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Getting OTHELLO and love in “the hood”: Interview with director Ozzie Jones, part 3

8/22/2015

Carlo Campbell as Othello leaning into Nastassja Baset as Desdemona with Walter DeShields as Cassio, Theatre in the X.
Photo by Tieshka Smith.

Theatre in the X is an Artists Collective, founded by LaNeshe Miller-White, Carlo Campbell, and Walter DeShields, providing African American theater artists in Philadelphia with acting and directing opportunities and offering free and accessible theater to the community. It is part of the City of Philadelphia’s Performances in Public Spaces program, managed by the Office of Arts, Culture and the Creative Economy, and is supported by the Leeway Foundation’s Art and Change grants. Theatre in the X tries to reach new audiences by taking Shakespeare right into neighborhoods that some Philadelphians call “the hood.” The first productions took place in 2013 with Amiri Baraka’s A Black Mass, and Nilaja Sun’s No Child. OTHELLO is this year’s major offering. All performances take place in Malcolm X Park.

Malcolm X Park

Eger: This summer, Philadelphia lucked out with many Shakespeare productions in various parks. What sets Theatre in the X apart from other companies that produce Shakespeare?

Jones: Our production is being done in a black neighborhood. Racist news outlets would say that such a production would be impossible. But like most such assertions and ideologies, they are exposed in the face of reality. And the reality is: The community is coming out in great numbers and loving it.

Malcolm X in Philly, tracked by the FBI

Eger: Malcolm X lived in North Philly in 1954 for three months. He tried to expand the Nation of Islam Temple. “The FBI was tracking his movements at the time, according to Hidden City Philadelphia. He did return to the temple several times and made his last appearance here during a rally in 1963.” I take it that Theatre in the X with its productions in Malcolm X Park pays homage to a revolutionary American.

Jones: In cities with large black communities, especially with great poverty, parks are often named after Malcolm X or Martin Luther King, Jr. Malcolm X did spend time in Philadelphia at a mosque on South Street. That’s where he saw a lot of guys in the mosque who were not really following the faith but were criminals. He knew they were killers. And like Jesus who threw out the money changers from the temple, Malcolm X tried to throw the criminals out of the mosque. He got into an argument with the elder Elijah Muhammad over that issue, and eventually, the charismatic young firebrand got assassinated by members of the Nation of Islam.

Theatre in the X

Eger: What are the goals of Theatre in the X?

Jones: The intention of all involved with Theater in the X is to bring smart, challenging, interesting, and passionate theater to the people: Theater that does not insult the intellect, culture, or community. Theater that is for free. Theater that is for all. The goal for the future is to do that more and more often.

We are building a community. The whole idea is to reach a wide audience through theater, something that the community is actually looking forward to with many more productions in the future.

Working class audiences, listening to Elizabethan English

Eger: Producing Shakespeare can be quite a risky affair as many people have trouble with Elizabethan English. What did you do to make this three-hour production, without intermission, accessible to your predominantly non-traditional audiences?

Jones: I’m trying to make my work more and more like a cave painting and get rid of all pretense. Nothing is hidden from the audience. That was important to me. I didn’t want to go into a poor community and change the words. I changed nothing. They heard the same Shakespeare they would hear if they were to go to the National Theatre in London.

Getting OTHELLO and love in “the hood”

Eger: Theatre in the X is performing on 52nd street, in an area that has been called “the ghetto high crime section of Philadelphia.” In response to the question whether one should buy a house in that area, a number of readers made these comments, “You are crazy for wanting to move there,” or, “Not exactly the hood when you see yuppies eating brunch at sidewalk tables. Things are changing, but it’s still spotty,” and, “Above-average street wisdom may be useful.”

Jones: I partially grew up around 52nd, and that neighborhood is filled with my family. If you are in any “hood,” you get what you are looking for. If any of the readers go up there looking for drugs, stolen property deals, etc., that’s what they will get.

However, if they go up there to live, eat, drink, chill, build with the community, and watch a play in the park, that’s what they will get—they will get nothing but love. My suggestion would be for everyone to turn off the television and get the EL to 52nd Street, get a grub, watch the play, and relax.

