I Interview Playwrights Part 461: Max Posner

photo by Kate Owen

Max Posner

Hometown: Denver, Colorado

Current Town: Brooklyn, New York

Q:  Tell me about the play you'll work on with P73.

A:  The play is called SNORE & OTHER SORTS OF BREATHING. It's a play about a large group of young people, and it takes place at each of their birthday parties over one year. All of them are pursuing "the common good" professionally - working for non-profits, NGO's, immigration law firms. They're breaking up with each other and visiting foreign countries and are very blessed to be very educated. This play is about the difficulty of evolving, together, as an organism of friends, trying to keep relationships the same and do everything "right", whatever that means.

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 11 and followed my sister into her "Creative Dramatics" class. I gathered a grain of courage and went onstage to improvise a scene. Boldly, I decided I was going to be a Pickpocket. The girl I was onstage with was wearing an unusually long T-Shirt. Down to her ankles. In order to "pick" her "pocket", I would need to pull her shirt up. I did. The teacher gasped. Then, the squawking and blushing and insta-gossip of our pubescent peers. I urinated in my cargo pants. My face was very hot. I sat in the men's room alone, legs soaked. It was a terrible, thrilling feeling. I had to go back into that room, I had to tell them I peed myself, perhaps I would say I was sorry, or perhaps I would shout that I wasn't sorry. Those gut feelings: humiliation, agony, and hope - these are the things I'm most interested in.

I took things very seriously as a child, which meant I was laughed at quite often by my own family. I wore shoes that were way too big because they felt right. I would trip down the stairs. I wanted to go to clown college. I've always been interested in accidents, and therefore theatre.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  Samuel Beckett, Wallace Shawn, Maria Irene Fornes. My mentors and teachers: Erik Ehn, Lisa D'Amour, Bonnie Metzgar, Paula Vogel, Greg Moss.

Adrienne Rich, Frank O'Hara. I read poetry, and I think it really informs how I think about plays, because it makes room for multiple meanings. The same poem completely transforms depending on where and when and how it hits you.

Also, this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VmO_0tIGo-4

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  Theatre that isn't sure what it's imitating, that asks us to learn how to watch it.

I like plays where people don't fully understand each other or themselves. I like plays that really do express the giant sadnesses and wishes and loves of their writers and collaborators. Plays that don't stare too directly into what they are About, because there is a certain mystery or a certain chase we're leaning into. Plays where conflict exists within characters, as much as it exists between them.

I also like to Laugh - to laugh when laughter might be inappropriate, to laugh in multiple directions, as a reflex and a celebration, because something is funny and happening on the body-level.

Q:  Plugs:

A:  There's gonna be a reading of my play THE THING ABOUT AIR TRAVEL at Williamstown Theatre Festival on August 10th, directed by Kerry Whigham.

And stay tuned for more Page 73 presentations in the fall!

I Interview Playwrights Part 460: Tim J. Lord

Tim J. Lord

Hometown: St. Louis, MO

Current Town: Brooklyn, NY

Q:   Tell me about your LA show.

A:  It's called Down in the face of God and it's being produced by this exciting, young company called AthroughZ who are an honest-to-goodness theater company making vibrant, physical theater right in the heart of the film monster's lair. The play began when director Jerry Ruiz was doing a Van Lier Fellowship at Second Stage here in New York. He and the other fellows were interested in putting together an evening of 1-acts based on Greek myths & plays and he approached me about doing a riff on The Bacchae. I took Euripides' idea, transferred it present day Southern Illinois, then swirled in various other Greek stories set in Thebes. I created a 4-hander that I was real excited about and started sending it around to no avail. Then last December Caitlin Hart, the director and co-artistic director of AthroughZ, contacted me about producing the play. The catch: they had a large company of actors at their disposal and would I be interested in adding characters. After I put my brains back in my head, I said, "How many total characters are we talking about?" Caitlin said, "Seven?" And I said, "How about eight?" They flew me out in February to spend a week workshopping the new version and now it's about to wrap up a 3-week run at Studio/Stage in Hollywood.

