Story of the Show

 HEDY! The Life & Inventions of Hedy Lamarr explores the life, inventions and person of Hedy Lamarr, Viennese-born Hollywood film star of the 1930s-1950s. Known as The Most Beautiful Woman in the World, Hedy Lamarr stored away knowledge of munitions while married to Austrian arms dealer, Fritz Mandl. She employed this knowledge to support the US Navy’s war effort during WWII by inventing The Secret Communication System with composer George Antheil, to make torpedoes more accurate. Also referred to as Frequency Hopping or Spread Spectrum Technology, her invention is used today in cell phones, WiFi, CDMA, GPS, Bluetooth and a myriad of other wireless systems.

Having studied Astrophysics with dreams of becoming an astronaut, Heather Massie marries her loves of art and science in the person of Hedy Lamarr. She brings Hedy to life while interacting with the audience and playing the 33 other characters in Hedy’s life including Jimmy Stewart, George Sanders, Bette Davis, and Louis B. Mayer. The audience summons Hedy to unearth the truth behind how such a glamorous actress could create an invention which is ubiquitous today. Massie says, "I use the story of the unexpected genius of Hedy Lamarr to empower women, to inspire audiences to find ways each day to make the world a better place, and to encourage young women in endeavors of science and technology."

Heather Massie stars as Hedy Lamarr. Director & Artistic Consultation - Blake Walton; Artistic Consultation - Leslie Kincaid Burby; Projections - Jim Marlowe & Charley Marlowe'; Sound Design - Jacob Subotnick and Andy Evan Cohen; Dialects - Page Clements; Technical Director - Dan Leary; Photography - Al Foote III, Charley Marlowe & Monica Callan.

Heather Massie was honored as the Outstanding Actress in a Staged Reading at the 2016 Planet Connections Theatre Festivity in New York City for HEDY! The Life & Inventions of Hedy Lamarr. The World Premiere was presented on Hedy Lamarr’s 102nd birthday in the United Solo Festival in New York City, and was named a 2016 Festival Bestseller. Ms. Massie was awarded with the Best Actress Award in the 2017 SaraSolo Festival in Sarasota, Florida; with the Audience Choice Award for the 2017 Shenandoah Fringe in Staunton, Virginia; with the Outstanding Performance in a Solo Show Award for the 2017 Planet Connections Theatre Festivity in NYC; with the Best Actress Award in the 2017 Galway Fringe in Galway, Ireland; and with the Audience Choice and Sold Out Awards in the 2017 IndyFringe Festival in Indianapolis, IN. It was developed in the Artist-in-Residence program in 2016 at the Grange Hall Cultural Center in Waterbury Center, VT, and performed there in March 2017. It was also presented in DivaFest 2017 in Indianapolis in March 2017; at Gamut Classic Theatre in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, July 2017; in a special NYC performance for Hedy Lamarr’s family and biographers in April, 2017; in a special invited performance at The Stag’s Head in Dublin, Ireland in July, 2017; and in the 2017 Charm City Fringe in Baltimore, MD in Nov., 2017.

Ms. Massie performed the show in the 2017 Intwasa Arts Festival in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, facilitated by the US Embassy, Zimbabwe. Ms. Massie served as a Cultural Envoy to the 2008 Intwasa Arts Festival as assistant to Tony-Nominated Playwrighting Instructor Mr. Leslie Lee. She returned to Intwasa to present HEDY! The Life & Inventions of Hedy Lamarr in her Leslie Lee Memorial Tour, and continued the tour in Cape Town, South Africa at the Alexander Bar, Cafe & Theatre and the Cape Town Science Centre. In Dec 2017 she performed the show aboard the USS Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in NYC for their GOALS for Girls Program, and in a Lecture Recording for NPR - WITF’s Mind Matters program for The Department of Aging in Pennsylvania. She returned to the SaraSolo Festival in 2018 to present an Encore! Performance and a lecture on Hedy Lamarr. In February, she was the keynote lecturer for the 2018 Inspirefest Salon New York. A special performance of the show was presented at the Austrian Cultural Forum New York in NYC in honor of International Women's Day and the Austrian Remembrance Year on March 6, 2018. And Ms. Massie delivered a lecture on Hedy Lamarr on International Women's Day at Siegel+Gale in NYC; and performed the show at Millersville University in Millersville, at Champlain College in Burlington, VT, and at the Grange Hall Cultural Center in Waterbury Center, VT in April 2018.

