Get Lit Players
MEET GET LIT PLAYERS 
MEET LITERATE
The Get Lit Players perform classic/contemporary poetry in addition to their own original works at middle schools, high schools, universities, and community events across the nation. They bring the passion and power of spoken word to the classics of poetry and literature. They bring to life works by Edgar Allan Poe, Langston Hughes, Walt Whitman, Rilke, Sylvia Plath, James Baldwin, Lorca, Neruda, Jimmy Santiago Baca, Emily Dickinson and many more. They are creating a resurgence of interest in the printed word by making it accessible for all.
The Get Lit Players are the premiere classic teen poetry troupe in America. They were semi-finalists in the 2008/2010 Brave New Voices International Teen Poetry Slam, where they placed among the top ten teams in the world for their own original poetry. They have been featured in the LA Times, HBO, NBC and an upcoming PBS Special called, “Art & The Mind.” They are endorsed by poets and educators throughout the country and were invited to the White House by Michelle Obama last May.
The Get Lit Players log over 150-200 performance and workshop hours a year. Classes are held at the Get Lit office in Hollywood or Actors’ Gang Theater in Culver City each Saturday.
The Get Lit Players are altering the lives of thousands of young people. They are tackling the darkness of illiteracy and lighting the way for our youth.
Jimmy Santiago Baca, winner of the Pushcart Prize, American Book Award, and International Prize for Poetry
There are no other young poets like the Get Lit Players. They take the Great Poems of the past and commit them to heart, then give them back to us – along with their own powerful original responses. The result is a conversation that can change the world.
Carol Muske-Dukes, Poet Laureate, California
Get Lit has given me the opportunity to be more than me. I am not only a better artist, I’m a teacher, a philanthropist, a literary scholar, and more conscious human being. The directors and the other participants have all been loving and supportive throughout my year in the program. I am leaving to study at Berkley in a few months. It breaks my heart that I have to leave something that has been so positive for me. I cannot stress enough how important being a part of the Get Lit Players has been in my life.
Gabriel Cortez, Get Lit Player 2008
After a recent Get Lit! performance at the Actors’ Gang the audience wouldn’t leave the lobby. People were talking to each other, finding common ground, sharing which poems touched them. As an audience, we understood each other better through the poets’ experience. This is the magic of theater and the power of poetry.
Tim Robbins, Actor/Director/Writer/Artistic Director Actors’ Gang
It’s been a pleasure and an inspiration for me, as Poet Laureate of California – to work with the Get Lit Players and Diane. Their seamless blending of memorized traditional poems with original spoken word response is absolutely unique and is an exhilarating and inspiring education technique, a dramatic tool for literacy and delight in language. I knew from the first time I saw and heard the GLP, that I would devote myself to their “cause” – there is no one like them – in rap, in hiphop, in spoken word – or in the canon of Great Poems – no one who brings poetry to life as they do!
