I Interview Playwrights Part 291: James McManus

James McManus

Hometown: Donora, PA

Current Town: Long Island City, NY

Q: Tell me about Cherry Smoke.

A: I wrote Cherry Smoke as my grad thesis. I literally wrote over 100 scenes for the play and then put it together like a jig saw puzzle in order to make a play. I based the story on the boys and girls I knew growing up. Our area was ravaged by poverty and many were not able to take advantage of even a primary education because of worsening family situations. But even in the ignorance, there was a beauty in both the language and the dreams. Many of them didn't make it off of those riversides whole, but I guess that I'm bold enough to think that all of those lost souls got together and want me to write their story. Cherry Smoke is enjoying its 6th production and I am keenly aware that the boys and girls I write about never got a chance to see places like Sydney or Scotland or even New York City where it has been produced...and I get an unending kick out of thinking about how these kids who could see every place that they had traveled by climbing a tree are now jet setters. I allow myself that little thunderclap of hope in the brutal world of Cherry Smoke.

Q:  What else are you working on?

A:  I'm working on a play about meth addicts titled Blood Potato. A screenplay that I can't contractually talk about. And I've recently started work on a musical set in the early 1900's in the world of the County Fairs of Western PA. It's my first time trying to write a musical and it's just tickling me to death.

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

A:  One day, I was eating a McRib sandwich, fries and an orange pop at the Donora McDonald's, the next day it was closed. The local paper said McDonald's left town because the townsfolk could no longer afford to eat there due to the mill closing down. I wish I was making this up.

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

A:  I would love it to not be so cost prohibitive.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  As a kid near Pittsburgh, I knew nothing of theater until someone introduced me to free tickets to Two Trains Running by August Wilson. I've always had a soft spot for Wilson since then. I love so many of my contemporaries, but would leave someone out if I named just a few. I will say that seeing a production of MUD by Maria Irene Fornes 5 or so years back changed the way I look at theater and reading SCARCITY by Lucy Thurber was like taking brave pills.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  Brave theater. I think the role of the artist is to not take one fucking step back from what the truth is no matter how it looks or how it makes you feel. I like theater that makes me uncomfortable. I like theater that turns a mirror on folks who I have never seen before.

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

A:  Write all the time. Write about big things. A hundred years from now no one will give a damn about conversations you overheard about the 7 train in New York City.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  My play, Cherry Smoke, runs at The Side Project thru December 19th. thesideproject.net has all the pertinent info for tickets.

I Interview Playwrights Part 290: Philip Dawkins

Philip Dawkins

Hometown: Chicago (though, full disclosure, I was born in Phoenix, AZ. But it was never my hometown.)

Current Town: Chicago

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  I just finished costuming an opera, which isn't writing, but it's story telling in a way, yeah? It's called "Boojum! Nonsense, Truth, and Lewis Carroll," and it's a co-production between my company, Chicago Opera Vanguard and Caffeine Theater. It's a really whacked out existential musical trip through the brain space of Lewis Carroll, and I'm proud to have worked on it, and happy to be finished.

Writing-wise, I'm working on a children's play for a theater in NY about death and grief. (!!!) And I just finished a first draft of a new play called FAILURE: A LOVE STORY.

In the new year, I'll be gearing up for About Face's premiere production of my play, THE HOMOSEXUALS. I just honestly couldn't be more excited about that.

Also, I'm nearing a test for my black sash in Shaolin Kung Fu, and trying my darndest to train for that.

Q:  How would you characterize Chicago theater?

A:  Blue Collar. Chicagoans take their theatre seriously. We've had a long day at work, and we're either going to put on our duck boots and Carharts to go to the bar where it's warm and we know we can count on good conversation, good whiskey, and a good fist fight; or we can put on something nice and try to find snowy parking to see a show. So, if we choose a show, it better be worth it. Which is not to say that a Chicago audience isn't cultured. No, Chicagoans know what they like, they know what's good, and if it isn't good, they're not going to give you a standing ovation on principal. They're going to stand up and say, "So that sucked. See you at the bar?" No phoning it in with Chicago Theatre.

Also, I think, Chicago theatre is accessible in a way. The cost of putting up a show here is . . . well, let's just say it's possible. And you can afford to take a big risk, do the show that maybe most people will hate but that you desperately feel needs to be seen. Why not? You won't go bankrupt. And if the people who need to see that show get to see that show, then Yahtzee! It's a success. A financial success? Maybe not. But it got done, it got seen, and no one went to the poor house.


