From acting to teaching, writing to performance art, ANNA DEAVERE SMITH has built a remarkably wide-ranging and successful career.

In the past four years, she has seized the American stage with her compelling one-woman theatrical performances. "Fires in the Mirror: Crown Heights, Brooklyn and Other Identities" explored the 1991 clash between Jews and Blacks. It earned her an Obie and numerous other awards, was broadcast on PBS as part of the "The American Playhouse" series and was the runner-up for the 1993 Pulitzer Prize nomination. First performed at the Joseph Papp Public Theatre in New York, Smith has taken the play on tour across the United States and to Australia and London.

Her "Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992" which examined the devastating riots and their aftermath, received critical acclaim on Broadway and in Los Angeles. Smith received two Tony nominations for the play, as well as an Obie, two NAACP Theatre Awards and numerous other awards.

"Fires" and "Twilight" are the best known of Smith's one-woman theatrical pieces which comprise her series, "On the Road: A Search for American Character."

Her next installment in the series will emerge from an upcoming residency at the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C. where she will explore the role of the White House press corps in covering and defining the American Presidency.

Smith's previous film roles were in the features "Dave" and "Philadelphia."

Born in Baltimore, Maryland, Smith graduated from Beaver College in Pennsylvania. She went on to get a Masters of Fine Arts degree from The American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco.

In addition to her roles as actor, playwright and performance artist, Smith teaches at Stanford University, where she is Ann O'Day Maples Professor of the Arts.

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