Eger: So everybody could go and see your all-black OTHELLO in Malcolm X Park.

Jones: Yes. What sets Theatre in the X apart is that Malcolm X Park is in one of the coolest, historically relevant sections of Philadelphia. 52nd street is the ultimate. It’s fantastic: Great theater in a fabulous place. Everybody should come.

HENRIK EGER

For earlier versions, published by Phindie, click here and there.

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“Gloriously liberating”: All-black OTHELLO, set in the criminal underworld of America. Interview with director Ozzie Jones, part 2

8/22/2015

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Nastassja Baset as Desdemona and Dwayne A. Thomas as Iago, with Malcolm X mural, Othello, Theatre in the X.
Photo by Tieshka Smith.

Ira Aldridge, famous African-American actor (1807-1867) and member of the African Grove Theatre—the first resident African American theater in the US—may be the patron saint of this all-black OTHELLO production in Philadelphia. Confronted with persistent discrimination, which black actors endured in the US, he emigrated to England (aged 26) where he played Othello, Richard III, and Shylock in The Merchant of Venice. Aldridge made quite a career on London and many European stages, and frequently played in front of royalty. He became so famous that he received top honors from heads of state—while the U.S. was still in the grip of slavery till 1861. Early in his career, he did what nobody had done before: On the closing night of his engagement wherever he performed, he addressed the audience with great passion, and spoke of the injustice of slavery and his desire for “freedom of those still held in bondage.” Aldridge never returned to the United States.

“Shakespeare‘s OTHELLO has been a battleground for race relations and identities, which continue to be fought and negotiated today,” as Andrew Ian Carlson points out in his dissertation (2011). He argues that “OTHELLO becomes the property of white Americans in the nineteenth century, conferring them financial and cultural benefits. In the 20th century, black Americans claim Othello as their property, thus challenging exclusive white ownership of the legitimate American theater.”

OTHELLO and the Black Mafia

Henrik Eger: How did you come up with the idea of casting a black Othello, instead of having a white Othello in an all-black environment?

Ozzie Jones: The idea came from Carlo Campbell. I wanted the audience in the Malcolm X Park neighborhood to relate to this play. I see Othello as an honest man and lonely warrior who looks different from the rest of the Venetians. He is unlike the others because of his rank as a general. He is also vulnerable because he is not part of the gangs that are roaming the streets. Therefore, he becomes an easy target for those around him.

I wanted to make OTHELLO become part of the area around 52nd and Market where, in the late 1950s, the Black Mafia, a dangerous crime organization, was born. In those days, there were not many Muslims in Philadelphia, so our Othello stands out along with Desdemona, who converted to Islam.

History has shown that jealousy and envy often lead to bloodshed, as it happens in the criminal underworld all the time. I was convinced that the audience in the Malcolm X Park neighborhood would relate to these problems.

“We did not have to discuss how white people feel about black folks.”

Eger: You said that the ideas in the play change without race as the issue.

Jones: Well, the change is actually quite simple. When you take the backdrop of racism and white supremacy out of the casting, OTHELLO becomes a play about jealousy. The realities of how human beings deal with jealousy, rage, love, etc. are what we must discuss and investigate. It was actually quite liberating. Through rehearsal, we did not have to discuss how white people feel about black folks. Gloriously liberating.

Eger: Powerful stuff. But doesn’t Shakespeare’s choice of words present quite a challenge for your liberating interpretation?

Jones: Shakespeare’s language—presenting Othello’s race and color in a disparaging, hateful way—reflects what the characters in the play think about Othello’s integrity and intellect. Our production of this tragedy showed the sadness, pain, and death that can come from human frailty, envy, passion, and violence—without the tiresome, destructive stupidity of white supremacy. I found it quite moving that our all-black OTHELLO didn’t fall apart as a play. I actually think it took wings and flew.

Othello: Muslim general with paranoia, massaged by Iago

Eger: You present Othello as a Muslim living in a violent non-Muslim environment.

Jones: I didn’t want to make Othello different because of race, so I envisioned him as a Muslim in a non-Muslim environment. In the black community in the 1950s, most folks were Christian, and many of them were scared of Malcolm X. But now, over half a century later, many black Muslims live in that area.