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

A:  Growing up in Phoenix, a lot of my friends were Mexican or Native American. But, as a kid, of course, I didn't recognize any cultural distinctions. My best friend all through grade school was a Mexican American kid named Manny. We spent pretty much every recess together, and if I remember correctly, he was one of only two kids who bothered to show up to my tenth birthday party. Manny was very, very quiet, very shy, didn't say much, but a nice nice kid. We got along great.

A few years ago I was talking about Manny with my mother, and she said, "Philip, you know that Manny didn't speak English, right?"
News to me.

All this to say, I'm pretty comfortable with monologue.

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

A:  I'd like more people to go to it.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  Personal mentors. I was a child actor, and I was very very lucky to be looked after by the most amazing roster of adult performers and theatrical nurturers. I dedicated my first published play to David Wo, who was sort of my theatre father. He gave me my first professional writing gig when I was sixteen, and then died later that summer. I had no idea he was even sick. He knew, and he went out of his way to give me that experience, to show me that I really could do this with my life. I don't believe in angels, but if I did ... David Wo.

And many others. A long list. I was a very, very fortunate child of the theatre.

Currently, my heroes are my students. Not all of them. Some of them are massive chores. But most of my students are, if not heroic, then inspirational to me. I think most teachers would agree with that...

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  Theater with a story. There' s a lot of really excellent spectacle being done all over the place. I mean, REALLY excellent. Breath taking. But if there's no story, if there are no characters journeying against all odds toward something they want, then I'm out. Spectacle without story is, in my mind, circus. There's nothing wrong the circus, but I didn't say goodbye cruel world to join the circus. I left to join the theatre.

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

A:  Write, Listen, Relax. Repeat.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  The play at About Face
http://aboutfacetheatre.com/?pg=homosexuals

The Opera at the Department of Cultural Affairs
http://www.dcatheater.org/shows/show/boojum_nonsense_truth_and_lewis_carroll/

My published kids plays
http://www.playscripts.com/author.php3?authorid=928

Cino Nights, Chicago

Here is a great article about Cino Nights.  19 playwrights asked to write a full length for the 7th street small stage at Jimmys No. 43 in nyc.  I'm doing it.  Great insight into some of the playwrights involved.  It's a lot of fun.  And it's free.  I suggest you see as many as you can.  The schedule is here.  Pretty much one a month through March 2012.

You in Chicago?  Come see my reading of Elsewhere at Chicago Dramatists at 7pm on Mon the 6th.  I will be there.

I Interview Playwrights Part 289: Jen Silverman

Jen Silverman

Hometown: I was born in Simsbury, CT & went to high school there later. Between being born and being officially educated, I lived in Europe, Asia, and Scandinavia, returning to Simsbury from time to time to learn how to be American. Let me know if it paid off.

Current Town: Iowa City, Iowa. Finishing up my MFA at the Iowa Playwrights Workshop.

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  A few different things, all at once, including trying to type this, pack a suitcase, make a sandwich, and drink a mason jar full of coffee without spilling it everywhere. Oh, you mean theatre?

I’m working on a final draft of my play “Gilgamesh’s Game” that I workshopped at Seven Devils Playwrights Conference this summer (playwrights, these people are gold, apply!), and on a second draft of a new play called “Still,” which came from a series of conversations with writer and professor Lisa Heineman about stillbirth and homebirth. Until this project I’d never thought much about the kind of reverberations (both personal and political) that the loss of a newborn sends through a family and a community. Lisa is currently working on a book about her experience of stillbirth, and our conversations have been quite a learning experience for me as a person and also as a writer—how to interrogate questions of loss, choice, and community in a way that is new and fresh while also being honest.

I’m also starting work on a new play for which I got a research grant this summer. As a kid I lived in Tokyo for a bit, then after undergrad I moved back to live in the rural south, in Okayama. I’ve been back to Japan every year since I moved away from Okayama, and this past summer I came back specifically to conduct interviews in the small but vibrant community of South Africans living and working in Japan. Many of the interviews have to do with their reasons for coming to Japan, the lives they’ve created there, the ones they’ve left behind, and the intricate balancing act of positioning themselves between worlds.

The impetus for the research and the play came from conversations I’ve had for the past four years with my close friend, South African photographer and writer Marilu Snyders. In some ways this project is a continuation of the conversations we started in 2006 when we were kicking around the mountains of Okayama together, drinking terrible vending-machine coffee and talking about identity, culture, place, roots.

Marilu and a number of other friends have been telling me that incredible things are happening in South Africa right now—musically, artistically, in terms of creativity and self-expression, despite (or in response to) violence and poverty and political corruption. So for them there’s this thing of, “Do I have the responsibility to go back and be part of that? Or do I want to stay in this life I’ve built for myself here?” And for me—I feel like I’ve spent maybe 95% of my adult life asking myself that specific question: Do I stay or do I go, where do I belong, how does the life I’m building in this particular country/ state fit into the one I left and the one I’m moving toward. I have a complicated relationship with my nationality—as, perhaps, do most American artists—and embedded in that are questions about my responsibility to America as an artist, as a citizen, as someone who has had ample opportunities to cut ties and run, but keeps coming back.

