Douglas McKeown, a multifaceted artist, unleashed terror on several Metuchen, New Jersey neighborhoods in the 1950s, and at a young age, he filmed a T-Rex devouring his brother.
As a teenager, McKeown began a brief career in teaching film, theatre, and literature in the early 1970s, during which several of his students went on to achieve success in television, film, and on the Broadway stage.
He later moved to New York and joined the Jean Cocteau Repertory, initially as an actor, playing a diverse range of characters, including Tony Lumpkin in "She Stoops To Conquer," the aged Emperor in "The Brass Butterfly," and doubling Duncan and the Porter in "Macbeth."
McKeown then transitioned to a designer of scenery, costumes, and makeup for revivals of classics such as "The Cenci," "Salome," "As You Like It," "The Tempest," "Hamlet," "The Dybbuk," "'Tis Pity She's a Whore," and "The Roman Actor."
He collaborated with Tennessee Williams, designing the playwright's last world premiere production in New York, "Something Cloudy, Something Clear."
Among the plays McKeown directed were "The Witch of Edmonton," "The Oresteia of Aeschylus," and "Cymbeline."
During this period, he also wrote and directed his first feature film, "The Deadly Spawn" (1983),which was recently restored to DVD by Synapse Films in 2004.
In later years, as a videographer, McKeown recorded significant public events for the LGBT Center in New York City, including their fund-raising documentary "Center Challenge: an Architectural Tour" for the Center's major renovation effort.
He also directed and co-wrote special scenes for the indie film, "The Watermelon Woman" (1997),shot on location in Philadelphia.
While at Sony Music in New York, McKeown joined the team that produced "Sony Music 100 Years: Soundtrack For A Century," a 26-disc box set.
In January 2005, he returned to the stage as an actor in Kafka's "The Trial," the inaugural production of the Phoenix Theatre Ensemble, and has since appeared with that company in "Antigone" (2007) and "The Lifeblood" (2008).
McKeown is also the editor of the anthology, "Queer Stories for Boys" (Thunder's Mouth Press, 2005),and currently resides in New York City.
