I’m in the last few laps of a stage directing marathon – three shows in three cities in three months:
- Quixote had a sold out run at the Arcata Playhouse in mid-April.
- Cavalcade of Clowns brought 15 clowns into San Francisco’s Club Fugazi on Tax Day.
- Under Friedl’s Wing will play in Poughkeepsie and Manhattan on May 2 and 3 (and then in San Francisco this July and Prague a year from now). Click here for tickets for May 2 in New York.
The themes and styles of these three pieces are wildly different although, oddly, they all include puppetry and music. They are also all pieces that are “performer driven,” making my job as director more circumscribed and more complex. Let me explain:
In these three shows, the ideas for all of material – verbal, physical and musical – came from the performers. This makes them, in the logic of a traditional theater, both the playwrights and the actors. Since they also created most of the costumes, puppets and props, they were the designers and craftspeople, too.
As the director, my job was to help craft the scenes so the structure is strong, work the transitions so the show flows, and coach the actors so the performances are engaging – usual director stuff but without much director power. I found myself challenging old friends on their hard-felt ideas and pushing on some of their long-held habits. And, of course, I came up against my own stubborn ideas and old habits. I often found myself switching to the mindset I used in the consulting world, where we were always working with the clients’ issues and goals. How do I use my tools to help them meet their goals? Harder to do when I care deeply about the material, and about the friends I’m working with, and I get mortified whenever my just-shut-up-and-do-what-I-say self comes flying out.
Sitting in a sold out house with an audience laughing and cheering my dear friends as they make their dreams live on stage – that part is really sweet.