Selected Short Subjects
nytheatre.com q&a preview by Richard Ballon
September 13, 2012
What is your job on this show?
playwright, director.
When did you know you wanted to work in the theater, and why?
When I was a boy, my parents were immigrants, and the table was a place for stories. Tales of war and hope, haunted alleyways and tearful reunions. Stories which were lathered in accents. These stories tethered us to the past. When I would listen to them I could see them taking place in my mind. I guess my imagination became my stage and the monologue a form I fell in love with.
Why do you do theater (as opposed to film, or TV, or something not in the entertainment field)?
Theater is live. It is an electric union which exists between performer and audience. It is cooperative, an artistic union between director, actor, designer, producer and technical staff. The sum is larger than its parts and when the balloon fills it lifts us for a brief moment out of ourselves.
Why did you want to write/direct/produce/act in/work on this show?
Women are so unrepresented in theater, and have the most interesting stories. They are cut outs in history books. I saw a photograph of a log jam on the Connecticut River outside the town of Turners Falls. The men would ride the logs down from logging camps and drag them into the sawmills. What did the women think who stood on these shores knowing the town would soon be bursting at the seams?
Which “S” word best describes your show: SMOOTH, SEXY, SMART, SURPRISING?
Surprising