Which is all to say: I’m starting work on the first draft of the play now. It feels harder to write and larger than almost anything I’ve worked on recently. Which means I’m looking forward to 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:  I was homeschooled until high school, which meant that upon completing the requisite lessons in the morning, I spent a lot of afternoons running around the streets of various towns, cities, and countries, improving my language skills by talking to strangers. Almost without fail, they would ask if I was cutting school, and I’d explain that I was homeschooled, and then all hell would break loose. They’d want to know if I was locked in the basement every morning with stale bread and Bible verses, if my parents believed in electricity, and if they needed to call the cops to rescue me. Some of the more enterprising ones (particularly in English-speaking countries, and almost invariably in the US) would administer impromptu reading tests, or assign me math problems. Their shock at my ability to read and do math was always a mixture of gratifying and insulting. As a kid I became very stubborn about knowing how to do things that I knew I wasn’t expected to know how to do.

I still find moments as an adult in which I recognize this. When I first moved to Okayama I started training martial arts there. The moment that clinched my absolute determination to train was the moment in which a group of extremely well-intentioned town ladies asked me if I wouldn’t rather learn how to arrange flowers, as young women aren’t conditioned to be able to fight. (I said No thank you, I'd rather fight, and for a precarious moment we all balanced on the edge of an international incident.)

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

A:  More affordable for audiences. While lucrative enough to sustain the lives of playwrights. Oops, that’s two.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  Sarah Kane—I find her fearless and angry and hopeful, and I take comfort in seeing those things coexist in her work. Naomi Wallace, who taught me that politics onstage can be a visceral, personal, impact on flesh. Caryl Churchill, Jose Rivera, Martin McDonagh. Sherry Kramer, who has been a wonderful and generous teacher. The class about to graduate from the Iowa Playwrights Workshop: Kevin Artigue, Jess Foster, Andrew Saito, and dramaturg Christine Scarfuto—all four have had a deep impact on my work and my hopes for theatre over the past almost-three years. Finally, the novelist Haruki Murakami and the film directors Takashi Miike and Wong Kar-Wei have had a huge influence on what I find compelling, beautiful and exciting.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  Theatre of hunger & desire. Theatre that tells driving difficult stories. Theatre that is visceral, that leaves bruises—you don’t walk out the way you walked in. Theatre of fluid lines and easily crossed boundaries— multilingual, multi-national, multi-mythic. Anything that surprises me, that plays with or complicates its structure in a way that feeds its content. Theatre that feels like a shared secret.

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

A:  Be bold. Write all the plays you’re scared to write because you think they’ll cause trouble or offend people. BUT: take responsibility for your choices—don’t be provocative because it’s stylish, be provocative in response to something, to interrogate something, to accomplish something.

Don’t ever let anyone tell you that you should not write genders, ethnicities, or cultures that are not your own—BUT (and this is a big BUT) do your research. Listen to authentic voices coming from the communities you’re trying to write. Let those voices tell you when you’re offbase. Make sure at all moments that you are writing with integrity and not clinging to a preconceived story you want to tell. The minute you write outside of your identity, it isn’t about you anymore, it’s about a responsibility you have to the community you’re portraying.

Finally, advocate for each other. We’re in this crazy world together. That pretty much makes us family.


Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  Check out Counterpoint Theatre Co (counterpointtheatre.org/), a new international US/UK group based out of New York. They just produced a short play of mine called “Love In the Time of Dolores” in their festival called What’s Love Got To Do With It?—my play was about cannibalism, as one might expect. Also, I have a reading of a new full-length play coming up March 21 with id Theatre’s NYC Sit In reading series (http://www.idtheater.org/). And if you're in New Mexico, check out FUSION Theatre Co (http://fusionabq.com/)— they've been a creative home for me for some time, and I've been in residence there on and off since 2008, developing a trilogy of plays based in Albuquerque. Lastly, these are two groups that I love more than hot chocolate (with a splash of rum) on a cold winter day: larktheatre.org/ and http://newgeorges.org/

A last plug— My brother is a graphic designer and visual artist who's designed a number of posters for shows of mine. I've always found his work unusual, quirky, and inspiring. Check him out at csilverman.com/.

I Interview Playwrights Part 288: Lally Katz

Lally Katz

Hometown:
I was born in Trenton New Jersey. But we moved to Miami when I was three, and then to Australia when I was eight and three quarters.

