Jill Szoo Wilson offers talks that use theatre to explore communication, human behavior, and the ways people connect. She holds an MFA in Acting and Directing for Theatre, taught Public Speaking in higher education for 15 years, and has worked professionally as an actor, director, and spokesperson.

Jill also speaks about Holocaust survivor Eva Mozes Kor, with whom she worked and traveled for four years, including research trips through Romania, Hungary, Poland, and Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Theatre & Human Connection

The Art of Paying Attention
What actors know about listening that the rest of us forget
Drawing from Sanford Meisner, Harold Pinter, Lanford Wilson, and the rehearsal room, Jill explores what actors learn about listening, behavior, and genuine response, and how those same skills can help us listen more accurately, respond more honestly, and communicate with greater attention to the person in front of us.

Are We All Performing Now?
Meta-Absurdism and life in front of an invisible audience
Jill developed Meta-Absurdism to describe a distinctly twenty-first-century condition. The Theatre of the Absurd confronted a world stripped of meaning; Meta-Absurdism confronts a world overwhelmed by it. Screens, algorithms, commentary, competing narratives, and constant self-presentation leave us surrounded by interpretations of reality while increasingly unsure which ones to trust. This program explores what happens when everyday life begins to feel like a performance and asks what it takes to remain present, sincere, and fully human in a culture that never stops watching itself.

The Roles We Learn to Play
How theatre helps us recognize the roles we inherit and the choices hidden inside them
Families, workplaces, and communities teach us how to behave long before we think to question the lessons. Theatre makes those learned roles easier to see. Drawing from Arthur Miller, Henrik Ibsen, Tennessee Williams, and the work of the actor, Jill explores how people adapt themselves to expectation, how repeated behaviors become part of identity, and how recognizing the roles we play can give us more freedom in deciding who we want to be.

Workshops for Teams & Organizations

The same skills actors practice in rehearsal have practical value far beyond the stage. Jill offers interactive workshops that use theatre and communication exercises to help teams listen more closely, respond rather than rehearse their next answer, read behavior more accurately, and communicate with greater presence.

Drawing on her background in theatre and 15 years teaching Public Speaking in higher education, Jill adapts programs for leadership groups, staff development, retreats, and professional learning.

Possible workshops include The Art of Paying Attention, focused on listening and responsiveness; Presence Without Performance, exploring authenticity and self-presentation; and customized communication workshops built around the needs of a particular team.

Eva Mozes Kor

For four years, Jill traveled with Holocaust survivor and Mengele twin Eva Mozes Kor while researching her life, experiences, and philosophy of forgiveness. That work became Throwing Stones: The Eva Mozes Kor Project and a continuing body of writing about survival, memory, and the difficult questions surrounding Eva’s decision to forgive.

Eva Mozes Kor and the Difficult Question of Forgiveness
Survival, memory, and the right to choose
Eva’s decision to forgive the Nazis made her internationally known and sparked fierce disagreement among survivors. Drawing from her years working with Eva, Jill explores what Eva meant by forgiveness, why other survivors objected, and what her philosophy can teach us about forgiving the people who have hurt us in our own lives. The program considers forgiveness as a personal choice rather than an obligation, asking what it can release, what it cannot repair, and why no one else gets to decide when or whether we are ready to offer it.

What Would You Do to Survive?
Auschwitz, human behavior, and the choices made when there are no good choices
Drawing from Jill’s travels with Eva through Eastern Europe and Auschwitz-Birkenau, this program examines survival at the human scale: hunger, fear, work, luck, adaptation, and the decisions people made in pursuit of one more day. Through Eva’s story and the experiences of other prisoners, Jill explores the extraordinary resourcefulness and endurance human beings can summon under extreme conditions, and what those stories can teach us about resilience, hope, and the stubborn will to keep living when almost everything has been taken away.

About Jill

Jill Szoo Wilson is a writer, theatre artist, educator, and communication professional with an MFA in Acting and Directing for Theatre and a BSE in Speech Communication and Theatre. She taught Public Speaking in higher education for 15 years, has worked professionally as an actor and director, and spent a decade as an on-air spokesperson. Jill is also the playwright and researcher behind Throwing Stones: The Eva Mozes Kor Project, developed through four years of work and travel with Holocaust survivor Eva Mozes Kor in Poland, Hungary, and Romania. She lives in the St. Louis area and is available for in-person and virtual programs.