Learn about Paul Muldoon here and Lenny Pickett below!
LIEV SCHREIBER
Heralded as “the finest American theater actor of his generation” by The New York Times, Liev Schreiber’s repertoire of resonant, humanistic and oftentimes gritty portrayals have garnered him praise in film, theatre and television. Schreiber starred in the title role in Showtime’s critically acclaimed hit series” Ray Donovan” for seven seasons opposite Jon Voight. Schreiber’s performance has garnered him five Golden Globe® Award nominations in the category of Best Actor in a Television Series Drama and three Primetime Emmy nominations as Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series. He also directed the first episode of season four.
Schreiber is set to star opposite Will Smith in Warner Brother’s upcoming drama King Richard based on Richard Williams, father of tennis players Venus and Serena Williams. Schreiber will play their longtime coach Paul Cohen. The film will be directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green. Schreiber will next be seen in Wes Anderson’s The French Dispatch opposite Owen Wilson, Benicio Del Toro, Frances McDormand, Jeffrey Wright, Adrien Brody and Timothée Chalamet, as well as Lea Seydoux, Tilda Swinton, Mathieu Amalric, Lyna Khoudri, Stephen Park, and Bill Murray. Schreiber was last seen in Marc Meyers’s Human Capital alongside Alex Wolff. Based on Stephen Amidon’s novel of the same name, the film follows two families, one middle-class and one privileged, as their lives intertwine across the social divide. The dramatic thriller is produced through Schreiber and his production company Illuminated Content, with a screenplay by Oren Moverman.
Schreiber narrated “Inside the Manson Cult: The Lost Tapes,” a two-hour true crime special on Fox about Charles Manson and his loyal followers. He also voiced the character ‘Spots’ in Wes Anderson’s stop-motion-animated film Isle of Dogs. Last year, he was seen in IFC’s Chuck which he also co-produced and co-wrote. The biopic tells the story of Chuck Wepner, the liquor store salesman and heavyweight boxer who was given the opportunity to fight Muhammad Ali as an underdog and was the inspiration for the film, Rocky. The film also stars Naomi Watts, Ron Perlman and Elisabeth Moss. In 2015, Schreiber was seen in Spotlight, an award-winning film about the true story of when The Boston Globe uncovered the scandal of child molestation within the Catholic Church. Schreiber played Marty Baron, the editor-in-chief of The Boston Globe who assigned the journalists to the task. The film won several awards including an Oscar for Best Picture, a Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture – Drama, and an Independent Spirit Award for Best Picture. It was also listed on the American Film Institute’s Top Ten Films of 2015.
Schreiber’s many feature credits include The 5th Wave; Pawn Sacrifice; The Good Lord Bird; Lee Daniels’s The Butler; Clear History; Fading Gigolo; The Reluctant Fundamentalist; Salt; X-Men Origins: Wolverine; Defiance; Repo Men; The Painted Veil; The Manchurian Candidate; The Sum of All Fears; Taking Woodstock; Kate & Leopold; Goon; Every Day; Michael Almereyda’s Hamlet; Spring Forward; The Hurricane; A Walk on the Moon; The Daytrippers; Mixed Nuts and Wes Craven’s Scream trilogy. His portrayal of Orson Welles in “RKO 281” brought Schreiber Emmy® and Golden Globe® Award nominations. His other telefilm credits include “Lackawanna Blues” and “The Sunshine Boys.” As one of the documentary medium’s foremost narrators, he has lent his voice to such works as Mantle, :03 from Gold; A City on Fire: The Story of the ‘68 Detroit Tigers; Nova and Nature.
In 2010, Schreiber received his third Tony nomination for his role in Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge. His performance as Ricky Roma in the 2005 Broadway revival of Glengarry Glen Ross earned him his first Tony Award. He was again a Tony nominee for his portrayal of Barry Champlain in the 2007 Broadway revival of Talk Radio. Other stage work includes in Les Liaisons Dangereuses, the Public Theater’s Shakespeare in the Park production of Macbeth, Othello, Hamlet, Henry V and Cymbeline. In 2005, Schreiber made his feature directorial debut with Everything is Illuminated, which he also adapted from Jonathan Safran Foer’s best-selling novel of the same name. The film was named one of the year’s 10 Best by the National Board of Review. Schreiber currently serves on the Board of Advisors at the Yale School of Drama.
Lenny Pickett
Lenny Pickett was born in Las Cruces, NM, and grew up in Berkeley, CA. A soulful, virtuosic Tenor Saxophonist, his sound is one of the most recognizable in all of music. He was a member of the Tower of Power Horns from 1972 until 1981, and since 1985 has been the tenor saxophone soloist with the Saturday Night Live band. He has served as the SNL band’s musical director since 1995. His playing is particularly renowned for his skill in the altissimo (high/upper) register, which can be heard during the opening credits of each episode of Saturday Night Live.
Lenny is truly an autodidact, a self-taught person. He has no formal musical training, except for a brief period of study with the jazz saxophonist Bert Wilson (another player known for his facility with the altissimo register). While with the Tower of Power Horns, which he joined when he was 18 years old, he performed with Elton John and many R&B and soul groups, including Little Feat, Billy Preston, Rufus, Joe Cocker, and Hall & Oates. He has also worked as a saxophonist and an arranger for artists David Bowie, Talking Heads, Laurie Anderson, Mariah Carey, Katy Perry, Rod Stewart, Lenny Kravitz, and many more. As a composer, he has written for his own groups like the Borneo Horns, the Kronos Quartet, the New Century Saxophone Quartet, and the New York Composers Orchestra. Lenny has received a number of commissions to write works mixing classical and popular idioms for a variety of musical ensembles. He has composed music for theater and dance companies, collaborating with choreographers like Steven Petronio, Yoshiko Chuma, and Bebe Miller, filmmakers such as Fred Wiseman, and poets including Alan Ginsberg and William Burroughs.
He is a professor in the Jazz Studies program at New York University. When his schedule allows, he performs concerts and clinics worldwide. During a sojourn in Helsinki, Lenny recorded with Finland’s premier Jazz Orchestra, UMO. The results are beautifully captured on the new album (only his second as a leader, and the first in almost thirty years), The Prescription.