Rick Allen Wilson is the senior English teacher at The Wheatley School where he teaches literature, creative nonfiction, creative writing, and serves as the faculty editor for Vintage, Wheatley’s nationally award-winning literary magazine which showcases dozens of student writers each year.
In 2019, Rick’s students won the top anthology award for WWBA’s “To Realize the Future” competition in celebration of Walt Whitman’s birthday, and three of his students won top honors in other categories. He is a Harvard Club Distinguished Educator, a PTO Teacher of the Year, and he served on the English Cabinet for Syracuse University’s Project Advance English for a decade, championing student access to post-secondary English writing studies while concurrently enrolled in high school. He was also the 2019 First Place Poetry winner for Blue Institute on Cape Cod.
Rick serves as Vice President of the Board of Directors for Long Island Crisis Center, which attends to over 12,000 crisis calls annually. He is a skilled conference presenter and workshop leader. This past year, he led a team of professional and young, would-be LGBTQ poets in a Pride for Poetry workshop for Queer Connect, a program of Long Island’s Pride for Youth in Merrick.
Public readings of his poetry this past year included events with Westbury Arts, The Center in Brooklyn, Friends Meeting House on Cape Cod, and The Real McCaw in New Jersey. Published poetry, fiction, memoir, and plays include “Pumpkins, Tooth Fairies, and Wedding Cake” in Prime Time Cape Cod of The Cape Cod Times, “LaJuana of the Plains” (Screendoor Review), “Tacos in the Old City” (Owl Canyon Press), “Ode to Lifeguarding” (ImageOutWrite), “The Stonewall Trilogy” (Local Gems Press), “Parade Route, 2015” (Sibling Rivalry Press), and The Declaration: a parable of same-sex marriage (IndieTheatreNow Best Play/Screenplay 2010 Oklahoma Writers’ Federation). Rick's plays and musicals have been performed England, Canada, and the United States: Hockey: the musical! (Toronto: Betty Oliphant Theatre, Helen Gardner Phallen Theatre original cast recording and script curated as official artifacts of the Hockey Hall of Fame), Come Out to Play (schools tour in England), The Declaration: a parable of same-sex marriage (Planet Connections Festivity, NY, Fully Flighted Productions, NJ, Winner: Best Play), Too Much, Too Far, Too Soon (Midtown International Theatre Festival, Box Office Award and subsequent extension), Good Friday (Robert Moss Theatre, NYC).
He is a two-time Planet Activist Award winner for his socially-conscious theatre productions with Planet Connections in New York. Rick is also a talented pianist and composer who performs regularly with Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra. He is a theatre director who has directed in London, New York, and regionally, his most recent credits including the critically acclaimed Haram! Iran! at Emerging Artists Theatre, and the original Off Broadway production of The Greatest Pirate Story Never Told! (Snapple Theatre Center, Off Broadway Alliance nomination). He is a proud member of NYSUT, UFT, and SAG-AFTRA. As an actor, he has appeared in theaters across Long Island, regionally, Off Broadway, and, most recently, on season three of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel as Mr. Hollander.