Current Town:
Melbourne, Australia.

Q:  Tell me about your upcoming play with the Production Company.

A:  In the play, the internet has its own cities. They're cities you can physically go to. The city this play focuses on is Myspace New York. It's about this girl who leaves her hometown for Myspace New York, and when she gets there, she falls in love with someone who's not capable of being a true part of life anymore. The play follows her journey in Myspace New York. It's kind of a comedy and kind of a tragedy. Oliver Butler, the director from the Debate Society is directing it. He's really very brilliant. I'm loving working with him and the cast.

Q:  What else are you working on?

A:  I've got three premieres coming up in Australia next year, they're called 'A Golem Story', 'Neighbourhood Watch' (which is about the 84 year old Hungarian lady who lives across the street from me in Melbourne and is kind of my best friend and sometimes enemy) and 'Return to Earth'.

Q:  How would characterize Australian theater?

A:  Gosh, there are so many different kinds of Australian theatre. But I think that a lot of Australian theatre that really works kind of subtly sidles into what it's doing- so that you don't realise where it's going until it's there.

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

A:  Sorry this is really long!

When I was about fourteen years old, I want caving (spelunking) with my outdoor education class at high school. We repelled deep into this cave called the Punchbowl. It was dark and you had to negotiate your way down, wearing a headlamp, and bouncing off of and scrambling down a forty meter (don't know what that is in feet or yards) cave wall. Once in the cave, we went for all these adventures. In the dark. Through chambers full of bats. Sliding down a wall in a place called The Ballroom Chamber where it sounded like music was playing because of the voices of the bats. Over never ending holes in the ground, that you had to kind of edge around or jump over. After these adventures we went back to the base of the forty meter cave wall that we had repelled down. The only way up, was by climbing a very thin, shaky sort of silver metal and chain ladder. I was very scared about this. At the bottom of the ladder, was a sort of grave, made of rocks. Our teachers said this grave was fake and a joke that spelunkers had made. But the longer I was down there, at the bottom of the ladder, the more I began to feel that this grave was real.

I started to think that the grave was for this half bat, half man creature that now roamed the cave, looking for young girls as victims. I got more and more frightened. It became kind of an intense claustrophobic feeling.

When it finally came my turn to climb up the ladder, I was terrified. I was pretty sure I would fall down it and die. But I was sure that if I didn't climb it, then the I would be killed by the creature from the grave.

When I finally reached the top of the cave wall, I sat down, so relieved, in the opening of the cave. It was mostly closed in, but from the top, I could see the sky and all the bright, bright stars. I guess I was kind of halluncinating. Because when I sat there, watching the remaining students climbing from the pitch black, up out of the cave, I would see the light of the headtorches gliding over the cave walls. And I could, so clearly and realistically painted into the cavewalls portraits of young women. Their faces, their expressions, their personality. And I knew these were the young women that this half bat, half man had kept in the cave, sacrificing so that he could taste life and light. I was so sure it was real.

When I got home, I wrote about this giant bat/man creature sacrificing a girl in the cave. For some reason, I decided to write it as a play. I'd never written a play before. But it just seemed right. I haven't stopped writing plays since then.

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

A:  I guess I would change it so that mainstream theater was made for audiences of all different ages, of all different demographics and that we trusted that audiences wanted to launch off into places they haven't been.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  Here are just some- I have more- but it will start getting crazy if I list all the people and companies I admire in theatre: Mac Wellman, Robyn Nevin, Caryl Churchill, Thorton Wilder

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  It doesn't matter what style it is. As long as it's true to itself, has a pulsating heart that you can feel, and that humbles you, changes you, challenges you.

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

A:  Just put on a play. Get anyone you can- even if the only people you can find aren't quite right- just get them and put something on. That's how you learn. By seeing and hearing your work. Also, see as much theatre as you can. Go and see all the theatre- every different type as often as possible. Also, read your own work outloud to someone you trust- it helps you to know exactly what it is, what parts work and what parts need work.

Q: Plugs, please:

A: Plug for 'Goodbye New York, Goodbye Heart' at the Here Center:
http://www.productioncompany.org/productions/goodbye.shtml

I Interview Playwrights Part 287: Anne Garcia-Romero

Anne Garcia-Romero

Hometown: Wellesley, MA

Current Town: South Bend, IN

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  I'm working on my play, Paloma, which had a great reading at the Open Fist Theater Company in Los Angeles last August. The play explores the lives of a young inter-faith couple in 2004 New York City and Madrid and how their religious differences threaten to demolish their love. The play is inspired by a gorgeous fourteenth century Muslim Spanish text, Ring of the Dove by Ibn Hazm, that considers all the permutations of love.

