Monthly Archives: August 2011

Opt In

Posted on August 31, 2011 by Polly Carl
My observation of how opting out manifests in a lot of theaters results in what I would call the new culture wars. The young and savvy know how to send out the message of the organization. An army of interns is behind the Twitter feed and the Facebook status updates. They are choosing what articles and video your theater links to, they determine the question of the day to pose to your audience, while those higher up the food chain do the “important stuff”—make theater.
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The Horton Lens

Posted on August 28, 2011 by jmahoney
I first started looking at theater through the lens of Horton Hears A Who! at the 2006 Seven Devils Playwrights Conference. I was sitting on stage moderating a discussion of Go Home Now by Judy Anderson. The setting and concern of the play was a town very much like the one I was in: McCall, Idaho. Like many communities, it was struggling with the loss of a large employer, a cross-generational identity crisis, and war vets who were increasingly coming home to a town they hardly recognized.
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On Theatricality

Posted on August 21, 2011 by lstryk
A few years back I was invited to take part in the launching of a new play development program and was paired with a fresh, young director. I was quite surprised as we talked about my play to find him urging me to pepper the text with highly theatrical stage
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Losing My Insomnia

Posted on August 10, 2011 by gsuilebhan
My typical night of insomnia begins, perhaps paradoxically, in sleep. I lie down at what feels like an appropriate time and drift off easily, but for some reason that no manner of science or self-investigation has managed to unearth, I fail to make the hoped-for graceful turn from light slumber
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A Lover’s Guide to American Playwrights

Posted on August 7, 2011 by tlondon
Sometimes even the American theater gets it right—as it did with August Wilson. Sometimes our community, our industry, overcomes its cowardice, its aversion to the new and unknown, its love affair with the one-shot, and—as it did once upon a time with August Wilson—invests in an artist over the long haul, invests in a body of work.
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