I Interview Playwrights Part 472: Lonnie Carter

Lonnie Carter

Hometown: Chicago

Current Town: Falls Village, Connecticut

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  Lots of new projects including a Tiger Woods play I wrote with a longtime friend, Mac Davis. If you Google Walter A. Davis, you'll see the kind of cat I hang around with for the last 50 years. It's called TRIM and features Howard Stern, Robin Quivers, Jack Nicklaus, Wendi Deng Murdoch, her hubby Rupie, Oprah, Joel Osteen, Elin Nordegren, Earl Woods to name a few luminaries. Did a staged reading last October at New Dramatists and we believe, as Mac puts it, that we've got lightning in a bottle. It's a What-If play, what if Tiger never went back to golf after Elin konked him with a 9 iron. Each of these folks has his/her reason for manipulating Tiger and he, becoming more and more Hamlettian, will have no part in it. O, did I mention that Marilyn Chambers plays a pivotal role? We've sent it everywhere. Anyone want to read it? Happy to send an ecopy.

But also, everywhere I turn, my play THE ROMANCE OF MAGNO RUBIO reappears. The original production by the Ma-Yi Theater Company directed by Loy Arcenas won eight (8) Obies in 2003 and has been done a lot across the country and abroad at festivals - Manila, Romania and soon Singapore. MAGNO THE MOVIE will soon be in production with me sharing screenwriting credit.

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

A:  Not a story, but an abiding memory. I recall collecting Jackie Robinson comic books. He was/is my hero. I wanted to be just like him.

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

A:  Fewer plays about dysfunctional families/neighbors shouting at each other. I'm reminded of that routine - Is it Monty Python, or does it go back to Peter Sellers and the Goon Show? Someone asks the man in the street what he thinks of all the violence and rape and incest in the media these days and he says, It's just awful. I get quite enough of that at home.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  Graham Greene whom we don't usually think of as a playwright, but his play THE POTTING SHED is terrific. And he's such a terrific writer across the board. Shirley Hazzard wrote a memoir GREEN ON CAPRI. And is she a writer as well! Jean Genet. I saw a production of THE MAIDS played by three men, which is the way Genet wanted it done. Produced by New Stage in Pittsfield Massachusetts. Unbelievably great and directed by my friend Tom Gruenewald. (I had to remind myself that I wasn't in the best theaters in Chicago, New York or London.) James Joyce and his play EXILES. Lorraine Hansberry and A RAISIN IN THE SUN. How about someone living? My Yale pals, David Epstein, Bob Auletta, Bob Montgomery. My Chicago budds, Doug Post, Charles Smith, Steve Carter, Gloria Bond Clunie and the Victory Gardens Ensemble and every New Dramatist and Playwrights' Center writer ever.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  Refer to the above. More specifically, theater which I don't leave saying - I AREADY KNEW THAT!

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

A:  Go be a Mad Man/Woman.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  The Falls Village Marshmallow Company whose motto is NO ART, JUST FLUFF!  Betsy Howie, owner, operator, CEO, CFO, Chief Cook and Marshmallow Tray Washer.

Self-plugs? My column FIST BUMP, an etymologically-centric rant/riff/rap I'm getting around. THE ODYSSEY CYCLE, a jazz album by Russell Kaplan, about to come out on the theme of Homer's The Odyssey. I have a spoken word TIRESIAS ADVISES CASSIUS CLAY/MOHAMMED ALI over one of the numbers. Nitroglycerine.
 
lonniecarter.com

I Interview Playwrights Part 471: Sarah Schulman

Sarah Schulman

Hometown: New York City

Current Town: New York City

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  A new play about sexual harassment and race.

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

A:  Like many of my generation I was handed The Diary of Anne Frank at an early age and it taught me that girls could be writers.

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

A:  Right now the standard is to reflect back to producers and their identified audiences, their perceptions of themselves. I would change this so that the standard for theater would be to expand what we understand about being alive.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  I must admit that Cherry Jones has inspired and frustrated me for many years.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  Work that grapples with something that matters while expanding the kinds of experiences, points of view and characters seen on the American stage.

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

A:  Don't do it.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  Most recent book: The Gentrification of the Mind:Witness to a Lost Imagination (U of California Press)

I Interview Playwrights Part 470: Micheline Auger

Micheline Auger

Hometown: Sacramento, CA.

Current Town: NYC

Q:  Tell me about American River:

A:  I wanted to write the Great American Love Story. It's also a grieving. And a comedy. It's a grievedy.

Q:  What else are you working on now?

A:  Right now I'm curating the Write Out Front Playwright Installation happening in the storefront of the Drama Book Shop August 13th - Sept. 4th. Some 70 playwrights will write new work in the storefront while the screen view of their computer will be projected on the wall behind them, visible to the street. People can engage, support and follow the playwrights via twitter, FB and the Write Out Front Website. They can go to their shows, follow their careers and when they win a Tony, Lily or Academy Award they can say I knew them when... Tina Howe called it "Inspired insanity!"