I've also translated an acclaimed Spanish play, The Gronholm Method, by Jordi Galceran, which was produced in Australia last summer. Galceran's play has already been successfully produced in Spain, Latin America, Europe and Russia with a current revival recently opened in Barcelona. A dark comedy about four job applicants vying for a top corporate position, The Gronholm Method examines the question: How far would you go to land your dream job?

I'm also just starting a new play so I can't say too much yet only that I've been studying the works of Mexican visual artist, Martin Ramirez, as inspiration. I'm working on the play as part of my Moreau fellowship in the department of Film, Television and Theatre at the University of Notre Dame. We're aiming to workshop the play next year at Notre Dame.

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 traveled to Barcelona from Massachusetts with my Spanish father when I was seven. We went to visit my great great uncle, a celebrated Spanish painter and sculptor. I walked through Tio (uncle in Spanish) Vicente's home gallery in awe of his work ranging from striking portraits to an expressionistic series on circus performers to stunning sculptures of voluptuous women. Tio Vicente wore a burgundy bathrobe and had long white hair down to his shoulders framing his cool chunky horned rim glasses. I held onto my dad's hand as my young mind soaked in this artistic abundance. I treasure the black and white photo from that day: I lean into my smiling dad, holding his index finger with a look of contentment on my face, next to my serene Tio Vicente.

This story contains many elements of my journey as a writer. As a Spanish-American, I gain much of my inspiration from the Latin world and often write about how the Anglo and Latin worlds collide, intersect and transform each other. I also draw huge inspiration from my father's Spanish family of artists. Dealing with loss has also been an area I've continually explored as a writer. My father passed away while I was in college. Surviving the death of a parent has greatly shaped who I am. Learning how fleeting life can be fueled my passion to pursue my writing.

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

A:  If I could change one thing about U.S. theater, theater companies would produce a wider, broader range of plays by women and men who fully represent the cultural complexity of twenty-first century U.S. culture. Theatergoers would then have access to a huge selection of diverse theatrical worlds that would challenge, entertain, delight and intrigue them. The U.S. theater would be on the cutting edge of social change and an apt mirror to contemporary society.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  My theatrical heroes who are with us in spirit only include Federico Garcia Lorca, Lope de Vega, Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, William Shakespeare and Tennessee Williams.

My theatrical heroes who are still with us in body and spirit include Maria Irene Fornes, Nilo Cruz and Griselda Gambaro.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  I am excited when I go to the theater and see a play that is culturally complex, linguistically innovative, aesthetically adventuresome, impeccably produced and has a running time of less than two hours.

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

A:  Keep writing. Trust your instincts. Find your tribe. Produce your own work at least once. Try directing your own work. See a ton of theater to hone your skills and discover what you really like in a play. Read widely. Know that in most cases you will have to do something in addition to playwriting to earn a living so find that work which you enjoy and gives you time to write. Buy the Dramatists Sourcebook and submit your work to lots of places that appeal to you. Cultivate a spirit of generosity toward your peers. Playwriting is a marathon, not a sprint. Continue on the journey and know that there are many definitions of success. And above all, always, always keep writing.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  My play, Desert Longing, was just published by Playscripts. It's part of a wonderful collection of short plays about Latino history in California. http://www.playscripts.com/play?playid=1544

Visit my website: www.annegarciaromero.com



Check out these wonderful playwrights' websites too:

www.adrianasevan.com

www.brookeberman.net

www.caridadsvich.com

www.elaineromero.com

www.juliehebert.com

www.quiara.com

I Interview Playwrights Part 286: Tony Adams

Tony Adams

Hometown:  Rives Jct., MI

Current Town:  Chicago, IL.

Q:  Tell me about Trickster.

A:  Trickster takes place in-between the spirit world and a war ravaged Southwest reminiscent of the dust bowl. The human world of the play is pretty brutal place--a mixture of the old testament, the southwest during the war on Geronimo and Juárez today. The spirit world will use masks and movement, and the characters on earth will be puppets. (Though not actual puppets, they'll be actors playing puppets.) It's bawdy and brutal, beautiful and brokenhearted. There'll be music and sex and fighting and fun. It's a re-imagining of the legends of Don Juan, Coyote tales and the Genesis account of Abraham, Sarah and Hagar. In a lot of ways it uses stories from the past as a mask to talk about today.

Part of it is an artistic response to a day when my daughter Charlotte was about a year old. She was standing next to the TV while I was flipping through the channels. A music video came on, I forget which, and I thought "this is a good song". Then I looked at the screen. Looked at Charlotte, and back to the screen. In that moment all the images I'd seen of women growing up, seen but not noticed, exploded in my head when I looked back at Charlotte and connected the dots. I've been trying to figure out that explosion in my head since.