Q:  What else are you working on now?

A:  I created a whole world/faith/mythology for Down... and I have this ongoing love affair with the Midwest which gets tangled up with a love/hate relationship with Aeschylus, so I decided to rediscover and re-imagine his lost Oedipus trilogy. Down... is the 3rd part. And when the whole thing is done it'll comprise 3 generations of betrayal and striving for redemption in my version of life on the Mississippi. Then there are two plays that revolve around military veterans. The first is a play called Fault & Fold and follows two sets of siblings--a brother and sister in Iowa and a brother and sister in Afghanistan--as their lives become intertwined following an act of violence; and the other is a commission for the Veterans Center for the Performing Arts called Over Before We Get There. The VCPA exists to use theater to help vets transition back to civilian life. They were handed a collection of short stories written by Nick Corea, a Marine who served in Vietnam, and told they could adapt them for use by the company and I was asked to find a way to make that happen.

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

A:  The story, as my parents tell it, goes like this: I was pretty young and we were hiking in Rocky Mountain National Park--I was actually riding in one of those kid-carriers on my dad's back. The wind was whipping about, blowing through the cliffs above us, and I said something along the lines of, "The rocks are talking to me, Daddy." So my folks knew long before I did that I was going to grow up to be a creative type. Plus, I'm still a serious hiker and mountain climber, so nothing's changed much in the last 35 years.

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

A:  Burn the Regionals. Then see what we can build from their ashes. Or, at the very least, I'd like to reignite the idea that vibrant, exciting, new theater can be made outside of New York.

How do we find new ways of creating? How do we create works for an early 21st century audience? How do we get young people back in the theater? Some of the Regionals are starting to find ways to address all this, but they need to be doing more. Subscribers are literally dying off and young people don't even realize that there are actual, living playwrights creating new works. The furor over the announcement of the Guthrie's 2012-13 season is a perfect example of what I'm talking about. I have great hope for the new artistic leadership at Actors Theater of Louisville, but I'd like to see more bold moves like that across the country. The regional movement was a revolution. It's time for a new one.

And while we're at it, maybe we should take down Off-Broadway too(?)

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  Rich Moran, Liz Carlin-Metz, the now defunct Primitive Science, Terry Gilliam, Anne Bogart, Paul Vogel, everyone in Theatre & Dance at UC San Diego, and my parents who have found a way to support this theater habit of mine through the years

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  The kind that leaves me feeling out of sorts. Primitive Science created a play called Hunger based on Kafka's hunger artist stories, and I left not even knowing if what I'd seen was theater; but the result of engaging with work like that was that it expanded my idea of what theater could be and do. The SITI Company's bobrauschenbergamerica and War of the Worlds affected me like that too.

Or plays that I just can't stop thinking about for one reason or another: Julia Cho's Piano Teacher, Alex Lewin's The Near East, Sarah Ruhl's Eurydice, Tracey Letts' August: Osage County. I call them "gauntlet plays" because they challenge me to do more with my own work.

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

A:  No one's ever going to pay you enough to live on in this business. I'm a crazy optimist but dreams of making money from the plays you write should be forced out of your head. Please approach playwriting with that in mind. I don't say that to scare anyone away from the form. Rather I want there to be more of us out there, asking the tough questions, telling the difficult stories in a medium that forces human beings to actually live with and listen to one another. But unless you're a trust fund baby, you need to find a job you don't hate that will both pay the bills and allow you the time and space to live as a writer. This is advice no one ever gave me when I was starting out and if I'd known it was going to take as long as it has to start getting noticed, I would've looked different ways to support myself in the meantime. And by "meantime" I mean yesterday, today, tomorrow...