Ms. Massie presented the show at the Harare International Festival of the Arts in Harare, Zimbabwe, May, 2018, facilitated by the US Embassy, Zimbabwe; the Unizulu Science Centre, Science Festival in Durban, South Africa, May, 2018; the Thope Foundation in Khayelitsha, South Africa, May, 2018; the Makukhanye Art Room in Khayelitsha, South Africa, May, 2018; Women in Tech Cape Town at Alexander Bar, Cafe & Theatre, Cape Town, South Africa, May, 2018; George Arts Theatre in George, South Africa, May, 2018; and the Sci-Bono Discovery Centre in Johannesburg, South Africa, May-June, 2018.

She was honored to perform for Inspirefest 2018, the presigious Technology Confernece in parntership with Silicon Republic in Dublin, Ireland, June 2018 in the 2000 seat Bord Gáis Energy Theatre. She then performed at the Dublin Science Gallery hosted by Women in Technology & Science in Dublin, Ireland, June 2018; at Accidental Theatre in Belfast, Northern Ireland, July 2018; at Áras Éanna Arts Centre on Inisheer, Aran Islands, Ireland, July 2018; at Halla Rónáin on Inishmore, Aran Islands, Ireland, July 2018; in the Gothenburg Fringe, Gothenburg, Sweden, August, 2018; in the New York New Works Theater Festival at the Acorn Theatre on Theatre Row, NYC, September, 2018; in the Scranton Fringe Festival September, 2018; and at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia at Old Cabell Hall, October, 2018. She performed at the historic Players Club on Gramercy Park in NYC with White Horse Theater Company, November 16, 2018; and showcased the work at the 2019 APAP Conference in NYC in January.

She then performed in the OnStage! Festival, Rome, Italy, January, 2019 to a sold out house, and for secondary schools; she was interviewed on Vatican Radio and on national Italian news. She then toured the show to the south of Ireland to St John’s Theatre, Listowel, Co. Kerry, Ireland - February 1, 2019; The Village Arts Centre, Kilworth, Co. Cork, Ireland - February 7, 2019; the Friars' Gate Theatre, Kilmallock, Co. Limerick, Ireland - February 8, 2019; Tech Amergin, Waterville, Co. Kerry, Ireland - February 10, 2019 and two performances at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia, March 22, 2019 at The Cube in the Moss Arts Center, sponsored by the Virginia Tech Science Festival, the Kevin T. Crofton Dept of Aerospace & Ocean Engineering, the Bradley Dept of Electrical & Computer Engineering, the Virginia Tech Women’s Center, the Moss Arts Center, and the Institute for Creativity, Arts & Technology. She performed with ACANSA in North Little Rock, Arkansas April 25, 2019; and at the Town Hall Theatre, Mainstage in Galway, Ireland, May 29, 2019.

Ms. Massie served as a 2019 Fulbright Specialist to South Africa, through the US State Department, World Learning, and the US Embassy South Africa to perform with RedFest, the Rural Education Festival in Giyani and Tzaneen, South Africa, July 2019; with Inkcubeko Youth & Science Centre in George, South Africa for National Science Week, July- Aug 2019; with Christoph Meyer Maths & Science Centre in Mseleni, South Africa, Aug 2019; and at Theatre On The Square in Sandton, Johannesburg, South Africa, August 2019. She performed the show with Gamut Theatre Group - Harrisburg, PA - October 2019, with the AHA! Festival - Chalmers University, Gothenburg, Sweden - November 2019; and showcased the show at APAP 2020 in NYC in Jan 2020. She performed with the Stone Hill Arts Series, Stone Hill Church of Princeton - Princeton, NJ - February 8, 2020; with the PRO.ACT Festival in Kyiv, Ukraine - Feb 28-Mar 1, 2020 earning the Best Performance Award; with Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory - Laurel, MD - March 6, 2020; and with Doudna Fine Arts Center - Eastern Illinois University, Charleston, IL - March 10-12, 2020. Due to the worldwide pandemic, her heavy itinerary for 2020 was put on pause. Many engagements have been rescheduled and several are to be determined.

