Allison Lanier Powell, age 28, beloved daughter of Dayle and William Spencer and Donald W. and Bonny Powell, died Sunday, January 2, 2011, in Boston. Allison was an accomplished theater producer, director, playwright, and performer. For more than twenty-two years she had been in stage performances. Her most recent play was “Choose Thine Own Adventure,” which she co-wrote with William Shakespeare. It ran for six weeks of sold-out performances at the Filament Theater in Chicago in September and October of 2010.
She attended elementary school in Lilburn, Georgia, and then moved to Maui, Hawaii, where she graduated with honors from Seabury Hall. She served as the student body president and performed in many plays while a student there. She graduated cum laude from Colgate University in New York, majoring in religion and philosophy. She also studied at St. Andrews University, Scotland, and in Melbourne, Australia. During her college years she was active in experimental theater and after graduation worked in the San Francisco and Chicago theater communities.
She is also survived by her brother, Geoffrey Taft Powell of Nashville, Tennessee, and stepbrothers Matthew Spencer-Grice of Portland, Oregon, and Daniel, Matthew, and David Phillips of Marietta, Georgia.
A celebration of her life on the stage premiered on Friday, January 14, 2011 at 2 p.m., at the Strand Theater in Marietta, Georgia, with a reception following. It was also simultaneously webcast.