Q:  Tell me about Theaterspeak.

A:  I started Theaterspeak because I come from a small town and even though my family went to the theater and my dad and grandfather were writers, I didn't really view myself as a creative person even though I played the piano, danced and acted. Being a creative person or being in the theater wasn't really viewed as an option. In a way, I think it was viewed as being egotistical. Instead the M.O. was "most people are lucky not to hate their jobs and do what they love to do on the side" so get a job in human resources or something. I had also been told that it takes ten years to make it, so when I was acting or beginning writing, I didn't really put myself out there as much. So Theaterspeak is my attempt to reach out to artists who have beliefs that don't serve them and connect them with artists who are creating their own work, their own lives in inspiring ways. It's a way to build community, to encourage people to do what they want no matter what, to believe in themselves and to spark innovation and new creation. And it's also a big thank you to all the people (like you, Adam) who have shared information, resources and their talent.

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

A:  Um, well I talked to myself when I was a child. It was the way I reasoned things out so, in a way, I think that was the beginning of playwriting and finding creative modes to help navigate the world. I'd also stay in the car when my mom would go grocery shopping, and I'd find pieces of paper or loose change in the back seat and make them into characters and do little scenes between them. Then, in high school, my step-brother died, and I wrote a piece about it and performed it for my acting class. I didn't think I was a writer, I didn't think it was a solo show. It was just the human instinct of story telling with people in your community to create connection.

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

A:  I'm certainly not the first person to say this but I'd make it more affordable to produce and more affordable to see. I'd also increase the avenues from which we collect our playwrights and theater artists.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  All the theater artists and companies that I saw growing up in Sacramento and LA doing their work despite the challenges internally and externally.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  I have pretty eclectic tastes in things but ultimately I'd say theater that is inclusive and is trying to have a conversation with a wide audience.

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

A:  Keep trying whenever you fail. Embrace others.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  Come say hi to me and the Lesser American's who are producing my play American River at Theater for the New City July 12 - 22. You can get info and tix here: http://www.lesseramerica.com/box-office/

If you're a playwright who wants to participate in Write Out Front, you can get info and application here: http://theaterspeak.blogspot.com/p/write-out-front-playwright-happening.html.

I Interview Playwrights Part 469: Greg Pierce

Greg Pierce

Hometown: Shelburne, Vermont

Current Town: NYC

Q:  Tell me about Slowgirl.
 
A:  Hm...it's a two-hander: uncle and niece. What do I say? It takes place in Costa Rica, way out in the jungle. Snakes are mentioned. The niece is trying to escape from something really awful that's just happened. Her loner uncle is doing the best he can to help her out but he's got his own stuff...I always feel like I'm saying too much, Adam. Come see! It's at Lincoln Center's Claire Tow theater until July 15th. Anne Kauffman directed it and she's a wizard. Željko Ivanek and Sarah Steele are killer. Seriously—I'm not just saying that because it's my play. What else...I wrote Slowgirl a while ago, did a reading in my friend's living room, and then put it in a drawer for a long time, thinking it might live there forever. So I'm really happy that it's now living on the Upper West Side, in air-conditioning.

Q:  What else are you working on now?

A:  I'm working on a three-part musical called The Landing with John Kander. We just did a lab production at the Vineyard Theatre, which Walter Bobbie directed masterfully. We're in discussion with the Vineyard about the next step. John and I are hoping to have a first draft of a new musical by the end of summer. I'm also working on a new play, and the libretto for an opera based on Thomas Mallon's novel Fellow Travelers (Gregory Spears is writing the music, Kevin Newbury is directing.) And I write fiction—mostly short stories, so that's ongoing.

Q:  How does your writing process differ when writing theater vs. fiction?

A:  The writing process is different for each project so there's no theater vs. fiction division in my head. Some things happen quickly, some don't. I tend to think about something for a long time, then write a quick first draft, then a slow and painful second draft, and then who knows? But it's always different.

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


A:  I wish it weren't so expensive to produce an Off-Broadway play. I wish all hard-working theater folks could make a living at it, and get insurance. I wish I could see a new Will Eno play every weekend. I wish jangly bracelets were illegal. I wish more people would go to new plays. I wish we could do away with all theater competitions, and just reward each other by showing up.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  I'm listing writers only, though I have lots of non-writer theater heroes like the set designer Rachel Hauck. But writers only: Will Eno, Pinter, Tom Donaghy, Annie Baker, Irving Berlin, Chekhov, Slick Rick, Doug Wright, Conor McPherson, Strindberg, Kenneth Lonergan. Lots of folks, but that's who's on my mind right now.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  Plays that have excited me this year: Denis O'Hare and Lisa Peterson's An Iliad, David Adjmi's 3C, Will Eno's The Realistic Joneses, Amy Herzog's Belleville. I don't know what these plays have in common, if anything, or why they excited me. They seemed like magic. Cheesy word, but how else do you say it? I left those plays thinking, "Wait, someone wrote that?" which is weird, seeing as I'm a writer. I like plays that remind me that the world is even bigger.

