I Wanna Be A Producer...

So, Rotation Three has come to an exciting end. And, as producer of said rotation, I am left with the task of beginning the chain of blogs to recount the salacious details of our tertiary summer segment.

This rotation marked the first in which we welcomed the Lab Playwrights to Ithaca. Mikey spent the time directing a new play by Yale Grad Playwright Matt Moses called THE EMPEROR OF ICE CREAM OR THIRTEEN WAYS OF LOOKING AT DONALD RUMSFELD. This prescient piece takes an intimate and at times sympathetic look at a political figure whom (dare I say) most of us directors view as somewhat of a demon. Mikey and Matt worked well together to make this production unique. In the middle of the process, the two decided to make a huge conceptual shift in the production, splitting the role of Rumsfeld into two parts, played by two very different actors. It was thrilling for the cast of the show to experience such a jarring shift in the play midstream, and it made it all the more rewarding when the final product turned out as well as it did. Mikey did such a great job of getting his actors on board with such a large change, which is truly a token of the amount of respect his actors had for him.

Kate also directed a new play, BURYING BARBIE, written by recent Carnegie Mellon alum Chris Dimond. Kate did an incredible job of taking a small cast of young actors and leading them through a piece that demanded both spot-on comedic timing AND an underlying layer of pathos. Most notable in Kate's production, I think, is the work she did with her play's lead actress. One of the least experienced of the Lab Actors this year, Kate did an incredible job of helping this young actor grow and really demonstrate some talent and skill we had not necessarily seen from her up to the that point.

In the midst of these new plays, Tamara's children's show was a happy respite from some darker material. For her production of CUCUMBER PHIL, Tamara directed the entire play in the style of a Looney Tunes cartoon. From costumes to sound effects to crazy montages in which one of the bad guys sets a bear trap to catch the protagonist only to have it backfire on her ten-toed foot, it is not often that you see a world created so vividly by a director. The kids have been absolutely rolling in the aisles with laughter. I told Tamara that, when I read the play, I failed to see the potential that she found in it. Many people at the Hangar have been crediting the script for the show's success, but I am certain that with any other director this show would not have shone as much as it did under Tamara's leadership and vision.

In addition to facilitating the production of these three fine plays, I also steer headed (with the help of my three colleagues) the 24-Hour Play Marathon, in which the entire Lab Company produces six new short plays in a period of...well...24 hours. After a week of playwriting workshops with New York-based playwright Kenny Finkle, we organized the whole Lab Company for a full day of making guerrilla theater. Actors wrote. Assistant directors acted. Designers directed. Everyone was challenged to move out of their comfort zones in order to create something new. And while the day's work was exhausting, the final results were exhilarating.

It was such a joy to help bring about the work of my colleagues over the past few weeks. And while I wouldn't dare to say that producing is in the cards for me anytime in the near future, I could not have been happier to assist my three fantastic colleagues in making their directorial visions occur. Now, back to the rehearsal room!

Kerry

Three Cheers for Pooh!

One actor out of the show with mono. Another out of commission for half the performances. A sound board operator fired on the first day of tech. A final performance in which the assistant director was playing one part and the assistant stage manager was playing another.

Who would've thought this would be the recipe for one of the most relaxing and fun processes I've had the pleasure to be a part of?

Coming off the intense and highly stressful process of directing "Romeo and Juliet" first rotation, I was intent on simply having fun while directing "Winnie-the-Pooh." We spent much of our early rehearsal time remembering what it meant to simply play: making up songs to sing while parading around the room; having conversations with our imaginary friends; discovering the many places our imaginations can go. The actors were completely game to go on a journey that often required them to go beyond their comfort zones. Thomas Murphy, the inestimable sound designer we were lucky enough to have working on the show, wrote delightful songs for the show which added such joy to the story (in addition to fulfilling my wish to direct a musical this summer). Joyce Bamman, the extraordinary costume designer, designed and built costumes that fulfilled every dream a kid could have about what Pooh and his friends might look like. Aimee Huber and Masha Tsimring, the exceptional set designer and luminous lighting designer, created a playground that turned Christopher Robin's bedroom to Hundred Acre Woods right before our eyes. Knowing that most of our audience would be children with their parents since schools were out and camps had yet to begin, we tried to create a show that celebrated the joy parents can give to their children through the power of storytelling, and I think we succeeded, all while having fun.