Considering what’s going on in the US, making Othello a Muslim man would make it reasonable that he would feel the level of paranoia that he felt, sitting in the back of his mind, fearful that everyone is against him. And Iago is massaging that insecurity, that fear.

OTHELLO, set in the world of a crime syndicate

Eger: In the 1939 film, Paradise in Harlem, Othello’s dialogue is “delivered in the a cappella gospel style.” What did you do to bring OTHELLO to an all-black neighborhood in Malcolm X Park?

Jones: We set Othello loosely in the world of a crime syndicate in contemporary America—mainly, because in such a world, violence is an expected reality for how men rise and fall from power. Also, the underworld has the patriarchal, macho dealings with women, with the mental and physical violence, ending in murder—all realities which the play needs for its awful, tragic end.

Casting an all-black OTHELLO

Eger: Tell us about your actors, especially those playing Othello, Desdemona, Iago, Emilia, and Cassio.

Jones: The actors are bloody fabulous. This is my first time directing Dwayne A. Thomas who is playing Iago. He gives a truly wonderful performance. I cast Carlo Campbell as Othello, because he was born to play that role, and Nastassja Baset as Desdemona, Walter DeShields as Cassio, and LaNeshe Miller-White as Emilia—all actors who are unique and have passion to do Shakespeare.

Good actors not getting hired on Philadelphia main stages

Eger: From your OTHELLO cast, Carlo Campbell is one of the few actors who gets hired quite often by a number of different companies, but I don’t think I have seen everyone else appear on Philadelphia stages regularly.

Jones: True. Not only are these actors interesting to watch, they have a really high technical ability as well. The number of gifted, well-trained black actors who never get to perform on downtown theater stages is disgraceful. I want lots of people to come and see this production, so they can witness how incredibly good these actors are.

Hopefully, the public can start demanding to see them on stages everywhere.

HENRIK EGER

A similar version was published by Phindie, click here and there.

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Black theater, black audiences: Interview with OTHELLO director Ozzie Jones, part 1

8/22/2015

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OTHELLO, Theatre in the X audience, Photo by Tieshka Smith

Ozzie Jones, a well-known director, has made a name for himself directing many black productions, not only in Philadelphia, but in Europe as well. In 1997, as the first African American in Ireland, he directed OTHELLO where a white actor played Othello the Moore in blackface, and a black actor played his evil counterpart Iago—to the applause of audiences and theater critics alike. Last year, Jones directed Philadelphia’s first all-black production of Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman with similarly positive responses. An established “elder advisor” of Theatre in the X, and an experienced member of the arts community to create theater in underserved areas, Ozzie Jones, in this interview, talks freely about a number of sensitive issues.

“Just Shakespeare. And people understood.”

Eger: You studied and worked abroad.

Jones: I learned a lot in Europe, especially when I saw the acclaimed Maly Drama Theatre of St. Petersburg perform Dostoyevsky’s The Possessed at the Barbican Centre in London—an eleven-hour production. They projected English translations onto a screen atop the stage. Although the whole production was in Russian, the story was so clear that after a while I stopped looking at the text and, instead, concentrated on the play and the story.

Eger: How did that experience influence your three-hour OTHELLO production without intermission?

Jones: I did the same thing with OTHELLO. Just Shakespeare. And people understood. I heard nobody who complained.

The folks at Malcolm X Park understood that Othello loves Desdemona, that Iago doesn’t like Desdemona, that he would do anything to drive Othello into murder, and they understood that everybody gets heartbroken. If the audience understands that, then they understand the whole play—even if they don’t understand all the words.

Eger: That’s quite an achievement—three hours of Shakespeare in one go.

Jones: True, and nobody left. Nobody was fidgeting in their chair. I was proud of that. I have never seen Shakespeare performed without intermission, but we performed it in the park non-stop with kids everywhere. What was exciting to me is living, breathing evidence that Shakespeare is still relevant and can be understood.

Purist approach to Shakespeare

Eger: Would such a purist approach to Shakespeare really work with non-traditional audiences?

