I Interview Playwrights Part 118: Boo Killebrew

Boo Killebrew

Hometown:   Gulfport, Mississippi

Current Town:   Brooklyn, New York

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  I just finished a script called "The Play About My Dad". Right now, I am working on revising it and getting it ready for a workshop in the Spring. I also just returned from a residency at Robert Wilson's Watermill Center with my theatre company, CollaborationTown. We began working on a new project (an ensemble created piece) about the self-help industry. I also am working with a sketch group, LaughterBirth. We are writing, filming and performing new sketches--it has been a lot of fun!

Q:  Tell me about your theater company. How did it come about?

A:  My theatre company is called CollaborationTown and we have been working together since 2003. We are a non-profit (we have a 501c3 status-yay!) and are committed to the development of new plays. One of our goals is to step outside of individual, traditional roles in order to unify different styles, opinions, emotions, backgrounds and philosophies into cohesive ensemble-driven pieces of theatre. We do a lot of ensemble created pieces, as well as more traditional "one playwright, one director" type projects. The seven founding members of CTown came together at Boston University's School of Fine Arts. We began working together there, and upon graduation, moved to New York and officially started CollaborationTown. The values that led to CollaborationTown’s founding; hard work, experimentation, and community, remain central to my identity as an artist.

Q:  You are also an actor and choreographer. How do these roles inform your playwriting and vice versa

A:  By working as a choreographer and actress, I’ve learned to write more physically and actively, as to understand theatre more completely. The whole of the theatrical process nourishes every aspect of storytelling for me. It is hard for me to focus on just one thing at one time: if I am acting, I am writing a story; if I am writing a story, I am choreographing bodies onstage; and when I am choreographing, I am investing in characters, so I am acting....it goes in circles like that for me and then becomes one big thing that I guess can be put under the description "Storyteller". Each time I invest in a creative process, I am taking all of my tools as a theatre maker and using them to explore the work as deeply as I can.

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A:  Well, I had an imaginary family. My sister didnt have an imaginary friend, so I created a family that had two sisters, so that she would have one. I knew (and still know) exactly what they wore, what they were allergic to, what they wanted to be when they grew up. There was Katie, who was my friend; Susan, who was my sister's friend; there was Mary, their older sister who was away at college, but would come home from time to time and was always getting into trouble; and there was Baby Wanner...he was a baby boy and we always had to baby-sit him. I have no idea where the name "Wanner" came from. Basically, there was always a bit of drama happening with the imaginary family and my real family would get daily updates. So, I guess I was writing plot and characters then.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  I love theatre that is fearless, whether that has to do with experimentation, humor, performances, direction, design, etc.

Two theatrical experiences that really, really excited me were "The Lily's Revenge" by Taylor Mac and "God's Ear" by Jenny Shwartz. Both those pieces just went for it and it was thrilling to witness.
I also love plays that are funny.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  I think the advice I would have to give is to find a support system of other artists. Whether that group is comprised of close friends, frequent collaborators, or is formed through a theatre; I think being a part of an artistic community is essential. I believe that continuing to hear other's work and ideas, as well as bearing witness to many creative processes, in an incomparable learning tool and a great comfort.

I would also say to write everyday. Develop it as a practice, similar to a Yoga or Zen practice and know that the actual do-ing of it is what it is all about.

Q:  Any plugs:

A:  CollaborationTown received a swing space grant the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and will be workshopping several new pieces this Spring, check out www.collaborationtown.org for details.
A short play of mine, called Date Night, is a part of a ten minute play festival this weekend at The Atlantic Theatre: Saturday February 13th at 4 PM and 8 PM, Sunday February 14th at 3 PM
Studio A @ The Atlantic Theater. 16th Between 8th and 9th Swing Space (it's free).

I Interview Playwrights Part 117: Daniel Reitz

Daniel Reitz

Hometown: Upstate New York.

Current Town: New York City.

Q: Tell me about the play you have going up at Jimmys No. 43.