It's not easy in theatre to find experiences where the process is fun, the collaborators game, and the product a true realization of the original spark. I feel incredibly lucky to have had this experience. It was especially gratifying to watch the kids interact with the cast after every performance. It may sound corny, but knowing that we truly gave these kids a special moment was the icing on top of a very sweet cake.

It should be worth mentioning that even though I am raving about the experience, the hurdles mentioned above were indeed stressful. Being in an environment where there is constant creation also means occasional destruction. This summer is no doubt one of the most trying experiences I've been through - the highs are high, which means the lows are low, and the constant yo-yoing contributes to the exhaustion. We're just now getting over the hump that began third rotation - the energy was lower, spirits were lower, and in an effort to stop the rollercoaster of emotion, we all hit a point where we tried to remain as indifferent to everything as possible. Indifference and theatre simply don't go hand-in-hand and we're finally gaining back our passion and our inspiration. We've gained two exciting collaborators in the playwrights Matt Moses, whom I'm having the pleasure of working with on "Emperor of Ice Cream or Thirteen Ways of Looking at Donald Rumsfeld," and Chris Dimond, whom Kate is working with on "Burying Barbie." The actors are beginning their playwriting workshop tonight, and we're finally settling into the routine of third rotation (which involves shorter rehearsals spread over an extra week).

The other directors continue to be the greatest gift this summer has given me, and I can't wait till next rotation when I have the chance to produce and truly watch them work.

Until then, it's Donald Rumsfeld, the 24-hour-play festival, and another frantic tech process. Just cross your fingers that no more actors get sick!

Till next rotation,
Mikey

After weeks of frustration at my second rotation blog having been deleted, I am finally getting over myself and returning to the blogging fray once more. This will be a combined look at the middle two rotations of the summer.

I have a confession to make. The first time I saw The Wedge I almost burst into tears. It was the day we arrived in Ithaca and even though we had (many!) official tours scheduled for later in the week, we couldn't wait. So Mikey, who had been an AD here a few years ago, took us right over to see it. Tamara, Kerry and Mikey burst into the room, beaming. As they ran around looking at every nook and cranny of the bizarre space, their eyes glowing with ideas and excitement, I stood in the doorway frozen. I was speechless. Then confused. Then terrified. I mentally crossed two of the plays I'd considered choosing off my list. Then I remembered the fleeting thought I'd had weeks before about Metamorphoses, by Mary Zimmerman - a play I'd adored since seeing it at Second Stage years ago. Suddenly The Wedge became the perfect alternative to the 80-foot swimming pool that the original production required.

Now don't get me wrong, there was still plenty to be terrified about. This was a beast of a play, with significant movement sequences, complex storylines, and heightened, difficult language. I knew I was in for a major challenge. The one great gift was the rotation order - being producer in the first rotation gave me the time I desperately needed to plan and prepare. And in that time I planned and prepared as I'd never done before. Knowing I would have a paltry 50 hours of rehearsal time for a 70 page script, I made sure that by the first rehearsal I had the basic visual structure for every scene, I knew exactly where in the space each scene would take place, and though I relied on the actors for much of the movement ideas, I had a back-up plan for everything. This may not seem all that revolutionary, but for me this was a huge risk. I tend to let the movement of a piece - whether blocking or actual choreography - grow organically from rehearsals, and making any large decisions without experimenting first has always seemed too risky. With this piece and these parameters however, the big decisions were the show's lifeline.

Anne Bogart writes so eloquently about what can be accomplished when an artist faces her own terror. That has always been a challenge for me - as a person and as an artist. This rotation was an unbelievable gift in so many ways, but I think most crucially it blatantly demanded that I face that terror, and didn't give me any alternative. Every day I had to enter the room and try something huge - even if it was terrible - and see what happened. And some days the idea failed miserably, and sometimes it hit spot on...but even when it failed I, and the company, and the show, still survived, and even improved as a result. Terrifying yes, but in the end, as gratifying as any artistic endeavor I've attempted.