When I had initially conceived of the show, three or four years ago, it was different. I was different. The economy was humming along, Tony Jr. wasn't walking, Charlotte wasn't born yet and Mom hadn't yet gotten sick. Since that point the economy imploded, Tony Jr'.s huge, Charlotte is talking in full sentences and Mom passed away.

Q:  What else are you working on?

A:  Being the best husband and father I can be; directing Caridad Svich's Iphegenia... (a rave fable); Producing and curating The Alcyone Festival; giving whatever support I can to the amazing artists I'm lucky enough to work with; trying to grow Halcyon to the point where we can pay people more than a pittance; and failing miserably at catching up to the stack of play submissions I've been sent from other writers.

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

A:  When I was little, I spent a lot of time on my Granny and Pa's farm. In addition to corn, fruit and vegetables that they sold at a farm market out front, they raised chickens and guinea fowl. We would eat them and sell some to pay for food for the winter. My dad had been laid off from the prison where he worked. (Things were so bad in Michigan around then they were laying off people who were supposed to be guarding convicts.) I didn't realize what poor meant, or that we ate at Granny and Pa's so much because we didn't have much food then--I just knew that's how we were able to eat.
When time came to harvest the birds, everyone would come over and each person had a different job. My brothers and cousins would get the birds out of the coup and carry them to my grandpa, dad and uncles who had a tree stump and hatchet and would chop off their heads. Granny, mom and my aunts would pluck their feathers and clean them. Mom told me that, when I was like four, one of my first jobs was to get the headless chickens from the stump to the women. I'd spend all day chasing chickens with their heads cut off, covered in blood, and taking them up to the women with a huge smile on my face. It was the only thing they could think of to tire me out.

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

A:  I would make producers stop being cowards without the vision and backbone to put up what they know in their heart can be great. Not good, Great. To stop hiding behind audiences, step out front and put their weight behind something or someone that gets them so fired up they are compelled to share it. And if an AD can no longer find something that revs them up to that point, stop going through the motions, step down and get out of the way so someone else can.

I know a lot of people talk about how great and open European audiences are, but from my experience they aren't any more or less open than American audiences. The big difference I saw when I was there was there were producers with the vision and courage to go beyond the very narrow, homogeneous, stories and writers that get routinely produced here. The world isn't a homogeneous place, but you'd never know if from sitting in most houses.

I firmly believe that there is no challenge facing theatres that leadership, courage and vision can't overcome. But there's only two ways you can get people talking about your organization: inspire them or piss them off. If you can do both at the same time, they're hooked. If you can't inspire people or create an experience that will blow them away, there's very little reason for them to come back.

If you are timid, you lose. We have way too many timid producers, and it shows across the field.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  Ariane Mnouchkine, Hélène Cixous, María Irene Fornés, Federico García Lorca

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  In science, I think there's only two ways that we can truly find out more about our universe: point a big telescope up to the heavens and try to figure out the expansiveness of it all, or go in a lab and smash atoms together to see what what forces drive everything around us.

Theatre that can approach either is exciting. King Lear, What of the Night or Caroline or Change on one end and Safe, The Brothers Size and Chad Deity on the other. I'm not as interested in polish as I am in power.

Because I wear so many different hats, producer, writer, director, designer, etc. it takes a lot for me to just forget where I am and fully live in the story the actors are telling. I can enjoy a play immensely but never get fully enveloped by it. It's rare, but on some nights, when every thing is clicking and you can forge a connection among strangers and feel that communal energy when you're taken away to some amazing new place or some new world you hadn't noticed right in front of you, forgetting everything outside the story and just live, just be completely alive in the moment you're sharing with a group of strangers--that's what truly excites me.

I know it probably sounds like some silly thing you're taught in school, but if you've had that experience--whether through theatre or music or sports or politics, whatever--it's addictive. People spend their entire lives trying to recreate and relive those moments.

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

A:  When I was studying in Paris, I had applied for an internship working with a Parisian theatre and was turned down by my college because my GPA wasn't high enough. The woman who ran the program on-site asked why I didn't do an internship. I was open and told her I really wanted to but my grades weren't good enough to qualify. She looked at me blankly then furrowed her brow and said, "Who told you you can't do that? A piece of paper? That's stupid. Go do it."

So I did. She helped me and called a friend who was an actor and hooked me up with an internship with a Arguia Theatre, a small theatre doing a show at Théâtre du Chaudron-- who only houses plays directed by women. It was right next to Le Théâtre du Soleil. The first day I was there they asked me what I wanted to learn and I said, "everything." They laughed at that, but because I asked, everyone took the time to help me learn and pass along whatever knowledge they could to offer.