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  If you're in LA June 2-4, go see Cry, Havoc! at the Veterans Center for the Performing Arts: http://govcpa.com

My website: http://timjlord.wordpress.com

Journal of the revolution: http://bloodinthestone.wordpress.com

I Interview Playwrights Part 459: Adrienne Dawes

Adrienne Dawes

Hometown: Austin, TX

Current Town: Austin, TX

Q:  Tell me about Am I White.

A:   I distinctly remember my senior year of college sitting behind a huge, messy pile of paperwork (old notes and shitty first drafts) and thinking out loud, “This is it. This is my play.”

I first read about Leo Felton in an article in MAVIN magazine and couldn’t believe I hadn’t encountered his story elsewhere (especially as I was living on the East Coast at that time). First incarcerated at age 19 for assault, Leo Felton entered the prison system with the word “Skinhead” tattooed onto his scalp. During his eleven year stint, he quickly rose in the ranks of the White Order of Thule, described as an "esoteric brotherhood” dedicated to “revitalizing the Culture-Soul of European people." Eighty days after his release, Leo and girlfriend Erica Chase were arrested exchanging counterfeit bills at a Dunkin Donuts. The subsequent search of their apartment found bomb-making materials, illegal weapons and plans targeting the New England Holocaust Memorial. Shortly after his arrest in the summer of 2001, the press revealed Leo’s mixed race heritage: his father, a Black architect and his mother, a former nun with Jewish ancestry. Leo’s parents married just a few years after Loving vs. Virginia passed.

I began the sort of draft that came quite naturally as a twenty-one year old playwright: “HOW DID THIS HAPPEN? WHO IS THIS PERSON? Blah blah blah add some AVANT-GARDE SHIT.”

Several years and several messy drafts later, Leo wrote me (via email through a pen pal on the outside) after he found out about my play. This was pretty unsettling for a number of reasons: 1) Aside from a reading at Salvage Vanguard Theater in Austin, TX, the play only existed in my brain; 2) someone actually reads my blog; and 3) my lead character basically wanted to talk to me - from prison.

I had never, ever had direct contact with anyone that inspired any of my plays, despite the fact that just about everything I write comes from what I read in the newspaper (or in the case of You Are Pretty, what I watch on HBO really late at night). It took a few letters for us to determine a comfortable communication process. I had to make it very clear that I was creating a fictional piece based on his story. Overall, our exchanges have been very positive. As Leo has been completing his memoir, I’ve been writing my play.

So I’m in this story now. This is it. This is my play.

Q:  What else are you working on now?

A:  As if Am I White wasn’t heavy enough, I’m working on a play about the Haitian earthquake, violent sex and PTSD. I’m in a real mood right now . . .

I’m also developing two screenplay projects and in post-production on my web series, Completely Normal Activity. Completely Normal Activity is an improvised paranormal comedy about a twenty-something slacker who tries to document suspected paranormal activity in his apartment. Our second season is a prequel (a nod to the Paranormal Activity movies) so we like to pitch it as “what happened before nothing happened.” New episodes will be released this Fall but the entire first season is available online for free, forever, at http://www.completelynormalactivity.com

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 taught myself to read when I was three years old so very early on, I felt a sense of ownership of story. I could escape to my books whenever I wanted, with or without my parents. I experienced a great deal of emotional trauma as a young child and my transition to storytelling was extremely empowering. When I could not speak, I could always write and did so voraciously.

My earliest stories were autobiographical, attempts to explain my “difference.” Let me just say that I grew up in Central Texas in the early 90s (pre-Jolie-Pitt era). I’ll also say that I am mixed-race, I have White adoptive parents and come from an interracial, differently-abled family. There was a lot of explaining to do.

I was excited to find my first audience in my classmates, who would excitedly pass around handwritten pages of my Wiccan sagas and pester me for advance chapters. I was extremely shy and introverted, so this was a huge push of encouragement to share my voice.