Moving to rotation three was a difficult transition for me. With Metamorphoses I felt totally engaged - as if every part of me was working on overdrive to do what felt like the impossible. It was tough for me to get my mind around anything else until Metamorphoses opened, and at that point it was two days before the first rehearsal of Burying Barbie. I did, however, really like the script, and looked forward to collaborating with the playwright - the very talented Chris Dimond - on the world premiere.

Chris Hayes, a wonderful director, once said to me that a director's chief job with a play is to make sure that every actor, on their journey to their peak potential, arrives at the same time - on opening night, so that no one arrives too early, and no one arrives too late. I believe in these words, and I worked really hard to make this happen. This piece had a small cast, but each actor's journey was a totally different speed, and had a diametrically different quality. My regret however, is that I spent so much time focused on this journey, that at times I lost sight of the bigger picture - the places where I add to Chris's statement. I think the director's job chief jobs are also to have a strong point of view, to inspire passion and excitement both in the actors and the audience, and, especially with a new play, to be constantly vigilant about what story is being told, and how it might be told more clearly. With every ounce of my focus on the actors' journeys I think I could have brought more of myself into these other aspects of the work.

At the end of the day I was really pleased with the work the actors did. I was also thrilled by the design. We had a beautiful environment created for the piece by the very talented Aimee Huber, complete with an off-kilter sandbox, and a gorgeous tree branch that aided Masha Tsimring's excellent lighting.

The two plays of rotations 2 and 3 couldn't have been more different, and the lessons I took further from each other...and I couldn't be more grateful.

Until rotation 4...

Kate

A Remembrance of Things (of the Recent) Past

I had just finished directing a children's play for the Hangar Theatre's 370-seat mainstage and was now to work on the English-language premiere of a crazy German comedy in the 30-seat Wedge Theatre...and I couldn't be happier!

Rotation Two flew by at the pace of a peregrine falcon, it would seem, but I'm certain it will be remembered as two of the most valuable and rewarding weeks of my entire summer. It is far too rare that a director gets to do a production he or she truly longs to do. There are all too often compromises made in the process due to lack of funds or talent or commitment. So when it DOES happen--when you get the opportunity and support to produce THE production you really do envision--it is an absolutely joyous moment.

I was introduced to THE UGLY ONE, a new play by Marius von Mayenburg, last January as I was on a solo tour of Europe attempting to see as much theater as possible. Through my three weeks of travel, I saw about 10 different plays, none of which was in English and none of which I could understand (as I speak ONLY English). Of all these plays I couldn't understand, THE UGLY ONE was the best un-understandable one.

I was in Berlin and got tickets to the show through a friend of a friend (who was the Assistant Director of the production). Thankfully, he gave me an English translation of the script before I saw the play, which I read over dinner one evening and with which I immediately fell in love. From the first read, I knew that it was a play I wanted to direct at some point.

The production itself that I saw was exhilarating, frantic, and ultimately totally dissimilar to the play that I directed. It is often a difficult thing to get a past production out of your head when trying to direct your own production of a specific play. Thankfully, certain circumstances made it a lot easier for me. For example, the production I saw in Berlin involved hydraulic floors that raised and lowered at various moments in the play, as well as fly cables that lowered from the ceilings, that the actors attached to themselves, and that then flew the actors through the air. Since the Wedge has neither hydraulics nor a fly system, I was forced to think of a different way of doing the play.

THE UGLY ONE is the story of Lette, who is told one day that he is hideously ugly. (He didn't know.) When he starts losing jobs because of it, he decides to get an experimental plastic surgery to rework his face. When the bandages are removed, Lette discovers that not only is he no longer ugly, he is now the most beautiful man alive. He lives the high life until other people start getting the same surgery and start looking exactly like him, forcing the audience to ask the question: How can one stick out in a crowd when every face within it is his own?

It is a play about the pressures society places on us to become one thing. We are becoming increasingly homogeneous, if not in our appearances, than in what we view as the ideal of beauty or success. This play acts as a fable to challenge the idea that being what society terms "beautiful" may not be the thing for which we should strive. When one of the characters in the final scene of the play declares the anti-moral of the piece--"Stop wanting to be different!"--, it leaves us all feeling a bit empty, a bit guilty. Or, at least, I wanted it to do that.