A: It's a one-man piece called Afterclap -- the title refers to the unexpected fallout that happens after an affair. It's a site-specific piece, and the third site-specific play I've done in this space in collaboration with director Daniel Talbott and produced by our company, Rising Phoenix Repertory. It was written for actor Haskell King. It's about a man, a writer, who wakes up naked at 4 a.m. on the floor of a back room of a bar where he works as a bartender. Working through the fog of alcohol and pills, he hashes his way through the circumstances that's brought him to this state. He's a kind of young-man Krapp, and the play is about, among other things, the question of culpability -- when are we directly and indirectly responsible for the things that happen to others, what is it about our nature and behavior that sets off an irrevocable chain of events? How much do we even want to prevent these things from happening, if it means denying ourselves what we want? And is the torture we feel later worth it?

Q: What else are you working on?

A: A screenplay, a couple still-to-be finished plays. Things one should never discuss in depth when they're still be worked on.

Q: I actually don't think I've asked anyone yet about New Dramatists. Can you talk a little about what they do and what it's like to be a playwright in residence there?

A: New Dramatists is a true haven, a safe house in a lousy world for playwrights. Apparently, playwrights whine too much, or so I read recently somewhere, so I'll skip the "lousy world for playwrights" stuff, as any playwright knows exactly what I'm talking about, anyway. But the existence of New Dramatists is a buffer against the abuse, the disinterest, the dismissiveness of producers, agents, all kinds of professionals for whom the interests and desires of playwrights are not a first priority. New Dramatists is a community of very talented, disparate, driven writers who come together to share, inspire, share booze and food, and occasionally get into fights. It's a place where you can do readings and workshops anytime you want, under any circumstances you choose; a place where you can live if you need or want to (temporarily); where you sometimes even get paid to develop your work and where you can work with whomever you choose, not who's chosen for you. And it's a building full of the most loving, caring staff any organization could ever claim to have. I'm not a hyperbolic person; when I say these people are loving, I mean it.

Q: Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A: That's a good, hard question. So much stems from childhood, right? I honestly can't think of any one thing that's not too personal or intimate. Your entire childhood informs you -- where you grew up, who your parents were, what economic background you came from. Sexuality. All that.

Q: What kind of theater excites you?

A: Theatre that's not banal, not like tv or the movies, that's not written by committee or feels like it has, that's honest and takes real risks without being concerned with being "perfect," "finished," or "polished." Theatre where the writer, the actors and the director are fearless, but fearless along with possessing technique and intelligence. Theatre that employs wry, sharp, non-clichéd language. That jolts us and makes us feel acutely aware of being alive in this world, even if that's a deeply discomforting feeling, because theatre isn't necessarily supposed to make you feel pleased with yourself or happy to be alive. We don't ask that or expect that from the visual arts, from literature, from music. We often look to those art forms to elevate us, to tell us something. Why do we continually demand less from theatre?

Q: What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A: Read and copy who you love, and eventually you will see what draws you to that person and what you have in common, and you will find your own voice -- slowly -- and then you will write for yourself. Always steal from the best, certainly from those who are better and smarter and have lived longer than you. Don't be disheartened by the lousy world that playwrights have to live in, because it is lousy -- unless you're lucky. Know that saying “no” can be a positive thing, and it won't lead to the end of everything. Stand up for yourself, because more people than you realize will try to disenfranchise you, whether or not they even mean to do it. Always proceed with a healthy spleen and very good humor. And remember that with no playwrights there would be no theatre, and no theatre business.

Q: Plugs, please:

A: Afterclap. It's a 40-minute piece about a man in misery. As Beckett said, nothing's funnier than that.


Check out Daniel's interview at the Clyde Fitch Report

I Interview Playwrights Part 116: Alan Berks

Alan Berks

Hometown: Chicago, Illinois

Current Town: Minneapolis, MN

Q:  Tell me about Music Lovers coming up in March.