Unfortunately, this also meant I could get in trouble for what I wrote. I’m embarrassed to admit that I authored and illustrated several inappropriate comic strips, based on playground gossip or national tragedy. I was in every other respect a model, straight A student so my terrible sense of humor came as quite a shock to my teachers.

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

A:   Lack of an inclusive community.

In part, it’s us. Theater folk. For all our ability to transform and transport audiences, theater artists lack a lot of basic social skills when the house lights rise. “Thanks for your $35, now get out.” Audiences and emerging artists desperately want in. Open a door or in the very least, open a window. There’s room for all of us.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:   Naomi Iizuka, Suzan Lori Parks, Vicky Boone, Jenny Larson and Christine Farrell. Special love to Mary Siewert Scruggs and to Paul Ryan Rudd, who helped me fall in love with Shakespeare again.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  Two productions changed everything for me: Classical Theater of Harlem’s production of The Blacks and Propeller’s production of A Midsummer’s Night Dream.

Now I want every play to be dangerous, strange and funny. I want to be an active participant of a theatrical event that cannot be reproduced or accurately recorded by any form of technology. I want narrative in the moment and only in that moment. I want to go home after a show and dream about it that night.

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

A: Truth be told, I’m still just starting out. I’m about ten years into my career and I hope I get another ten to continue to “emerge.” I will say that it’s impossible to be a playwright without a supportive community. An academic environment comes with a lot of built-in resources but if you are just out of school or in an academic limbo (as I am), you have to find your artistic home(s). You have to seek out creative partners and collaborators. And quite frankly, you have to stage manage a whole lot of shows before anyone will remember your name.

I found a way to work with every company in Austin after college and that’s how I met most of my collaborators. I’m not particularly out-going or extroverted but I work really hard and am organized. I believe if you put good work karma out into the community, it will return to you.

Be grateful whenever anyone reads your work. Have a law school friend or family member to help you read contracts carefully. Expand your friend circle to include some non-theater friends. Find some “extracurricular activities” to exercise other creative muscles and distract from writer’s block. Go easy on yourself (playwriting is not a competitive sport) and your peers (please do not under any circumstances talk trash about a show in the theater lobby or bathroom directly after a performance).

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  like meat loves salt will be produced as part of Eat Street Players’ Fresh Bites One Act Festival (Minneapolis, MN) which runs May 31st thru June 9th: http://www.eatstreetplayers.org/onstage/freshbites.html

My short comedy LARPers in Love will premiere as part of American Theater Company’s Big Shoulders New Play Festival (Chicago, IL) June 19th at 7:30pm: http://www.atcweb.org/about/about.php

Am I White will receive a reading as part of Blackboard’s Reading Series (NYC) in November. More details will be up shortly on my website: http://www.adriennedawes.com and http://www.blackboardplays.com

I Interview Playwrights Part 458: Susan Soon He Stanton

Susan Soon He Stanton

Hometown: Aiea, Hawai‘i

Current Town: New York City

Q:  Tell me about your show at Clubbed Thumb.

A:  Takarazuka!!! is set in the Takarazuka Women’s Revue in Japan, where women perform all roles in lavish Broadway style musicals.

I was inspired to write this play after watching an interview of a Takarazuka “male star.” She explained, “I always dreamed of joining Takarazuka. I never imagined what would happen when the dream would end.”

After hearing this woman's bittersweet interview, I began to research Takarazuka. I became obsessed with the lurid, surreal, and oddly compelling performances. I was introduced to the strange ritual of forced retirement that these actresses undergo, a tradition unique to the Takarazuka Revue. This play is my imagining of what happens when “the dream ended.”

Q:  What else are you working on now?

A:  At the moment, I’m developing The Underneath (a commission from Kumu Kahua) with Rising Circle. The Underneath is a story about Col, a young man who returns home to Hawaii after receiving a mysterious SOS note from his estranged brother, whom Col had left behind. When Col returns home, nothing is the way he remembers and Honolulu becomes a dark and unfamiliar backdrop. Although this play is stylized and draws from film noir, particularly The Third Man, The Underneath is a very personal play for me that explores complicated emotions I have about leaving home and living abroad.

