Episode 9005: The Art of Theatre

♪ ♪ Artworks is made possible in part by... And by... ♪ ♪ VINCENT: I feel like theater holds a mirror up to nature.

Start with the writers, the great writers, from the ancient Greeks all the way to new people writing today like Charly Evon Simpson.

At Everyman we like to look forward, and be 'au courant' with the latest thinking, and the youngest writers and sharing with us their points of view.

But we also like to go back to Shakespeare and some of the great classic plays and re-examine them because you know, society was totally different and had different values, and sometimes it's amazing to go back and look and see what they thought was the right thing to do at that time.

And why did they think that.

It makes you question what you're doing today, and go "are we doing the right thing?"

You know, we don't believe that anymore, but is that right?

You know, if, if you're a history buff, right, you learn from history.

If you're somebody that's looking to get your finger on the pulse of what people are feeling today, you're gonna love Everyman Theater.

(grinding).

DANIEL: Well a scenic designer, in general, is the, often the first experience an audience member has with the world of the play.

The scenic designer is ultimately really responsible for what the thing looks like.

It's the biggest physical presence of the play.

So much of the rest of the design work is all happening in a digital world, where the sound work is all happening in a digital world, the lighting is more and more involved with digital, the projection work that's happening, these are very ephemeral sort of tools in the theater.

But scenery is all about lumber and steel and upholstery and paint.

The scenic designer is often the first designer working on a project, even though the conversation will encompass all the rest of the design team, and the director, and the producing directors, but their work tends to be the first thing that's coming out.

You can't really design without having some idea as to how engineering works.

I often design to the strengths of the crew that I'm working with, and I know we handle steel really well.

So I know that if I want to do something that was requiring steel, I don't have to be afraid of it.

It's a language we understand here.

Plus things have turned out these days with what things cost, steel is actually less expensive than lumber.

Oftentimes something we might be painting to look like wood might be a steel frame.

SUMMER: For this first go tell me what you would like to do.

I'm of the mindset of like let's run the song, let's run the track, let's see everything that it brings to us, and then we'll go back and work on cleanup.

So let's run it all the way through, see what we see.

TONY: Okay.

SUMMER: And then we'll play, the whole scene.

TONY: Hey Billie, FYI, I'm trying actually smoking this today.

BILLIE: I'm really excited.

(Tony laughs).

TONY: Are you?

Okay.

We'll see how it goes.

BILLIE: Did you read the box?

TONY: No, why?

BILLIE: The box is concerning, Just don't read it.

(Tony laughing).

SUMMER: We're risking it all.

(lighter clicks).

(clears throat).

BILLIE: The thing about theater is that somehow it can allow us to see a perspective that we never would see otherwise.

SUMMER: I think theater reminds us that community is our healing space and theaters serve as community gathering points.

VINCENT: I wanted the theater to really be a place for the community to come and, and experience human stories.

When I was studying theater at Catholic University in Washington, I always knew I wanted to start a theater.

I always knew that for me, the actor is at the center of the work, that you could put two actors on stage with no script, no costumes, no scenery, and they can create live theater that's explosive and exciting, and, and, and, and makes you laugh and makes you cry.

And so for me I wanted to find a place where I could set down some roots and bring a resident company of actors together to tell stories.

NOAH: I mean we are located in downtown Baltimore and we believe that the primary purpose of a regional theatre is to serve the community of which it's a part of and with local artists.

While we do bring in actors, directors, and designers from outside the area we do have a commitment to local artists, and one of our core tenants is our resident company of actors and designers.

KYLE: I get pretty emotional about it, it's something that doesn't really exist very much anymore in theater in America.

It used to be for hundreds of years it, it was the resident company did everything.

And as the resident theater movement came about in this country starting in the 1950s, many theaters had resident acting companies of actors who, who performed in multiple plays throughout their seasons.

But those have gone the way of the dodo, I mean, they don't really exist anymore, and you could probably name on one hand the number that still exist in America today.

The production we're doing right now, "Jump" uh, there's an actor in that Jefferson Russell who I've known for 25 years and I've acted with two or three times in his history with us.

JEFFERSON: It can mean guaranteed work.

It's a blessing because I live in Baltimore, I'm from Baltimore, my immediate family is here.

My father's senior, it's a delight to be able to have the security of work um, but also being able to be close to where my family is.