A:  It's a love-triangle, romantic comedy thing about two musicians and a record executive, and the Workhaus Collective is producing at the Playwrights Center in March. I get to direct it too with an incredible cast and a set that will transform the rectangle that is the theater into a bar/coffee shop/art gallery/stage. I'm very excited. Come see it.

Q:  What else are you working on?

A:  I started writing a novel. Seriously. (I think you and I had a conversation about novels when you were in Minnesota. Branching out.) I just felt like I wanted to deal with a wider range of subjects, more characters, bigger picture, and – as we all pretty much know – considering the economics of theater – you can't do that in theater.

Q:  Tell me about Minnesota Playlist.

A:  MinnesotaPlaylist.com is the website that my wife, Leah Cooper, and a friend, Matthew Foster, started in October of 2008 to fill the void in the Twin Cities for a more comprehensive source for information on Twin Cities performing arts. For such a large cultural scene, we thought there should be a trade publication of some kind. Also, we thought it would be fun. Sometimes, it's fun. Sometimes, it's a lot more work than we bargained for. But we're a central source for audition notices and a comprehensive performance calendar. We aggregate all the critic's reviews on the site and also provide a searchable database of talent in the Twin Cities. We also do monthly issues on various topics in the performing arts and get artists and arts journalists to write thought-provoking, or how-to, or memoir essays over the course of the month. . . What does it say that I can write more about this publication than I can about the show I'm so excited to be doing in March? It frightens me a little.

Q:  If you could change one thing about theater, what would it be?

A:  I would actually fire every Artistic Director at every non-profit regional theater across the country, whether they were thought to be doing a good job or not, and replace them with someone fifteen years younger who has been running a completely independent but successful small theater in the same town.

Why the hell not? People keep talking about theater dying; maybe it's because theater leaders have bad taste, or are too set in their ways, or too isolated, or something. Seems to me we should do something more dramatic than have another conference about how we can improve our social networking marketing. Let's change something real and dramatic, something about the content that gets produced. In a way, I don't care what one thing it is as long as it's big.

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A:  This is a great question. I think that if this were the question on grant applications that I was asked – instead of the describe-your-vision-as-an-artist question (Answer: depends on the time of day. . . ) – I might get more grants. . . And yet, now that I sit down to write about it, I go blank. . .

Here's one: The first script I ever wrote was a three-part sketch for the variety show in my high school. It was a parody of old-fashioned noir films, working on which I met the guy who would quickly become my best friend. Then, on opening night, I stepped out on stage in a trench-coat with a bubble gum cigarette dangling from my mouth and a fedora on my head and before I even opened my mouth to speak I heard a girl in the front row say, "He's cute." Then I started the monologue, and everyone started laughing, and kept laughing at all the right places. . . I think theater people are sometimes idealists because sometimes life in the theater is ideal.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  I like anything that is done well in any style on any subject though generally I enjoy active stories about adult people who actually do stuff in the world more than I like miniscule psychological analysis about people overwhelmed by their lives or archetypal abstraction that aren't about people at all. I like both language and very physical styles of theater. I like dance a lot these days. I like when theater makers remember that the theater is three-dimensional, that actors have bodies, and people – even in script-based plays - communicate with more than their tongues, teeth, and the location of their feet in relation to the fourth wall.

I get excited by plays where the playwright thinks that people other than him or herself are dumb, by plays that substitute clever for compassionate, or think that compassion is actually discovering that other people actually exist and they suffer. But that's a negative kind of excitement.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  I'd like to say, don't do it, but that's clearly not going to stop anyone really. Instead, I'd say that you shouldn't expect to make a living at it, and you should see that as allowing you the freedom to make the kind of theater you really like rather than the kind of theater that other people tell you is supposedly more commercially viable. No one, even the big regional theaters, is making commercially viable theater, so fuck 'em. There's always a bunch of serious or committed other theater artists to collaborate with. Find them and do what you want. . . Unless you're into musical theater. Then I don't know what you should do. Your theater is apparently commercially viable.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  Looks like a play I wrote a few years back called "Almost Exactly Like Us" will be produced by an off-off Broadway theater company called Theater of the Expendable. I wrote it for a theater company in the Twin Cities called Gremlin Theater, and it came in wild and woolly and just barely in time for opening, so I'm happy that I'll get another chance to see it done. I actually became pretty proud of it in the end. (That's a plug for Gremlin Theater too.)

