Givens to Speak to Local Teens on Acting and Life

Actress Robin Given is coming to Manatee County to team up with the Manatee Players to workshop a play she has written: "Joy in the Morning."

Manatee Players’ Producing Artistic Director Rick Kerby will coordinate the case for the project that Givens will workshop and direct during the month of July at the Manatee Players. The script was originally presented ten years ago in a play reading at Carnegie Hall in New York.

During her month-long stay in Bradenton, Givens will present a workshop two days a week for two hours each day at the Palmetto Boys and Girls Club.  The course, entitled The Art of Living through Acting, is open to teens and preteens. 

“It is all about confidence building,” Givens said.  Thirty young people will be given the opportunity learn and feel better about themselves through improvisation and rehearsed scenes.

The Manatee Players will perform "Joy in the Morning" for audiences on August 2  at 7:30 p.m. and on August 3 at 8 p.m. The production will be offered as a benefit for the Manatee Players. A limited number of Preferred Seating tickets will be available for each evening and will include a private talk-back.  Givens will host a reception after the final performance.

Preferred Seating tickets are $50 per person.  All other seats are Adult tickets at $26, Students at $13 and Teachers at $15. Tickets are available by calling the box office at 941-748-5875 or at manateeplayers.com.  

The next production of the play will be in Toronto, Canada in October. 

Givens has had a long acting career, but may still be best known for her role as Darlene Merriman in Head of the Class, which aired on ABC from 1986 to 1991. She was aso famously married to Professional Boxer Mike Tyson, who is talking about their life together as part of his one-man show "Undisputed Truth" now on Broadway.

Still Givens has dozens of movie and television credits to her name. In recent years she has had roles in NBC's Chuck, Lifetime's Drop Dead Diva and several Tyler Perry projects, including The Family that Preys.