In Atlanta, the Alliance Theatre has filled three senior roles, naming Rhavynn Drummer casting director, Tyler Ennis chief development officer and Amanda Watkins BOLD artistic producer.
The Tony Award-winning company announced the appointments on October 26. Two of the three are arrivals from outside; Amanda Watkins is promoted from within, having served as the Alliance’s associate producer and director of new works. All three have roots in Atlanta, and Jennings Hertz Artistic Directors Tinashe Kajese-Bolden and Christopher Moses made that the theme of the announcement.
“At the Alliance, we believe that being a national theater and being rooted in Atlanta are not competing ambitions – they are what make each other possible,” the pair said.
Rhavynn Drummer moves into casting at the Alliance from Tyler Perry Studios, where she worked across film, television and stage on titles including The Haves and the Have Nots, Sistas, The Oval and A Jazzman’s Blues, with further projects for Nickelodeon, Starz and BET. She studied theater and American studies at the University of Virginia and is also a filmmaker, whose digital series include Good Girls and Brooklyn.Blue.Sky. Her job will be to cast the company’s productions and to widen its ties with Atlanta’s acting community.
Tyler Ennis takes over fundraising after two decades in the field, 13 years of it in senior development posts at Roundabout Theatre Company in New York and Center Theatre Group in Los Angeles. He has also worked with Manhattan Theatre Club, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, La Jolla Playhouse and Atlanta’s Horizon Theatre Company, and most recently ran his own firm, Mainstage Consulting Group, advising arts organizations on campaigns, boards and leadership. Born in Atlanta and raised in Georgia, he began his fundraising career in the state.
Watkins’s new title puts her in charge of developing new plays and musicals. She is the resident director of the Alliance’s annual A Christmas Carol, and she co-developed and directed Approval Junkie, starring Faith Salie, which began at the company’s Hertz Theatre before Audible Theatre brought it to the Minetta Theatre in New York and released it as audio. Earlier, she spent eight years as executive vice president of production and development at The Araca Group in New York. Her Broadway producing credits include Ayad Akhtar’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Disgraced and the 2010 revival of Lend Me a Tenor, directed by Stanley Tucci. She has also performed on Broadway and in regional theater, and was general manager of Broadway Dreams, which trains and mentors young theater artists.