I worked my ass off and learned a lot and then they asked me to stay on for another month or two and help them with a festival they were doing with La Tempête, another theatre in that crazy compound. I didn't know it was 41 plays in rep (with around 275 actors) by a who's who of French theatre. It was an amazing thing to see firsthand. I was very lucky, I was working 30-40 hours a week at what was essentially a poor storefront and at the same time was able to watch and interact with some of the most amazing artists in Paris.

I think everything that has been good in my life since has followed the same pattern. I guess that's a long way to say: be open; don't be afraid to ask; work your ass off; recognize when you're lucky; thank the people who are helping you; and if someone tells you you can't do something--That's stupid. Go do it. And if push comes to shove, don't worry about trying to get your foot in the door--just kick the damn door off it's hinges and go.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:
Trickster opens January 6th, Iphigenia opens February 17th and the Alcyone Festival opens June 9th. All are at the Greenhouse Theater, 2257 N. Lincoln Ave in Chicago (the old Body Politic and Victory Gardens space for folks who haven't been in Chicago in a while.)

I Interview Playwrights Part 285: christopher oscar peña

christopher oscar peña

Hometown:  San Jose, CA

Current Town: New York City by way of Manhattan (Harlem!) - thats for all the brooklynites

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  It'd be nice if this were a straight-forward one project answer but it never is! I'm currently in the Catskill Mountains in this ridiculous estate on a ten day retreat with Terra Firma Theater. The company is rehearsing a workshop of an adaptation of Bergmans "Cries and Whispers" and they brought me up as playwright-in-residence to work on whatever. I'm beginning a rough (read: ideas in mind, about to write page one) brand new jazz based musical, set in the 1920's in a brothel in new orleans with composer Jesse Gelber. I'm also in the middle of rewrites on my play Icarus Burns which I have a deadline on very soon, and I also just got a book agent and am in the process of writing my first novel for young adults. So it's a very busy, very exciting time. When I get back to the city in a few days, I'll also continue shooting my web series 80/20 (which i cowrote with Vayu O'Donnell) and am also acting in. We have a RIDICULOUS cast (Shannon Esper, Jennifer Ikeda, Matt Rauch, Michael Izquierdo, Mike Crane, Hannah Cabell, Lucas Near-Verbrughhe, to name a few) and Wendy McLellan is the lead director on it. Everyone's been very generous and is excited about the project so that's amazing obviously. I have a deadline on a musical I'm writing with Parker Ferguson that was commissioned by Carlos Armesto's Theatre C, so that needs to get done. Oh yea, I'm also starting to write song songs, like non-theater songs with Kevin Joaquin Garcia. Kevin's one of my best friends in the world, an extraordinarily talented musician, and on top of collaborating on the web series, we have a variety of projects in the works that we're very excited about. I've always loved music and though I don't know a lot about it practically, Kevin's encouraged me to pursue it, so that's come out via song lyrics. We'll see what happens.

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 knew this question was coming and I could never really put my finger on one story. When I was a kid I remember being precocious and one day wanting to be a firefighter and another wanting to be a doctor. My mom always complained about her back so I always wanted to make her feel better. But I don't know that those were ever things I really wanted to be- you know, for myself. And recently, my dad told me that when I was very young the first "when i grow up I want to be" thing I ever said, was actually a writer. Which was beautiful and stranger since I don't recall it. But it makes sense now. And also, I think as a family, my grandparents and aunts and uncles and stuff, they always talk about how I always had a book in my hand. Or if i went missing at the mall, they knew theyd find me at a bookstore. I wasn't the cool kid when I was little and I think I just grew up with books, with words. I felt safe there. In a way I think I had a very old soul very quickly, and books seemed to be the way to experience this world I always longed for and hoped would someday be real or true.

