Ege Maltepe – Actor, writer, director, educator
Ege Maltepe was born in Istanbul. Her journey of theater started when she was 14 years old after she got accepted to Nöbetçi Theater School of Turkish Theater legend Ferhan Şensoy. Later her love for theater brought her to New York where Oscar winning celebrated director Mike Nichols resumed her performance by saying “Excellent!”.
As a theater artist and writer she’s known with her work staged in New York “Variations After Joe” (2009, Cave Arts Space), “TEA for 3, A Trilogy on the multicultural face of New York” (2012, LPAC), “TITS by Prof G” (2013, Wired Arts Fest), Women of New York (2016, 4thU Artivists), and Classical for All projects; “Drama in Beethoven”, “Talking to Schubert”, “Genius #CHOPIN” and “Two Faces/ Phases of Schumann”.
In 2009 she started Spolin-ist with her partner Emir Gamsız, bringing Viola Spolin’s improvisation technique to her home country, Turkey. She translated Spolin’s seminal book Improvisation for the Theater into Turkish. In 2018 Maltepe and Gamsız returned to Istanbul and started a two year Spolin improvisation school names Theater Games School under the roof of Spolin-ist. They also started Bach Cafe where they organize music, and theater events.
Ege Maltepe is a graduate of The New Actors Workshops/Antioch McGregor‘s Master of Arts program where she worked with legendary directors and teachers; Mike Nichols and George Morrison. Viola Spolin’s son, Paul Sills was one of the founders of the school. She came to New York on a Fulbright Scholarship after finishing her Bachelor of Arts in Bilkent University’s Acting Department.
Apart from Nichols and Morrison she worked with writers and directors like Edward Albee, Kevin Kline, Stanley Tucci, John Patrick Shanley, David Lindsay-Abaire, Philip Seymour Hoffmann, Eve Ensler. Ege Maltepe’s acting credits include “Hermia” in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” by W. Shakespeare, and “Marta” (lead) in “Misunderstanding” by Albert Camus with Bilkent Theatre, “Leslie” (lead) in “The Letter” by Somerset Maugham and “Arsinoe” in “The Hip Hop Misantrophe” with Hudson Guild Theatre Company.
As an “artivist” Ege Maltepe directed 4thU Artivists’s (formerly 4thU V-Day) production of “The Vagina Monologues” three times with different women ensembles. In 2014, she curated and directed “Women’s Voices”. The company premiered Maltepe’s play “Women of New York” in 2016. With the theater productions , artivist theater group has raised over $90.000 for different nonprofit organizations supporting women & girls.
From 2013-16 Maltepe produced music and theater events in West Viallage’s Caffe Vivaldi, a cultural hub known from movies of Woody Allen and Al Pacino. The Sunday classical concert series they organized and performed with Gamsız became a weekly hangout for New Yorkers.
Currently Maltepe resides in Istanbul where she runs Bach Cafe and Spolin-ist. Her children project with Gamsız Chatty Pianist and Story Theater – a children’s play with Beethoven and Shakespeare’s Tempest is on stage in İs Sanat Hall throughout the season of 2019-20. She’s also busy working on three independent film projects Chekhov in New York, Greatest Classic and Transformism, in which she works as a writer, producer, and actor.