Lynn Nottage, Pulitzer Prize-Winning Playwright, to Receive Honorary Degree from Adelphi University

Online, May 11, 2010 (Newswire.com) - Ms. Nottage often portrays the lives of African Americans and women in her work. A production of Ruined just opened on April 15 at the Almeida Theatre in London and will run until June 5. Her other plays include Intimate Apparel, Fabulation, or the Re-Education of Undine, Crumbs from the Table of Joy, Las Meninas, and Ruined. Her scripts have been produced and developed at theatres both nationally and internationally, including at the Manhattan Theatre Club, the Goodman Theatre, the Roundabout Theatre Company, Freedom Theatre, Sundance Institute Theatre Lab, San Jose Repertory Theatre, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Steppenwolf, Yale Repertory Theatre, The Vineyard Theatre, The Women's Project, and The Tricycle Theatre in London, among many others.

Ms. Nottage has won numerous awards: Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2009 for Ruined, the 2007 MacArthur Genius Award, New York Drama Critics Circle Award, American Theatre Critics/Steinberg 2004 New Play Award, 2004 Francesca Primus Award, and two Audience Development Committee (AUDELCO) awards, to name a few. In addition, she was awarded a 2007 Lucille Lortel Foundation Fellowship, 2005 Guggenheim Fellowship, The National Black Theatre Festival's August Wilson Playwriting Award, and the 2004 PEN/Laura Pels Award for Drama.

Born in Brooklyn, NY, Ms. Nottage is a graduate of Brown University and the Yale School of Drama, where she is currently a visiting lecturer.

Adelphi University will confirm more than 2,800 graduates at the associate's, bachelor's, master's, and doctoral levels at its Commencement. Carol A. Ammon '79, founder and retired CEO and chairman of Endo Pharmaceuticals Inc., will deliver the Commencement address and receive an honorary degree. Noel Burks '43, M.S.W. '65, a long-time friend of the University and past president of the Adelphi Alumni Association board and Friends of the Adelphi University Library, will receive the Ruth Stratton Harley Distinguished Alumni Achievement Award.

For more information and the full day's program, please contact Adelphi's commencement office at (516) 877-4695, or visit http://www.adelphi.edu/commencement/.