Twyla Tharp Keynote Speaker

Twyla Tharp is a ground-breaking choreographer. An expert in the creative process, she talks about how making an effort to think creatively can increase your productivity and happiness.

Twyla has choreographed more than one hundred thirty-five dances, five Hollywood movies, directed and choreographed four Broadway shows. She received one Tony Award, two Emmy Awards, nineteen honorary doctorates, the Vietnam Veterans of America Presidents Award, the 2004 National Medal of the Arts, the 2008 Jerome Robbins Prize, a 2008 Kennedy Center Honour. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and an Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

In 2002, Twyla’s award-winning dance musical Movin’ Out, set to the music and lyrics of Billy Joel, premiered at the Richard Rodgers, where it ran for three years. For this show, Twyla received the 2003 Tony Award, the 2003 Astaire Award, the Drama League Award for Sustained Achievement in Musical Theater; she also received both the Drama Desk Award and the Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Choreography. For the London production Twyla won Best Choreography (Musical Theatre) Award of the UK Critics Circle National Dance Awards 2006.

Her television credits include co-producing and directing Making Television Dance, which won the Chicago International Film Festival Award; Twyla also co-directed the television special Barayshnikov By Tharp, which won two Emmy Awards as well as the Director’s Guild of America Award for Outstanding Director Achievement.

Twyla is the author of her best-selling autobiography, “Push Comes To Shove” (1992), “The Creative Habit: Learn it and Use it for Life” (2003), and “The Collaborative Habit: Life Lessons for Working Together” (2009).