Sea Gull” and the landmark racially integrated production of “Othello.”

Hagen was rewarded with Tonys for her work in Clifford Odet’s “The Country Girl” and Edward Albee’s “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” In 1947, she began teaching at the Herbert Berghof acting studio, where Jack Lemmon, Jason Robards, Mathew Broderick, Whoopi Goldberg and many others were her students.

Hagen is the daughter of Oskar Hagen, who founded the UW Department of Art History in 1925 and chaired it 22 years. Uta Hagen spent a year studying at UW before continuing her education with theatrical doyen Eva Le Gallienne. Hagen’s most recent role was in “Collected Stories,” a Broadway production about an elderly writer and her young protégé.

Hagen and other honorary degree recipients will be honored at spring commencement Friday, May 19, at 5:30 p.m. in the Kohl Center. For more information about the workshop, call Peder Melhuse, (608) 263-3354/263-2329.