Outside Providence
nytheatre.com q&a preview by Andrew Joseph Clarke
July 25, 2012
What is your job on this show?
Playwright.
Who are your heroes?
My heroes are the people who know what they want and aren't afraid to go after it. Sometimes compromise is necessary between people but in this field it means compromising your art. Though I'm still learning this skill, but I'd rather be decisive and fail, than equivocate and float along.
Oh, also, my dad.
Complete this sentence: My show is the only one in FringeNYC that...?
My show is the only show at FringeNYC to feature an inflatable turkey as a named character. In a drama.
In your own words, what do you think this show is about? What will audiences take away with them after seeing it?
This show is about realizing you don't always have the power to make things right, even if you put everything you have into trying. It's about holding on to someone even after they're gone and working through the grief to find the balance between forgetting and obsessing.
People who like which of the following recent Broadway shows would also probably like your show: THE BOOK OF MORMON, ONCE, DEATH OF A SALESMAN, CLYBOURNE PARK?
Of that list I would go with "Once". A sweet little love story with somewhat fantastical elements (um, people singing?) where two people are together in this one moment but in the end know they can't be--and they have to move on. I guess what I'm really saying is watch for the premiere of "Outside Providence!:The Musical".
Theatre is a necessary ingredient in democratic societies. Do you agree or disagree, and why?
Agree. Theater is one of the strongest and most historically recurring examples of the voice of the people. Theater is where Athenians could criticize government figures or where Romans can criticize the military lifestyle (Miles Gloriosus, anyone?). I'm never as excited to be alive as I am when I watch a musical, and I'm never as willing to challenge my own way of thinking or understand an aspect of society I know little about as when I'm sitting in any theater. Theater is how a nation keeps in touch.
