Author Profile:  Bill Hayden

It is hard to think of something Bill Hayden had not done in theatre in his over forty years of involvement as actor, director and playwright.  A former student of the Yale School of Drama, Hayden had done 10 years of summer stock in New England as stage manager and actor and five years off-Broadway in New York.

After his marriage to Lucy Hayden, who had been on the faculty of the School of Dance Performance in New York City, the two left the east to settle in Albuquerqe, New Mexico where they established the Hayden School of Ballet and then in 1962, the Albuquerque Children's Theatre which came to include a number of performing groups, including a mime troupe.

Besides writing thirty plays, Hayden also wrote and produced a children's television series viewed over Albuquerque's educational station in 1971.

As an actor, his unbelievable range of activity included experience as a professional mime artist and experience on the stage, in television, and in movies.

Hayden's work in children's theatre brought him touring grants from the New Mexico Arts Commission and the National Endowment for the Arts.  His play, The Cat Princess, published by Pioneer Drama Service, Inc., was winner of the Kansas City Community Children's Theatre Play Award.

Pioneer also publishes Bill Hayden's My Sister, The Dragon, An Orphan Betrayed and Clown Prince, the latter which was published in 1991 following his death.