I’m also working on a play called Murdo at the Public’s Emerging Writers Group. Murdo is about hoarding as well as the exodus of a small town in South Dakota. The play focuses on Paul, a Desert Storm Vet, now a hoarder and possibly the town’s final resident, and Paul’s hyper-sexualized eleven-year-old daughter, Bitna. I’m really excited about Bitna. I had forgotten how terrifying eleven-year-old girls can be. Even though I’m from Hawai‘i, my father is from the Midwest. This is the first time I’m exploring that landscape.

In addition, I’m developing a few short films and working on my first musical with Michael McQuilken.

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

A:  There is no explanation for me. But here's a story.

When I was five-years-old, I was lost for hours in a Beijing market. There were stalls displaying pigs’ heads and innards, live turtles, and chickens. I was pushed to the ground by the shouting, jostling crowd. A tall stranger grabbed me by my wrist and lifted me into the air. He said, "Do you know what happens to little girls who run away from their mothers? Their eyes are gouged out and their hands and feet cut off. Then they are shipped to Malaysia to beg and they never see their families again."

I was pretty sure this was my fate until my mother ran up to me. Turns out this charming man was a business associate of my mother's, who was irritated to have been asked to look for me. The fear that I would be kidnapped, disfigured, and sent to an unfamiliar place haunted me for years. I will never forget that man’s face or the smells and sights of the market. I want audience to feel vulnerable and engaged while sitting in the theatre. I want my plays to terrify and overwhelm, but also be funny.

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

A:  I wish it was easier to convince people to see plays. People will shell out money to go to a concert but balk at $20 theater tickets. A bad play is far more torturous than any film could ever be. But a good play can change your life.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  My mentors are Paula Vogel, John Guare, and Jose Rivera (they are also my heroes). My heroes also include Gabriel Garcia Lorca, David Lynch, Caryl Churchill, Witold Gombrowicz, and Charles Ludlam.

And if I can be old-school about this…Euripides. Even thousands of years later, his plays still feel shockingly modern. I also appreciate a controversial playwright. Euripides was controversial in life and in death. While in exile, it was said he was either killed by his rival’s hunting dogs or torn apart by women. That’s living life with the same intensity as your art.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  I like spectacle and seeing how magic is created in small spaces with tiny budgets. I’m drawn to impossible plays, awkwardness, and stories in which anything can happen at any moment.

That said there’s no one particular kind of style that I favor over the other. I think certain theater-makers create work that challenges their audience and demands to be seen.

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

A:  I think every playwright should read Jose Rivera's 36 Assumptions.

I also received this piece of advice from Martin Epstein. His advice stuck with me because I received it at a time when I was questioning whether or not I should continue playwriting.

“If you haven't already begun, read. Cannibalize the classics and track down great plays of the present moment—discover what 'great' means, but never imitate until you've absorbed the influence in ways to stimulate your own take on things. And see as many plays as you can afford until you can't stand it. It's best to see amazing plays and terrible plays.”

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  Running from May 26 to June 4, 2012 please check out Takarazuka!!! at Clubbed Thumb. http://www.clubbedthumb.org/

June 7th I have a reading of The Underneath at Rising Circle. [http://playrise2012.eventbrite.com/].

I Interview Playwrights Part 457: Kendall Sherwood

Kendall Sherwood

Hometown: Madison, GA

Current Town: Los Angeles, CA

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  I'm honored to be working for 10 great writers on "Major Crimes" (TNT's new crime drama, a spin-off of "The Closer"), so I'm soaking up lots of knowledge about screenwriting and playwrighting, both. But as far as my own writing goes, I'm thinking about a new play - an absurdist drama about a woman who refuses to give birth to her baby when labor pains bring up suppressed memories. Unfortunately, I've been stuck in the thinking phase for a long time -- maybe I'm scared to tackle some of those issues. To balance it out, I'm working on an action-adventure Buffy-style TV pilot, which is so far out of my pocket that it's just a thrill to be able to write a single page.