A bunch of Workhaus playwrights are doing a show at the Humana Festival this year with Dominique Serrand, formerly of Theatre de la Jeune Lune. I'm happy to plug them. They're friends.

Send us topic suggestions for MinnesotaPlaylist.com. That's also a plug.

if you're in Minnesota for the Fringe Festival in August, I'll probably be doing an ensemble-created, site-specific piece called "Ringtone." Come check that out.

I Interview Playwrights Part 115: Erik Ehn

Photo Credit Kagami 

Erik Ehn

Hometown: Dallas

Current Town: Providence

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  15 play cycle on the history of 20th century America through the lens of genocide. Soulographie.

Q:  Can you talk a little about "Arts in the One World"?

A:  Fifth iteration. Follow up to rat. Building an ensemble/conversation around art for social change in international community. Draft (draft!) agenda attached.

Draft Agenda 12/30/09
ARTS IN THE ONE WORLD 2010

Home: Composing the Rooted Local in the Rapid Global Environment

How the arts and social services compose, consider, and translate community

We are looking at how the sense of home – the ways it is defined and enacted – is useful as a political and esthetic argument for fidelity, trust, immanence, the safe store of memory and the reconstitution of identity. (As against? in dialogue with? industry and the nation-state.)

AOW is an annual gathering; this is our fifth convening. We pull together students, faculty, practitioners and activists across disciplines, from immediate and international communities, framing presentations and conversations open to the school and the general public. We explore various ways artistic, political, and historical purposes intersect (through reconciliation, the recovery of historical memory, and advocacy for justice).

Our partner in hosting the conference is the Interdisciplinary Genocide Study Center (Rwanda) – where the Tutsi Genocide is researched, testimony is gathered, negationism is resisted, and social space for survivors is afforded.

Wednesday, March 17
2-5 Keynote presentation: Chinua Achebe in Conversation (R+R)
5-6 Conference introductions: History and overview
6-7:30 Dinner
7:30 Performance

Thursday, March 18 – Rwanda/Uganda: The Current Scene
8-8:30 Coffee
8:30-9 Reflections and Forecasts
9-10:30 IGSC Report
10:30-11 Break
11-12:30 IGSC Session 2
12:30-2 Lunch
2-4 Keynote Speakers: Hope Azeda, Carole Karemera
4-4:30 Break
4:30-6 Panel: Arts, service initiatives: Africa/Africa-US
4:30-6 Film: Jen Marlowe – Rebuilding Hope
6-7:30 Dinner
7:30-10 Performances, Presentations:
Jill Pribylova: Okulamba Dance Company
Colleen Wagner: The Monument
Film: Abigail Disney – Pray the Devil Back to Hell

Friday, March 19 – Palestine, Israel, The Mid-East: Conversations
8-8:30 Coffee
8:30-9 Reflections and Forecasts
9-12:30 Workshop: BoxWhatBox (Part A)
9-12:30 Panel: Becoming a Diasporic Cluster
12:30-1:30 Lunch
1:30-3:30 Presentations, with Q+A:
A: Lisa Schelssinger, Ed Mast, Laura Zam: from Collaterally Damaged
B: Guitta Tahmassebi: Operation Blackout, Michael Devine: Divided Territories: Making Theatre in Kosovo, Joanna Sherman, Michael McGuigan: Bond Street projects
C: Story Circle, facilitated by Devorah Neumark
3:30-4 Break
4-5:30 Conversation:
Rula Awwad-Rafferty, Neery E. Melkonian, Dorit Cypis: on Zochrot and the Nakba, incl. Norma Musih: on the town of Sumeil
5:30-7:30 Dinner
7:30-10 Performances:
Michael Anthony Reyes Benavides, Luis Rosa: Crime Against Humanity
Lauren Weedman: Bust (tent.)