Jones: Many people in the theater community think that if an audience is poor, young, or uneducated, there has to be singing and dancing, and a production must not be longer than 90 minutes. That’s almost an unwritten rule. However, this show is evidence that this kind of thinking is absolutely false.

Many of our schools don’t even perform Shakespeare because they think that poor kids are incapable of understanding Shakespeare, but our production demonstrates that this notion is absolutely not true.

Black theater, black audiences

Eger: How does this production of OTHELLO go beyond the perceived limits of black theater in Philadelphia?

Jones: This production and the community’s response to it says: There is no limit to the kind of theater that the black community will go see and embrace. The idea that the people who live in poor black neighborhoods need to have theater with loud slapstick comedy, singing, dancing, eye popping, and booty shaking is a stone cold lie.

Another false belief is that a play should not exceed an hour and 20 minutes. Our three hour production, with no intermission, is proof that we as artists can and should be making more interesting, more creative, and more inventive work, because the people want it.

“My focus is on the people I work with.”

Eger: Did you encounter any resistance to your all-black OTHELLO? If not, could such an absence suggest that at least the theater world is open to innovative approaches—and is not based on racial criteria?

Jones: To quote Thelonious Monk [American jazz pianist and composer with an “unorthodox approach to the piano”]—“I listen to my own music.” My focus is on the people I work with, the work that we are making, and the community we are making it for. If there were any resistance, I would not have heard it.

A director’s dream projects

Eger: You are well known for ground-breaking productions. What would be some of your dream projects as a director?

Jones: I have been working on creating a large series of plays called The Real Book. The idea of my collection is to write a number of plays that are inspired by America’s most important jazz composers and compositions. The Real Book series will be broken up into five parts: Blues, Swing, Bop, Modern, and Queens (women composers). Each section will have four plays.

Eger: Where are you now with your work?

Jones: I have almost finished the Bop section. The first piece in my Real Book is Chasin’ the Bird. In short, it is my imagining of the dream Charlie Parker had as he lay dying. Chasin’ the Bird was developed and read at Penumbra Theater in Saint Paul-Minneapolis, in 2012.

Kind of Blue is the second work in The Real Book series. Its first public reading was for African Continuum Theater at Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., in 2013. And recently, I fully mounted it at Freedom Theater. Kind of Blue is a romantic poem about love and relationships, birthed from the music of Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue.

The other two remaining pieces are Liver and Onions, inspired by the music of Thelonious Monk, and A Love Supreme, an epic poem inspired by John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme.

The goal of each piece in The Real Book will be to write plays that feel, move, and swing like the sound of the artists’ music—and not bore anyone with a linear, biographical retelling of an artist’s life. A large, long-term goal is to finish and have them performed everywhere.

But you know how it goes—one step at a time.

HENRIK EGER

For earlier versions, published by Phindie, click here and there.

[Malcolm X Park, 52nd and Pine streets] August 8-22, 2015; theatreinthex.com

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A Different Kind of “Love Triangle”: MOTHER TONGUE playwright F.J. Hartland, interview 2

8/10/2015

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F.J. Hartland has been called “Pittsburgh’s most eminent playwright” and his plays have won numerous awards. His MOTHER TONGUE, about a different kind of love triangle, will be one of the highlight productions of this year’s GayFest! In the second part of this two-part interview (read part one here), Hartland talks about the themes and influences of his GayFest! production.

Henrik Eger: MOTHER TONGUE is a moving story about a young painter who finds his life turned upside down when he must choose between his new lover with a mysterious past and his mother who dreams of a career as a stand-up comedian.

Tell us about the genesis of this intriguing story.

F.J. Hartland: I began playing with the idea of someone who can’t stop hating someone who is dead. Then I added the opposite, someone who can’t stop loving someone who is dead. That took care of the characters of Cale and Bertie.

I needed a forum where they come together, so that’s when Matt, the painter, became part of the story. He’s the one who is trapped between these two polar opposites. His life can’t move forward until the lives of Cale and Bertie move forward. It makes for a different kind of “love triangle.”

FJ Hartland in his office, Photo by Dr. Victoria Cope

Eger: Your play deals not only with a lively presence, but a past that impacts all three characters: mother, son, and lover. Were any of them based on people you knew?