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

A:  Writing plays is a great thing to do because it's a great thing to do. It's easy to get all freaked out about where you fit in on some dumb spectrum but what's the point, you know? It's great to write something and do a reading in your common room with your friend, or to put up a show in your storage unit, or to just go to other people's plays for a while. Easier said than done, but it's good to be proud of where you are. Starting out is most excellent. If you've written 90 plays: also excellent. There's room for all of it. I'm not qualified to give advice but since I've been asked I'd say: just participate. In whatever way feels right to you. The only comfort in playwrights being wildly underappreciated in this day and age is that none of us is "making it" so we might as well just write what sounds good to us and support each other, right?

In late July in Los Angeles:

I Interview Playwrights Part 468: Susan Mosakowski

Susan Mosakowski

Home and Current Town: New York City

Q: Tell me about Escape.

A: Escape just opened in New York at La MaMa. Escape is about freedom—freedom from self-limitations, freedom from the limitations that come from the outside. It's about the chains that hold us back.

Emblematic of a person in chains was the great Harry Houdini. What kind of person was he? As a playwright, the most interesting thing about Houdini was that he was someone who understood the secrets of his jail. My play became about exploring our limits in all of their manifestations, physical and psychological. I created the character of Harry Houdini the III, but unlike his grandfather, Harry does not understand the secrets of his jail and is not a successful escape artist like the great one. We watch him roll around the floor in a straitjacket, trying to release himself as his wife Bess reads a newspaper and has tea—a normal day in the Houdini household—while next door, Gus, an unemployed elevator repairman, lies in wait with a shotgun. He keeps his neighbors and wife in the cross hairs, protecting his piece of the pie. At the same time, in an adjacent room, lives an agoraphobic actress held captive by Daddy, a terrorist on the run.

Three couples occupy three rooms. Imagining the play is to imagine a triptych. Three stages are going on simultaneously. The verbal text of the play takes place in one of three rooms and rotates from room to room throughout the play. The actors in the two adjacent rooms assume still tableaux or silent actions while the main action takes place. The two silent rooms create an expanded visual field for the play and are intended to contribute to the subtext for the play. The challenge in doing this was that the designers and the director had to create three stages and three spaces that are always present, always active because the characters never exit. The stage is transparent, where people live in rooms without visible walls or doors and windows, and yet they still are trapped. What does the key look like? That's my question.

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

A: If I could change one thing about the theater it would be to change the current system of producing theater in this country and in this city. There is a serious lack of small and mid-level producers. In the 80’s and 90’s there was a theater landscape that included a number of small producers doing off off Broadway shows, as well as independent theater companies doing their own work. Next on the ladder was the tier of producers for off Broadway, and then Broadway. There was an economic tier for many different kinds of work. It was possible to do daring and experimental work in smaller theatres and if the work could reach a wider audience there would be a step up to an off Broadway house. With the downturn in the economy what we have now is poor theater—and even that takes a small fortune to produce—and large theaters that need to have real ticket sales and subscription audiences to survive. Like the middle class that has vanished in this country so have the mid-range theaters. For many off Broadway theaters it’s imperative that they move a play to Broadway so that they have a cash cow to support their operations, their mid-sized ambitions need big money. While some large theatres offer a second stage and workshop productions, the vast majority of playwrights do not see their work produced on a main stage because the larger theaters cannot take risks, and the smaller theaters, in general, are producing less—NYSCA and the NEA has been gutted, foundation and corporate funding is down. Where’s the middle? How are we to sustain a vibrant theatre community when everybody is looking at the bottom line, when theater has been turned into a commodity? There needs to be greater support for those groups and individuals who desire to produce theater. Within reason, the dreams of a playwright or a director should not be tied to economics of a theatre.

Q: Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A: I have many theatrical heroes. Early ones were Robert Wilson, Peter Brook, Pina Bausch, Jerzy Grotowski, Suji Terayama, Richard Foreman, and Meredith Monk. More recent heroes are Ariane Mnouchkine, and Robert LaPage.

Q: What kind of theater excites you?

A: I’m excited by theatre that is total. Total in the sense that the conception of the work is a collaborative effort of text, music, choreography and direction, and design, all in process together from the beginning so that the whole stage is unified and that the theatrical experience is created from a wide artistic palette.

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

A: My advice to young playwrights starting out is that to keep the work front and center. It’s all about the work.

Q: Plugs pleas:

A: ESCAPE plays for one more week at La MaMa. Wednesday June 20 – Sunday June 24th.

Go to http://creationproduction.org/next/index.htm for info or to www.lamama.org