Saturday, March 20: Opening out
[All day: Film Festival – shown on a rolling basis throughout the day.]
8-8:30 Coffee
8:30-9 Reflections and Forecasts – Yesterday, today
9-12:30 Performance Workshops:
Elaine Avila, Kate Weiss
Michael Devine – BoxWhatBox (Part B)
9-10:30 Concurrent Roundtables:
Systems (Theaters, Collectives, Social Initiatives)
Groups A and B
Special Topics:
A: Actions for the Individual Artist
B: Art and Personal Identity/Healing
C: Art and the Living Archive
10:30-11 Break
11-12:30 Concurrent Roundtables:
Systems (Theaters, Collectives, Social Initiatives)
Groups A and B
Special Topics:
A: Students and Activism
B: Cultural Diplomacy
12:30-2 Lunch
2-4 Concurrent Roundtables:
The Local and International in Continuum
Groups A, B, C, D
Performance/Conversation:
The Generations Project
4-4:30 Break
4:30-6:30 Concurrent Panels:
A: Art and Peacebuilding
B: The Visual Arts
Presentation:  Lili Bernard: Ceiba De Cuba
6:30-8 COMMUNAL DINNER
8-10 Performances:
Hector Aristizabal
Sandeep Bagwati: Transience
Paula Cizmar, Carol Mack: Seven, and Cklara Moradian: Tamam
Laura Zam: Collaterally Damaged

Sunday, March 21
8-8:30 Coffee
8:30-9 Reflections and Forecast
9-10:30 Panel: Storytelling Now
10:30-11 Break
11-1 Panel: Home and Homelessness
1-2:30 Lunch, Review, and Planning

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A:  I was seven, I was fat. I dove into a life preserver at a public pool, got stuck. Drowning, upside down - pulled out and the only way to get the preserver off was to take my shorts off in plain view. Art!

Q:  You are now the head of the playwriting program at Brown.  What are your plans for the playwrights who will be studying there?

A:  Have them write a lot. Write with an awareness of the whole U, the town, the region, etc. - To accept responsiblity as community organizers. To advocate for joy, even the joy of outrage.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  The kind that happens. What Abdoh was; community theater, anything that involves terrified people doing terrible things, or delighted people infecting the unsuspecting with delight. So, I guess, contagion.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  Get sleep, watch nutrition, stay strong and stay in trouble otherwise. Writing is a license to intrude, anywhere.

Q:  Any plugs?:

A:  Arts in the One World. Come on by!

http://www.brown.edu/Departments/Theatre_Speech_Dance/about/oneworld.html

Resources for playwrights

Places in New York to go read new plays by contemporary playwrights. 

The New Dramatists Library:

http://newdramatists.org/Library_Hours.htm

The Drama Book Shop:

http://www.dramabookshop.com/NASApp/store/IndexJsp

New York Public Library for the Performing Arts

http://www.nypl.org/locations/lpa

(You can also watch films here of plays and musicals from the recent and not so recent past, though I think you may have to reserve them ahead of time.)

I Interview Playwrights Part 114: Krista Knight

Krista Knight

Hometown: Portola Valley, CA

Current Town: La Jolla, CA

Q: What are you working on now?

A: We are about to start rehearsals for my play PHANTOM BAND in March (for the Baldwin New Play Festival here at UCSD) and there’s lots afoot with casting and designer meetings and the like. I’m starting something new so I won’t prematurely metabolize that play before we get into the rehearsal room. I’m alternating between a silent opera about a house painter obsessed with the family of a house he used to paint, and a play called SALAMANDER LEVIATHAN about a farmer named Salamander Leviathan who is being successively bled by the town schoolteacher in 19th century Wisconsin. I’m going to hear both tomorrow so I’m hoping one will float to the surface and make itself apparent as a play worth pursuit.