Hartland: To be honest, MOTHER TONGUE is probably my least autobiographical play. There are small elements that reflect things in my own life, but the three characters aren’t based on anyone I know—they are all from my imagination.

Eger: You wrote about a man who can go “full Monty” onstage but is unable to express his feelings with words.

Hartland: I think much of it is indicative of what society is like nowadays. People post the most intimate things on social media—things they would never say to a real person standing in front of them. In the case of Cale and Matt, they’re both looking for something to fill a need in each of their lives. The sex—while good—isn’t really what they’re looking for.

Eger: You began writing MOTHER TONGUE about ten years ago, with several productions along the journey. Tell us more about the “many changes over the years.”

Hartland: Originally, the play had a reading at Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Company. I always find a reading is particularly helpful to me. When other voices speak the lines, my ear can hear what rings true and what rings false, what moments feel right and which ones feel rushed or too slow. Then I can go back and do a re-write based on those discoveries.

Next, the play was performed in New York City as part of Gayfest 2010. I had a marvelous director and cast who really challenged me and brought many nuances to the play. I loved watching it.

Eger: You said that you “like working with directors and actors to improve the play.” Could you give some examples of how such cooperation made MOTHER TONGUE even stronger?

Mother Tongue with Peggy Smith, Andrew Dean Laino, and Bill Egan, directed by Rich Rubin, Philadelphia Gayfest! 2015

Hartland: What’s so wonderful about working on a new play is that a director comes in and sees it with a new set of eyes. Actors, also see it with a fresh set of eyes. They all bring the playwright a new perspective, often asking questions about the play that I never thought of. At first,I thought I had such bad comedy material for Bertie’s routine, so I was surprised when the audience found her to be funny. Also, Rich Rubin [director of Gayfest!] had a good suggestion about changing the end of a scene in Act II that I think really helped to improve the act.

Eger: Your work has been produced a record-setting nine times in the Pittsburgh New Works Festival and other theaters. In New York, your work has been produced by Emerging Artists Theatre, Love Creek, 13th Street Theatre, Ensemble Studio Theatre, The Quaigh Theatre, Don’t Tell Mama, and five times in the Samuel French Off-Off-Broadway Short Play Festival. Fantastic. How did you manage to get your plays accepted in that many theaters?

Hartland: So much of theater is “who you know.” So along this journey I have met people who have people who have helped move my career along as well. And I do the same for them.

Actually, this September I’ll be making my record-setting fifteenth appearance in the Pittsburgh New Works Festival. I was named for Best Play in 2005, 2010, 2011, and 2013.

Eger: Looking back, how did those experiences shape your writing, especially MOTHER TONGUE?

Hartland: I think everyone who has ever worked on MOTHER TONGUE, whether as a director, an actor, or a designer, has left some kind of mark on the play. As a playwright, I don’t take every suggestion that I am given, but I am always open to suggestions. I tell my playwriting students that you may have to listen to fifteen suggestions, but there’s usually one that is real gold.

Eger: How did audiences respond to your play?

Hartland: I love to watch and listen to an audience during a performance, then to eavesdrop on their conversations during intermission and after the show. That’s one of the great things about being a playwright. No one in the lobby knows they’re standing next to the person who wrote the play—so you hear some very honest reactions. Following one of the New York performances, someone leaving said, “There is nothing this good playing right now on Broadway.” I was truly overwhelmed by that.

Eger: Great. F.J., is there anything else you would like to share?

Hartland: I always try to challenge myself as a playwright and MOTHER TONGUE was my first “romantic comedy.” There are a lot of laughs along the way, but there is also a great deal of real feeling. Even though the story of Matt and Bertie and Cale is unique to the three of them, I think everyone will be able to relate to the play.

Eger: I’ll watch out for anyone who eavesdrops on our conversations during intermission or after the show. Who knows, I might actually meet you—not on Broadway, but at Plays & Players, one of Philadelphia’s oldest theaters.

HENRIK EGER

For interview originally published by Phindie, click here.