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

A:  I'm sure people wont like this, but I wish it were more hip and current. And what I mean by that: look at film, look at music, music is a phenomenal example. You have 14, 15, 16 year olds who are working. Whether you like that or not, those industries really embrace the current. And the theater, I mean its ALWAYS behind. I dont go to the theater to find new ideas. I know theaters are suffering from a lack of money, but a playwright writes something at a certain time because it means something to them at that particular moment, there is an urgency. But by the time things get produced, if they ever do, its two, three, four, five years later. Its already dated when it's new. And Broadway is all hollywood, recycled movies now. And the fact that we're an industry where 45 years olds are considered "emerging" as writers because its taken them that long to get notice. We've all read the reports on new plays and playwrights. I dont know, I do it because I love it, but when I talk to people outside of the theater, theyre not jazzed by it, and its easy to see why. Wow, that was inarticulate.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  I will always think Angels In America is the greatest play of all time, and you can't convince me otherwise. So Kushner certainly is my biggest. I will always think of Naomi Iizuka as my artistic mother. I'll always credit her as the first person to show me that theater can be more than this boring dead thing I grew up feeling it was. Paula Vogel, Suzan Lori-Parks, Sarah Kane, Sarah Ruhl, Luis Alfaro, Chay Yew, Les Waters, Williams, Miller, Caryl Churchill, Ruben Polendo, Miguel Piñero, Lisa Portes, Carlos Murillo, Brecht, Joanne Akalaitis, Doug Wright, Adam Rapp, Anne Garcia-Romero, Ivo van Hove, Sam Shepard, Michael John Garces have all left an artistic footprint on my work in one way or another. All those people have been deeply influential to me in one way or another and I certainly think theyre the reason I love theater. I got my MFA from NYU and a large reason I went there was because of people who had gone or taught there: Rinne Groff, Julia Cho, Daniel Goldfarb, and Itamar Moses. I knew there work before I went to grad school, so I credit them for a lot too.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  dangerous. unconventional. surprising. weird. stuff that feels rock and roll. things that terrify me. things that confuse me. my theatrical heroes ARE the theater that excites me. but along with them, the joke has always been that I dont love things that were created before the year 2000. And in a way thats true. I am MOST excited by the work of many of my peers and contemporaries. so ill tell you some of them (including more than just writers): dan lefranc, greg moss, david adjmi, krista knight, sharif abu-hamdeh, lauren yee, bekah brunstetter, mattie brickman, stefanie zadravec, tea alagic, mike donahue, maria dizzia, the civilians, michael esper, daniel aukin, leigh silverman, quincy tyler bernsine, lou moreno, davis mccallum, evan cabnet, rolin jones, anne kauffman, matt roi berger, lauren gunderson, emily schwend, daniel tallbot, bill heck, sanjit de silva, jihan crowther, david murray, elevator repair service, aaron landsman, peter gill-sheridan, daniel alexander jones, peter sinn-nachtrieb, daniel zimmerman. anytime those artists work: GO! im always excited to read, or see what these people are doing. if i were to teach a class, they would be my syllabus. if i were 14 and in the middle of nowhere, i wouldnt want to be taught hamlet for the tenth time, i'd want to know what all these people were doing.

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

A:  its hard of course. but you have to be your best advocate. make sure you have a few good plays under your belt, and make sure until you feel they're ready, and only them, share them with people. but it has to be when you know theyre ready, because a lot of time people won't come back. know everything. that's impossible of course, but one of the greatest pieces of advice, that i think is incredibly important, is that you want to know as much as possible about the profession youre in. read everything you can get your hands on. watch as much as you can. know the work that is out there. be well read. i find it problematic when people say they want to work and live in the theater and then you ask them certain things, and you realize that they dont know much about whats out there. the more eager and sincere you are about knowing as much as possible, i think the further it'll get you. this is key. dont burn bridges. dont bad mouth people- the theater is an insanely small community and youd be surprised who hears what. support your colleagues.

i think the most valuable thing ive learned so far: is build a community. naomi used to say to me : "find your tribe."

this is one of the most underrated, important things i know to be true. find those people that you find brilliant, that you would work on anything with, that you would cry to. find the people that you want to spend the rest of your life with and support them. champion them and youll find theyll be there for you, doing the same thing. and this is about the work, but its also about the bad days when you need to go see an embarrassing chick flick. or those nights you have to have a drink. find your family. ive been lucky to have some amazing collaborators and friends. theyre the people i write for, theyre the people i recommend, theyre the people i hang out with. to that end im going to plug them: kevin garcia, shannon esper, josh barrett, vanessa wasche, vayu o'donnell, steve stout, dominic spillane, jennifer ikeda, lucas near-verbrugghe, patrick heusinger, demin borges, vonia arslanian, adam folk, mike donahue. they're talented, theyre charming, and im lucky to have them.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  I'm currently a writing fellow with the Playwrights Realm so there will be a reading of my play "Icarus Burns" sometime in the new year

Also, at some point very soon, I'll be having a reading of my play "maelstrom" which I've been working on with Chay Yew at NYTW

Terra Firma will be having a workshop of "Cries and Whispers" and I'm lucky to call them home and continue developing my work with them, so you should definitely check them out

stay tuned for our upcoming webseries: 80/20

ive just secretly launched my website which ill be keeping up to date so you can find me here, see whats coming up, get in touch, all that jazz! : http://cpinthenyc.wordpress.com/