Q: You're getting an MFA at UCSD right now. What's that program like?

A: I love it. Naomi Iizuka (who runs the Playwriting program) is freaking fantastic. I really can’t say enough about how much she’s done for my writing and the way I approach theater. She makes me scared and excited and totally over-enthused about writing and play-making in discussion. Scared in a good way. In a – UH OH we’re going to create something and who the hell knows what it’s going to look like and if it’s going to escape and raze townships or bring people to a greater understanding of humanity– kind of way. I sweat a lot in workshop. Mostly I am grateful to be here.

The program itself is an exciting intersection of the theatrical arts – there are graduate designers, directors, actors, stage managers, choreographers, scholars, and playwrights all working in conjunction. In my second year I’ve taken greater advantage of the opportunities for interdisciplinarity. I took a sound design/telematics class in the fall, and I wrote new text for a production of LOVES LABORS LOST hybridized with a fictional Darwinian study of Sexual Selection. I also wrote the new text for an Enron-esque adaptation of Machiavelli’s play LA MANDRAGOLA.

San Diego sometimes drives me crazy. There is a gallery in La Jolla that only has sculptures of whales. Expensive glass whales. I think the door handles of the gallery are whale tales.

BUT the natural landscape here is beautiful and my German nanobiologist friend is teaching me how to surf. Also having The La Jolla Playhouse across the street is an asset. Their literary manager Gabriel Greene is dramaturging my Baldwin Play and we get tickets to some great theater.

Q: You were the fellow at P73 a few years back. How was that?

A: Despite the possibility of sounding entirely over-enthused, I loved that too. I think it’s the best career thing that’s ever happened to me. Asher and Liz took a risk on me. I proposed to write something about Intelligent Design and Evolution and came back with that piece about swarming teenagers and a molting grandmother I think they were like WHAT? But it worked out. It was such a rare and beautiful thing to have these intelligent, nurturing artistic advocates so soon out of undergrad. I would spend afternoons working on the play in their office in Brooklyn. They connected me with brilliant collaborators. That year is very special to me.

Q: You also were the impetus for P73 starting their writing group, Interstate 73. Can you tell me about that?

A: Sure! I had just moved to New York the year before and I thought it might be a good way of building an artistic community. When I first got the P73 Fellowship, Asher made a speech about making the fellowship what you wanted it to be—and they really facilitated that. I love responding to other writers and being part of a greater dialogue than what’s happening in my head and on my page.

Q: Tell me a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a person or as a writer.

A: Oh dear. Let’s see. When I was in kindergarten, or pre-kindergarten, and I would get hungry sitting at my tiny desk in class, I would reach my arms out as wide as they would go and pretend I had a large sandwich or slice of cake. I would munch this victual from side to side, recessing my hands closer and closer towards my face as the imaginary sandwich or cake was consumed. My classmates thought I was very strange. I don’t know what this explains though other than I have a vivid imagination and I am hungry.

I also don’t know anyone who could beat me at tag.

Q: What kind of theater excites you?

A: I like theater that kicks ass. I like theater where you get all tingly and know that SOMETHING is HAPPENING. I like theater that has something naked in it—and something raw, because I think that is hard for me.

Q: What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A: Call me, we’ll get coffee and talk shop. And I really feel like it’s an art of attrition. If you want to do it, and you love to do it, and you keep doing it, you’ll be able to do it.

Q: Any plugs?

A: If you’re in San Diego, you should see my play PHANTOM BAND April 14-24th. If you’re in LA you should see Ronald McCants’ play THE PEACOCK MEN at Company of Angels Feb 5th-March 7th. If you’re in NY you should see Lauren Yee’s play CHING CHONG CHINAMAN at Pan Asian Rep March 19th-April 11th. Go UCSD Playwrights!!