KYLE: You know I've done, with some of those actors on the wall downstairs, I've done 10, 15 different productions with them.

So when we enter the room at the first day of rehearsal, it's like a family reunion.

TONY: You often hear it said, but I've never felt it more true than here that, you know, Everyman is a family.

But it's also really great to know that I have this artistic home here.

MORGAN: Everyman is special for me just because it was my first theater I grew up wanting to be at Everyman coming from the Baltimore School for the Arts.

I would say that Everyman treats you like family as soon as you walk through the door.

REGINALD: At Mosaic Theater we really believe that theater can spark a conversation.

My name is Reg Douglas and I'm the artistic director of Mosaic Theater.

So we want to use theater as a catalyst for connections, for community building and for civic change.

And so the plays we're producing this season, "The Till Trilogy" by Ifa Bayeza, our production of "Bars and Measures" by Idris Goodwin that I'm really honored to be directing this year, are plays that take moments from our past, allow us to think about our present, and then spark dialogue and conversation about who we could be.

And that to me is the gift of the theater to take not just who we are now, you can read that in the newspaper, we want to add imagination and curiosity to that.

And that's what we do at Mosaic Theater.

VINCENT: I, I love Reggie and I love what he's doing at Mosaic.

And, Reggie and I have worked together, he's directed plays here at Everyman, he's introduced me to great new writers.

We share performers that work at his theater and at Everyman theater Billie Krishawn is a really great example of that.

Just recently was in Emmett Till, and was booked in "Jump" at Everyman.

We share an esthetic about finding the humanity in stories and in sharing them in our community in the most inclusive way possible.

So I'd like to think that we're kindred spirits.

REGINALD: You know I'm so honored to be uh, working with the team that's committed to using theater for social change, theater that sparks justice conversations, theater that's not scared of the hard topics, because we believe that if we talk about the harrowing events with honesty, we can hopefully engender and empower some hope.

And that's really the goal for us.

And partnership is one of the key themes up for our season, really how can we collaborate with other artists across the disciplines, with other organizations.

For our "Till Trilogy" we worked with over 25 arts and culture organizations all around the city, and beyond, to bring the themes of that play: racial justice, Black history, to life in new and exciting ways.

MAMIE: After they pulled his body from the water, a ring I gave him was still on his finger.

I gave him the ring, his father's.

LAWYER: Is this the ring?

MAMIE: Yes.

LAWYER: Now, I hand you the ring that has engraved on it, May 25th 1943 with the large initials L-T.

This was in the effects of your dead husband?

MAMIE: Yes Sir.

LAWYER: Louis Till?

MAMIE: Yes Sir.

Emmett had won the ring occasionally, with the aid of Scotch tape or string, he had to have something else on with it to make it fit his hand.

Usually he kept it in his jewelry box, but on the morning of August 20th when he got ready to board the train he was looking for some cuff links and picked it up.

He put the ring on his finger and shook his hand to make sure that it would stay on and I remember he said... LAWYER: No, don't tell me what he said.

But did he then put the ring on his finger?

MAMIE: Yes sir.

LAWYER: And he left for Mississippi with it, did he?

MAMIE: Yes.

LAWYER: And that was the ring he had when he came down here to Mississippi?

MAMIE: Yes sir.

LAWYER: Now Mamie, I have here a picture which has been introduced into evidence as exhibit one of the testimony here of Mr. Strickland in this trial, as to the dead body that was taken out the river.

That is a picture of your son?

MAMIE: Uh, yes sir that is the body of my son.

LAWYER: That is him, isn't it?

MAMIE: Yes sir it is a picture of my son, it is a picture of the body of my son.

LAWYER: Court please just one moment.

These pictures have never been shown to the jury and I wondered at this point if you might let the jury look at them.

You may take the witness.

BILLIE: The power that theater has is that, one, as people we can only see things through our own lens, through our life experiences right?

It's almost like rose-tinted glasses, like whatever we've experienced is the way in which we'll experience the world, and how we'll understand the world.

So sometimes it can allow us to see a perspective that we never would see otherwise.

If we were speaking with a character for instance that's in a play at a café, maybe we wouldn't be open to their perspective because we had ours.

And yet somehow in the hour 30 minutes or two hours that a theater has to put on a show, the audience members allow themselves to put their own perspective aside for a second, and opens themselves up in a way they might not in the everyday world to another.