GayFest! 2015 runs August 7-22, 2015, at Plays & Players Skiner Studio [1714 Delancey Place]. MOTHER TONGUE has performance August 13, 14, 16, 17, 19, and 21 (all at 7pm). Check quinceproductions.com for the full schedule and tickets.

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The limits of forgiveness: Interview with FROM WHITE PLAINS playwright Michael Perlman

8/10/2015

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Playwright Michael Perlman at work. Photo by John Racioppo.

A successful young director-playwright, Michael Perlman studied at Brown University and now lives and works in New York. His most recent play, At the Table, just closed to critical acclaim in New York. Perlman’s first play, Flying on the Wing (2006), won the Outstanding Solo Show award at the New York Fringe Festival in 2013. It was followed by the award-winning drama, FROM WHITE PLAINS, which became an instant success in 2012. Directed by Rich Rubin, it will be performed in Philadelphia as part of Gayfest! 2015, with Frank Schierloh as Dennis, Thomas-Robert Irvin as Ethan, Jeff Hunsicker as John, and Connor Feimster as Gregor (see image by John Donges below).

FROM WHITE PLAINS artistic director Rich Rubin, GayFest! 2015 and his cast:
Frank Schierloh, Connor Feimster, Jeff Hunsicker, and Thomas-Robert Irvin. Cast photo by John Donges.

Written in collaboration with Craig Wesley Divino, Karl Gregory, Jimmy King, and Aaron Rossini, FROM WHITE PLAINS shows role reversal at work. It follows the impact of negative childhood experiences that carry over into adulthood. Dennis, the protagonist, speaks up for his best friend who had been bullied into suicide. In publicly castigating Ethan, a homophobic bully from his youth, Dennis becomes an angel of revenge—a modern bully who preaches from the Oscar pulpit via his acceptance speech. This act has consequences for everyone. The play won critical acclaim and was presented with the GLAAD Media Award for “Outstanding Theatre Off-Off Broadway.”

FROM WHITE PLAINS original cast: Jimmy King, Aaron Rossini, Karl Gregory and Craig Wesley Divino. Photo by Jacob J Goldberg

Flying on the Wing

Henrik Eger: In 2006, you wrote an autobiographical one-man show, both thought provoking and entertaining. In her NY Theatre review of your play and your performance, Maggie Cino presents this moving account: “Perlman’s small physical size and his hoarse, unusual voice are explored again and again. He stands on boxes and acts out scenes with tiny figures that make him look gargantuan, he drinks water to soothe his scarred vocal chords, conducts the sound of the hospital machines, and lip synchs with heartbreaking nuance.”

Michael Perlman: I wrote Flying on the Wing, probing into what about my life story was worth sharing.

What the play ended up being was an exploration of whether or not everything happens for a reason, and, essentially, how what I faced were not adversities, but simply the experiences of my specific life.

I wrote the play ten years ago, so it feels like a very different place in my life and my work.

Eger: Cino concludes her review of you and your work with these observations: “Perlman has won his battle. [. . .] Ultimately, the show is about how love does make a difference, and how life is a choice, and how at the intersection of love and life is the possibility for genuine transformation.”

Could you talk about how transformation fuels your work?

Michael Perlman, Flying on the Wing, Aug 2006

Perlman: We go to the theater to see change and to be changed. Underlining all theatrical work is the possibility of transformation—and the story is whether or not that transformation happens. All my work starts from this notion: do these circumstances allow for change? In From White Plains, the characters desperately want to change and are searching for how to make that possible.

Scheduled before it was written

Eger: How did FROM WHITE PLAINS come into existence?

Perlman: When we were looking for a new play to do with Fault Line Theater back in 2012, a few possibilities fell through.

I [then] got the idea of FROM WHITE PLAINS and offered them to write that play. We had a workshop production that June—with an opening night scheduled before the play was written.

Eger: That sounds risky.

Perlman: It went well. We decided to do it again in a larger scale production.

Eger: Looking at the plays that you have written, how helpful was the workshop approach and the feedback from others?

