Charlotte's Web Creative

Director

Mr. Nathan Mittleman

is a proud graduate of Riley High School where he now teaches theatre arts and serves as the director of choirs. At RHS, he has directed JEKYLL & HYDE, FOOLS, THE RAINBOW FISH, ONCE UPON a MATTRESS, TWELVE ANGRY JURORS, and JUNIE B. JONES is NOT a CROOK. He also choreographed the last two SBCSC Summerfly productions: THE PROM and THE DROWSY CHAPERONE. Before entering the classroom, Mr. Mittleman performed professionally in Chicago and across the country at such theatres as Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, Drury Lane Oakbrook, Fireside, Northbrook Theatre for Young Audiences, and the Adirondack Theatre Festival. He holds a BFA in Musical Theatre from Indiana University and an MA in Secondary Education from Ball State University. Proud member of Actors' Equity Association and associate member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society.

Costume Designer

Mrs. Laura Pollock

is a costume designer, seamstress, sewing teacher and artist. She has recently done the costuming for The South Bend Civic's production of HOLIDAY INN. She has volunteered for all of the Riley productions over the last year. Laura loves working with the students at Riley and inspiring a passion for the arts.

Original Creative Team

E(LWYN) B(ROOKS) WHITE (1899-1985) was born in Mount Vernon, New York. For many years, he was the contributing editor of The New Yorker magazine. His non-fiction work The Second Tree from the Corner (1954) earned the superlatives of one critic who termed him “the finest essayist in the United States.” The critic continued: “He says wise things gracefully; he's the master of an idiom at once exact and suggestive, distinguished, yet familiar. His style is crisp and tender and incomparably his own.” White is best known, however, for his children's books and, in 1952, he wrote Charlotte's Web. This work is one of the most popular children's books of all times. The Children's Literature Association, for example, named Charlotte's Web as “The best American children's book of the past two hundred years.” Eudora Welty wrote of it: “The book has liveliness and felicity, tenderness and unexpectedness, grace and humor and praise of life.” For many years, White lived on the same farm in Maine where he wrote Charlotte's Web.

JOSEPH ROBINETTE is the author of more than twenty published plays and musicals, including Anne of Green Gables, The Lion, the With and the Wardrobe, The Paper Chase, and A Rose for Emily. Recipient of numerous playwriting awards, Robinette was presented the 1976 Charlotte Chorpenning Cup given annually by the Children's Theatre Association of America to “an outstanding writer of children's plays who has achieved national recognition.” Robinette currently resides in New Jersey where he is Professor of Speech and Theatre at Glassboro State College.