After a pandemic hiatus Massie returned to live performance with a Sold Out and Extened Run at the National WWII Museum in BB's Stage Door Canteen in New Orleans, LA - May 21-30, 2021. She then traveled to Iceland sponsored by a US Embassy Iceland Grant for the RVK Fringe Festival - Reykjavík, Iceland - July 3-11, 2021 playing at the prestigious Tjarnarbíó Theater, and was awarded The Character Actor Award, and The Maine Award (awarding her participation in the PortFringe Festival in Portland, ME in June 2022). As she was to have appeared as part of the Main Programme for the National Arts Festival in 2020, and live events were still not possible in 2021, one of her performances was streamed live from Reykjavík, Iceland to the National Arts Festival - Grahamstown/Makhanda, South Africa Virtual on July 10, 2021 for a truly cross-continental, cross-cultural event, which employed Hedy Lamarr's technology!

Massie then performed for the Stowe Theatre Guild in Stowe, VT - Sept 11&12, 2021; and for Suffolk Community College in Brentwood, NY - Oct 27, 2021. And in November she travelled to Italy by special invitation to perform with Lucido’s Festival "Extraordinary Women" in Cagliari, Sardinia, Italy - Nov 18-21, 2021.

Massie’s goal is to create a trilogy of shows celebrating women in science. Her second is to be Flying with Sally Ride! America’s First Woman in Space. In February 2019 she was the Resident Artist at the Áras Éanna Arts Centre on the island of Inisheer in the Aran Islands, Co. Galway, Ireland, for the research phase of this new work. She continued this work in an Artist Residency with the New York Mills Regional Cultural Center in New York Mills, MN in April, 2022.

She has also presented the show in the following events:
Private Virtual Performance - Zurich, Switzerland - Jan 24, 2022
Tubac Center of the Arts - Tubac, AZ - Jan 28, 2022
Willcox Theater and Arts - Willcox, AZ - Jan 29, 2022
CPAC Community Performance & Art Center - Green Valley, AZ - Jan 31, 2022
High Point Theatre - High Point, NC - (previously Feb 24) Rescheduled to Oct 7, 2022
Goodwill Theatre - Johnson City, NY - Mar 11 (private) & 12 (public), 2022
District Theatre - Indianapolis, IN - Mar 18-20, 2022
New York Mills Regional Cultural Center - New York Mills, MN - Apr 13, 2022
Sweden Tour sponsored by the US Embassy Sweden & the US Dept of State:
UPPTECH Science Center - Jönköping, Sweden - Apr 26-28, 2022
Navet Science Center - Borås, Sweden - May 3-5, 2022
Vetenskapsfestivalen - Intn’l Science Festival - Gothenburg, Sweden - May 6&7, 2022
Vetenskapsfestivalen Show: May 6 @7PM & Lecture: May 7 @4pm
Finland shows sponsored by Mid Atlantic Arts USArtists International:
FinFringe - Turku, Finland - May 11&14, 2022
Tom Tits Experiment Science Museum - Södertälje, Sweden - May 17-18, 2022
Cincy Fringe - Cincinnati, OH - June 5-11, 2022
PortFringe - Portland, ME - June 14-18, 2022
Virginia 4-H All Stars Centennial - Lecture - Blacksburg, VA - July 30, 2022
WAA Conference - Calgary, Canada - Aug 29 - Sept 1, 2022

And is scheduled to perform the show for the following events:
Scifest Africa - Grahamstown/Makhanda, South Africa - Sept 7-10, 2022
Cairo Days International Monodrama Festival - Cairo, Egypt - Sept 12-16, 2022
TBD - Intwasa Arts Festival - Bulawayo, Zimbabwe - Sept 26 - Oct 1, 2022
High Point Theatre - High Point, NC - Oct 7, 2022 - preceded by a Hedy Lamarr Film Festival
Zeiterion Performing Arts Center, New Bedford, MA - Nov 1, 2022 - preceded & followed by a Hedy Lamarr Film Festival
Sigma Xi Conference - Alexandria, VA - Nov 5, 2022
Upper Manhattan - NYC - Upper Manhattan Empowerment Zone Grant - TBA 22/23
Amityville Women’s Club - Amityville, NY - Jan 10, 2023
APAP Conference - NYC- Jan 12-17, 2023
Desert Hills Presbyterian Church - Scottsdale, AZ - Jan 27, 2023
Sarasota Jewish Theatre - Sarasota, FL - Feb 22-26, 2023
Kirkland Fine Arts Center, Millikin University - Decatur, IL - Apr 21, 2023

Plans are underway for further production in international festivals, regional theatres, universities, museums, libraries, schools, and scientific and cultural organizations. Further Upcoming and Past production dates can be found at the show’s homepage www.HeatherMassie.com/Hedy and at www.heathermassie.com/hedy/upcoming.
This project is recommended, and supported in part, by the Austrian Cultural Forum New York.