Perlman: The workshop approach is invaluable to me. It is the only way I know how to write. I can write plenty on my own. In FROM WHITE PLAINS, for example, I came to the first rehearsal with a much simpler version of the ending that was not nearly as emotionally complicated. The feedback I got was to make it more emotionally complicated—so I went home that night and reworked it.

I write for—and sometimes with—the ensemble, using their voices and feedback to guide where the play goes. All of my plays are written for specific actors and for their specific skill sets.

Eger: Tell us more about your process of collaborating with actors.

Perlman: I did a few playwriting programs when I was a teenager—through The Playwrights Center in Minneapolis and Young Playwrights, Inc. in New York. As I kept developing, I realized that I truly valued the rehearsal collaboration with actors and the big picture.

Eger: Did you ever experience any writer’s block?

Perlman: Yes. When I was facing writer’s block in FROM WHITE PLAINS, I would go to a Tumblr we created and find inspiration from what the actors posted. In some cases, stories people shared made it directly into my earlier drafts. [For example,] the telephone moments in FROM WHITE PLAINS came from an exercise I had given the actors.

From White Plains with Frank-Schierloh and Thomas-Robert Irvin, Philadelphia's GayFest! 2015. Photo by John Donges.

“Can we truly become adults without facing what we’ve done to others?”

Eger: What was the driving force for you to write FROM WHITE PLAINS?

Perlman: I’m interested in exploring how we, as a country, seem more and more afraid of the gray areas between good and bad. Everyone coming [to a show] would believe they know that “Gay bullying is bad.” I wanted to choose a topic that explores how to make that [illusion] complex: What happens when it’s in our past? How do we hold on to it and honor our past? Can we truly become adults without facing what we’ve done to others? Can we move beyond what we’ve had done to us? And how do we move on?

Eger: Your play shows a shift of power that could well be a fantasy held by oppressed peoples. It hits a raw nerve with critics and audiences alike. What responses do you get from those who share with you that they were bullied, too?

Perlman: Many [share] their own stories and respond to Dennis’ line, “It’s not that I’m holding onto it, it’s holding on to me.” I hear a lot about that—about the limits of forgiveness. How what happens in high school still affects us throughout our lives. I also heard from people who were bullies, and how it offered a new perspective for them. I personally think people are hungry for nuanced conversations, and I think and hope that FROM WHITE PLAINS offers that.

From White Plains with Frank-Schierloh and Connor Feimster, GayFest 2015

GayFest! runs August 7-22, 2015, at Plays & Players Skinner Studio [1714 Delancey Place] and Studio X [1340 S. 13th Street]. AT THE FLASH runs August 11 (preview), 12 (opening), 15, 18, 20, and 22, at 7 PM. See quinceproductions.com for a full calendar of shows and check out all the Phindie GayFest! coverage.

[Plays & Players Skinner Studio, 1714 Delancey Place] August 11-22, 2015; quinceproductions.com

This interview was originally published by Phindie on August 9, 2015.

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“Nobody cares what a playwright looks like”: F.J. Hartland interview, part 1

8/4/2015

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F.J. Hartland has been called “Pittsburgh’s most eminent playwright” and his plays have won numerous awards.

Hartland’s MOTHER TONGUE, about a different kind of love triangle, will be one of the highlight productions of this year’s GayFest!

Hartland spoke about his background, success, and influences ahead of GayFest! 2015.

Eger: What sparked your interest in theater in general and writing plays in particular?

F. J. Hartland as actor, Conor McPherson’s Shining City

Hartland: When I was 13 or so, I asked for a typewriter for Christmas. My parents obliged, and I just began writing plays. And I’m not exactly sure why, as I come from a family that has no interest in theater at all. If I wasn’t involved, they probably [would] never see a play!

Eger: Three guesses: You had good teachers who encouraged you all the way.

Hartland: Yes,I had many wonderful teachers who encouraged my writing. For the 1974 summer program of The Pennsylvania Governor’s School for the Arts, I was accepted into the creative writing class.

I went to college to study acting, but the head of our theater program told me I was “too short, too fat, too ugly and too untalented” to be an actor. So I went back to writing. Nobody cares what a playwright looks like. So I switched to the English Department where my new advisor encouraged me to go to graduate school to study playwriting.