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 have to tell a story about church, as a lot of my writing centers on organized religion, particularly of the down-home, rural Southern variety. I have a distinct memory of being in the basement of the baptist church for "Bible Drills." For those who are unfamiliar, you memorize bible verses and perform them for a judge, competing with your classmates (or - if you're lucky - against the whole county!). The teacher left the room for a minute and, in some conversation that I've now forgotten, I used the word "hell." Not even in a "go to hell" sort of way -- more like a "I don't know what the hell Ezekiel 14:3 is." Of course, the room erupted in a chorus of "oooos" and I was immediately humiliated and felt so, so, so much shame. I think it may have been the first time I ever cursed. I tried to explain myself - that I didn't mean to say it, I didn't know WHY I said it. Yikes, I'm practically blushing now, remembering it. So much shame over 4 letters. There's something in there about the power of language, I guess. And it's probably needless to say, but these days I swear like a sailor and stay out of churches.

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

A:  It should be free. I also think everything should be free.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  So glad I get to answer this in writing. In person, when I'm asked this, every name and title immediately leaves my head. It's like I've never read or seen a single play. At different times, I've found myself drawn to the works of Martin McDonagh, Edward Albee, Caryl Churchill, Rajiv Joseph, Lynn Nottage, Sarah Ruhl, and Rebecca Gilman, who I had the honor of learning from at Northwestern.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  To be honest, I'm fascinated by simple stories that are interrupted by horrible acts of violence. The intersection of the mundane with that kind of mortality is kind of the definition of humanity, I think. I also dig plays by chicks. They are much too few and far between.

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

A:  I want to say that a broke writer's best tool is a box of wine, but I also don't want to leave out people who don't enjoy alcohol. What I mean to say is: use whatever method you can to keep perfectionism at bay. Whatever seems perfect today will read like shit tomorrow. And vice versa. So trust your words and just keep going.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  My play, THE RECORD BREAKERS, will be featured in the Athena Project Festival in Denver July 12-29. Find info here: http://www.athenaprojectfestival.org/events.html

And check out "Major Crimes," which premieres August 13th on TNT.

I Interview Playwrights Part 456: Wendy Dann

Wendy Dann

Hometown:  Morrisville, NY

Current Town: Ithaca, NY

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  I'm writing a play with music called The Liberator, a project I've been researching and writing for a few years now. Starting work with a composer soon. And revising everything else. As always.

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 grew up with two college professors as parents, and surrounded by eighteen acres of land...my parents were friends but never slept in the same bedroom my whole life...I don't think I ever put together what was going on until I was an adult, but I spent a lot of time in the woods playing make believe...turning rocks into horses and trees into gods...

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

A:  More people would go. Productions would all be great so people would come back.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  I took a SITI workshop in grad school, so Anne Bogart. When I turned to her and said, "I feel like I need to think differently," she replied "No, you need to see and hear differently." That changed everything for me.

At the same time I was studying with Bob Moss, and learned a huge amount from his other directing proteges: people like Michael Mayer and Kevin Moriarty.

And from afar: George C. Wolfe, Tina Landau, Paula Vogel, Tony Kushner, Donald Margulies, Sarah Ruhl, Annie Baker, Tom Stoppard, Brian Friel.

Wishing they were still here: Harold Pinter. Samuel Beckett. Chekhov. Shakespeare.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  Stories that feel so close to home I get embarrassed. They force me to reexamine my own choices, my own decisions, and how to move forward.

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

A:  Endurance. Sit down every day (jeez, Wendy, listen to that yourself)

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  Check out our new theatre company:
www.breakingbreadtheatre.com

And my ongoing project:
www.sammyandme.com