History Overview

private lives solo The company was founded as Project Synergy at Duke University, where they presented their premiere performances with the 1974 US/USSR Summer Arts Festival. They also developed a signature creative process workshop in movement/image/sound (see workshop section.) Under the direction of David and Suzanne White Manning, the company moved to San Francisco in 1978, where they continued to explore and present original “Ideas on Stage” using the name Delta Carnival. They moved back to Durham in 1982, reverting to calling the company the Synergic Theater. From Durham, they brought selected productions to New York, before moving there permanently in 1987. Along the way, their innovative productions and creative process workshops garnered considerable critical and individual recognition.

The Mannings’ original productions were presented at the Herbst Theater, Project Artaud, Julia Morgan Center, and Margaret Jenkins Performance Gallery in San Francisco; Reynolds Theater, Page Auditorium, the Ark, Baldwin Auditorium and Stewart Theater in NC; and Marymount Manhattan Theater, Schimmel Center for the Arts/Pace Downtown Theater, Schaeberle Studio Theater, and the Ohio Theater in NY. 

Suzanne White Manning bio statement (pdf)

David Manning bio statement (pdf)

Excerpts from Suzanne's Zoom memorial Sadly, Suzanne passed away on May 14, 2022. Excerpts from her August 2022 Zoom memorial are presented below, including David’s comments plus several music-image collages. Other segments such as her self-written bio statement (above) and the Private Lives Lullaby Quartet (images>videos) are incorporated in this website. Unfortunately, we were unable to record the many heartfelt individual testimonials. In many ways this entire website is a testament to Suzanne, as well as to her and David’s nearly half a century of creative collaboration.

The seeds of Suzanne’s longstanding interest in collaborating with other artists were planted with Requirere, her MFA thesis concert at UCLA in 1968, followed by the written thesis a few years later. Although we don’t have any videos from the stunning concert, samplings of Richard Russel’s music, Malcolm McComick’s costume illustrations, and parts of the performance program (pdf) are all incorporated in the opening 4:30 of the memorial video linked above (simply pause to linger on any visual element).

The remarkable written thesis can be read here (pdf).