Poster for upcoming Games of the Mind by F. J. Hartland

Eger: You have been writing plays for over 40 years. Were there any themes or patterns that emerged?

Hartland: There is a joke in Pittsburgh theater circles that all I write about is death. And I guess that’s true. What’s more dramatic than life and death? I have a new play opening in Pittsburgh in September called Games of the Mind. I told the producing Throughline Theatre Company that they should use the advertising tag line, “It’s a Hartland play and nobody DIES!”

F.J. Hartland as Charlie and Amy Landis as Liz in The Whale by Samuel D. Hunter

Eger: You spent your professional life as a playwright, actor, and director. Given that rich background, what were some of the highlights?

Hartland: This past spring I played the lead in the play The Whale at Off The Wall in Carnegie, so that was one of the true high points in my acting career. I’ve been a member of Actors Equity for almost twenty-five years, and The Whale was a real pinnacle for me.

One of the best times I ever had as a director was over a year ago when I directed The Mystery of Irma Vep for a local theater. I had an amazing cast, wonderful designers, and a crackerjack crew of dressers who kept those two actors racing through hundreds of quick changes. I was able to sit back and enjoy just directing, or as Orson Welles used to say, “presiding over the happy accidents.” And we had many happy accidents.

As a playwright, I feel like I have reached a true achievement when a total stranger tells me how much my words have moved him or her. If something I put on a piece of paper can make someone I don’t know laugh or cry . . . wow.

Eger: In 2008, you were the recipient of a Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Playwriting Fellowship. How did that honor impact your life as a writer?

Hartland: It was a true godsend because I was broke at the time and the $5,000 saved my life. Sadly, that was the last year the state of Pennsylvania awarded individual artist grants. Budgets were cut—starting with the arts.

Eger: Tell us about your writing process. What works for you and what does not?

Hartland: I can’t even start writing until I know the first and the last thing I want the audience to see. Then my first draft is trying to see if I can get from that first picture to the last picture. I often say that a play has to “simmer on the back burner” in my brain for a long time before I am comfortable enough to commit to the idea.

I have playwright friends who just sit down and let the story take them wherever the story takes them. I am too much of a “control freak” to do that. If I get in a car or a bus or a plane, I need to know where I am going. If I commit to writing a play, I need to know where I am going.

Eger: You have written mostly one-acts, but also some full-length plays. Which ones get performed more often?

Hartland: Definitely the one-acts. There seems to be a much bigger market for them. I think there is something really wonderful about a well-crafted one-act. If they’re good, they are little jewels. Probably for the same reason I love short stories.

Eger: You said that your ideas come from many different places. Tell us more about the things that influenced your plays.

Hartland: I once wrote a play based on a name I saw carved on a tombstone. Once I wrote a play based on a photograph I saw in the newspaper. Another play was inspired by something funny my sister said. I keep all my inspirations in what I call my “idea book.” It is an unorganized mish-mash of possible play titles, character names, ideas for plays, and funny lines.

Eger: Very few writers can live on their plays. What did you do to support your writing financially?

Hartland: I lived in Pittsburgh for seven years and did a myriad of things to keep body and soul together. I was a college adjunct, teaching mostly freshman composition and public speaking. I wrote and edited copy for a small newspaper. I worked as a proofreader. I graded essays for a company that processed the standardized school testing. Sometimes I held down as many as five part-time jobs.

Pittsburgh skyline with Sea of Fog. Photo by Ruth E. Hendricks

A year ago, I accepted a position teaching theater full-time at a small liberal arts college here in western Pennsylvania.

Eger: Congratulations!

HENRIK EGER

For interview originally published by Phindie, click here.

[Plays & Players Skinner Studio, 1714 Delancey Place] August 13-21, 2015; quinceproductions.com.

GayFest! 2015 runs August 7-22, 2015, at Plays & Players Skiner Studio [1714 Delancey Place]. MOTHER TONGUE has performance August 13, 14, 16, 17, 19, and 21 (all at 7 pm).

Check quinceproductions.com for the full schedule and tickets.

For a video interview with F.J. Hartland, “Pittsburgh’s most prominent playwright,” click here.

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