For this production, the entire action of the play was confined to an 8'x8' white square painted on the floor. The audience sat on risers on either side of the square, looking down on the action as medical students would view an operation. I used live sound to both acknowledge the theatricality of the world and to comment on the action of the play. For example, the actual plastic surgery scene is accompanied by live sound effects to heighten the sense that this operation is actually a violent, inhuman act. The surgeon asks for an electric knife, and we see and hear a blender turn on, eviscerating the tomatoes inside it. He asks for another instrument, and we see and hear a jigsaw drilling gratingly into pieces of wood.

While the actors I directed are still in early stages of their training, they were totally game for everything I threw at them. Throughout the process, I admired their work and dedication to make it happen. And while every performance may not have been ideal, I could tell that they were constantly striving to make it better. They WANTED it to be perfect...which is definitely not always the case.

In the final scene of the play, the main character sees the face of another man who has had the surgery and now looks identical to him...and he falls in love with himself. Through a series of comic lines between the man and his doppelganger--"I'm beautiful." "Thanks. You're sweet. I'm beautiful, too." "Thanks. I'm blushing."--the two characters move into each other, and Lette loses all sense of reality, giving himself over to his own appearance. It is a moment of false hope. He seems content and peaceful, but what has really happened is that he has lost all sense of self. He has sacrificed his own identity for the image of beauty that is his face. (Complicated to explain, I think...I hope that makes sense!)

Anyways, the most gratifying moment of the experience was when my parents came up to see the play. My Southern parents are not the most artistic folks. Aside from the plays I've been in, they haven't seen much except the stuff to which I take them. But after the play, my mother offered, in her slow Southern drawl, her personal critique of the final moment:

"It seemed like I was supposed to be happy, but I just felt so sad."

I laughed, and my heart warmed. I had gotten it right...

On to Rotation 3!

Kerry

Two Down, Two to Go . . .

So. Wow. Second rotation just ended, and yet we're already well into third rotation. Third rotation will give us a slight breather -- we have TWO weeks of rehearsal for this process, instead of one, so we have all the time in the world!

I was lab producer for second rotation, and I was so proud of the work that my colleagues put up. I had the amazing luxury of having not only a little more free time, but also the chance to watch three talented and different directors at work, at various points in the process. I watched part of each first rehearsal, early run-throughs, later run-throughs, dress rehearsals and performances of all three shows, and it was amazing to watch the shows develop, and the directorial minds behind these shows hash out the issues and challenges of each show. And the shows were as different as the artists involved: Michael directed Winnie the Pooh on the Kiddstuff stage, and Kate directed Metamorphoses, adapted from Ovid by Mary Zimmerman, sharing the Wedge with Kerry, was directed The Ugly One, a new play by German playwright Marius von Mayenberg. It was such a joy and a privilege to observe such different processes, and to have the opportunity to support these directors in their work. I was particularly honored on the occasions that a director sought my feedback, or suggestions on their work. There was also something incredibly liberating about this -- I could waltz into the room, watch some work, have one good idea, and leave the details to someone else -- something you can never do while directing. But more than that, I loved the chance to collaborate (even a little) with other directors, which is a rare and wonderful opportunity. Being a director can be very lonely -- you're always the only one in the room. Being here is a chance to have colleagues and collaborators on hand to serve as sounding boards. As lab producer, because I wasn't in rehearsal, this was a chance for me to be that for my colleagues, and it was fabulous. I felt welcomed into their rehearsal rooms, and loved watching the shows develop, and learn from each director's strategies for dealing with issues of clarity, staging, conceptualization and acting. So I ended this rotation with such a sense of fulfillment and pride, because I knew where this work had begun, and was so thrilled with the level the work had reached. Each director grappled with major questions of storytelling, clarity and conceptualization in his or her process, and each bravely made the choices that served the play and the production, even if it meant rethinking things fundamentally. I hope that Michael, Kate and Kerry will speak about these processes in their own words, but their work was a true inspiration to me this round.

I will say, however, that I'm thrilled to be back in rehearsal again. I'm embarking on that terrifying and thrilling journey: directing a children's play! It's a blast so far, although it's hard to know whether it will work for my target audience; it’s been a while since I was 5. But it's certainly fun to try to figure out what a five year old might find funny, or magical, or revelatory. I'll let you know how it goes!