10.02.05: MARC KELLY SMITH

Marc Kelly Smith is best known for bringing to the world wide poetry community a new style of poetic presentation that has spawned one the most important social/literary arts movements of our time. As stated in the PBS television series, The United States of Poetry, a “strand of new poetry began at Chicago’s Green Mill Tavern in 1987 when Marc Smith found a home for the Poetry Slam.” Since then, performance poetry has spread throughout the country and across the globe to hundreds of cities, universities, high schools, festivals, and cultural centers. Each year, teams from American and European cities compete in the National Poetry Slam, an extravagant festival blending thousands of poetic voices. Not surprisingly, the Slam has taken root internationally and includes on-going performances in Germany, UK, Switzerland, France, Sweden, Denmark, Ireland, Italy, Czech Republic, and Singapore.

Born on the southeast side of Chicago, Smith’s innate sense of rhythm and unflinching realism has made him one of the country’s most compelling performers. Full of grit, his performances break poetic boundaries, giving audiences an acute vision of what poetry is and what it can be. Smith has performed and hosted at The Smithsonian Institute, The Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, The Art Institute of Chicago, The Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art, and at such festivals as the Asheville Poetry Festival (North Carolina), 1st Night Annapolis (Maryland), The Innovator’s Festival (Washington, DC) and Navy Pier’s Neutral Turf Poetry Festival. He has been featured on CNN, National Public Radio’s Whadda Ya Know, ARTbeat Chicago, Wild Chicago, WGN Chicago’s Very Own, Chicago Slices and has been a many time member of NewCity’s Lit 50, a listing of the top fifty movers and shakers in Chicago literature.

Smith’s first published book, Crowdpleaser, celebrates the Green Mill, particularly its audiences who remain at the core of the Slam’s success. Illustrated by Michael Acerra, Crowdpleaser, is a remarkable document, sensitively chronicled by original poems and anecdotes. As with the Slam, the book defies labels and explores new forms. It has been credited by the Chicago Book Review, The Chicago Sun Times, The Chicago Tribune, Illinois Entertainer, New City and The Reader.

Smith’s poetry has been featured in Hammer’s Magazine, Chicago Magazine, The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry, Poetry Slam, an anthology, Aloud! Voices from the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, which won the 1994 American Book Award, and The United States of Poetry, a publication that accompanied the PBS television series. His work has been cited by The Wall Street Journal, Playboy, The Los Angeles Times, USA Today, New York Times, The Chicago Tribune and The Chicago Sun Times. Selection of his work can also be heard on the CD By Someone’s Good Grace, a recording of the first National Slam Team Champions and Grand Slam: The 1995 National Slam.

Chalking up more than 900 performances at The Green Mill, Smith continues to host and perform to the Uptown Poetry Slam’s standing room only houses. He has staged a multitude of special slam productions including The Neutral Turf Poetry Festival at Navy Pier—Chicago, Slam Dunk Poetry Day at Chicago’s Field Museum, which had people hanging over the balconies to see the action, and The Summer Solstice Poetry Show at the MCA, which crowded people cross-legged into the aisles.

Moving his talents forward into an even more dramatic realm, he has written and produced two stage plays: Flea Market, a night of monologues, and A House Party For Henry, an interactive play, and co-wrote, produced, and performed in the Zeitgeist Theater’s The Psychic Café. He is on the Artistic Board of several Chicago based performing arts companies and is currently collaborating several performing arts projects including Sandburg to Smith, Petey’s Bridgeport, and Tap Dance Stud.

Listen to Marc on The Lit Show
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