And I think what that does is allows us to understand people more, to have more empathy, to see a different side.

REGINALD: And make connections in a world that's often seems disparate and disconnected.

I want to use the 90 minutes that we spend together listening to a story about our neighbor, so we can see our neighbor in ourselves.

That's the business we're in, one of empathy.

BILAL: My brother and I are gonna have us a cutting session.

ERIC: We're gonna go phrase for phrase.

GUARD: Like a rap battle?

BOTH: No!

GUARD: Hey watch it!

I'll take you back to your cell and I'll kick you out of here.

ERIC: Sorry.

BILAL: So, what do you say then?

GUARD: I don't know your music, I wouldn't be a good judge.

BILAL: You're perfect.

GUARD: I don't know jazz.

BILAL: Neither does my brother here.

ERIC: Oh-ho, okay!

BILAL: Just tell us what sounds better.

You'll know.

GUARD: Yeah okay, whatever.

(clears throat).

♪ BILAL: Zi-boom boom.

♪ ♪ ERIC: Zip-bi-boo-di-bi-boo.

♪ ♪ BILAL: Zi-boom boom.

♪ ♪ (jazz scatting).

♪ ♪ BILAL: Zi-boom boom.

♪ ♪ Boom boom boom boom, boom boom boom!

♪ ♪ (jazz scatting).

♪ ♪ (jazz scatting).

♪ ♪ (jazz scatting).

♪ JOEL: It comes with its own nuances, and even from the direction from Reg allowed us to see that even some of the movement, some of the transitions, have a certain music to them.

And there's some moments where it stops.

GUARD: Lockdown!

Let's go.

(alarm blaring).

BILAL: Catch you next week.

ERIC: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

How did I do?

BILAL: Listen to more Count Basie.

ERIC: Why?

BILAL: Cause he can make one note swing.

ERIC: How?

BILAL: You can understand that, then you're ready to play "Caravan"!

JOEL: When we were discussing the show during rehearsal one thing that we talked about and discussed was that it was a love story.

And love brings a lot of other emotions as well.

Sometimes anger, sometimes frustration, and I think it's because there are high expectations.

Our instrument is used to bring the spirit of a character.

Sometimes we play characters that are completely unreal, but they're real somewhere.

And I think being an instrument in that way is a cool thing because you're getting a chance to play their song, and play their music whatever that story is.

REGINALD: You know one of the main themes in our season this year is how does history allow us to better understand the present?

If we really do our jobs well, start a conversation about what our future could be.

And that's exactly what I think Idris is doing in "Bars and Measures", he's taking a moment from our recent past, this play's inspired by true events around the Patriot Act and the criminalization of Muslims, particularly Black Muslims in really unfair unjust ways.

But he's looking at who we are today and sadly the reality of Black life and the criminal justice system has not changed, but I do believe this play is a call for action but also a call for hope.

And that's something that feels to me feels really uniquely Mosaic.

That the play is harrowing and honest but also full of hope and nuance.

Plays that center empathy are the plays we want to produce.

And I'm really excited to be sharing a story that is provocative, that is joyful in surprising ways, but also quite nuanced and honest in its arguments with our audience.

BILAL: I might not make it out of here.

ERIC: Bilal.

BILAL: I was supposed to have my trial by now, they stalling because they know they messed up.

ERIC: You really should just... BILAL: I'm not stupid alright?

They won't let me go to trial because they don't want the truth out there.

ERIC: Okay, okay, I hear you.

Calm down, okay.

BILAL: Gotta stay on them exercises.

You're teaching up at that school, but don't forget... ERIC: I won't.

BILAL: Something happen to me, you gotta tell the people my story.

It's composition, man.

This is my truth.

ERIC: Alright go ahead, let's hear it.

BILAL: You're gonna write it down?

ERIC: Don't worry, I'll remember it.

BILAL: You gonna remember?

ERIC: Let's hear it.

BILAL: Okay.

We doing E-flat minor.

ERIC: Ah, melancholy, huh?

BILAL: Your boy Shostakovich and Chopin stay working in that key.

ERIC: Monk did "Round Midnight" in E-flat minor.

BILAL: True, true.

Okay.

A five, a six, a five, six, seven, eight.

♪ (scatting).

♪ ♪ (scatting).

♪ KRIS: As a composer I always like to make music that people can take away from hearing it, they can, they can walk out with it.

And, and since I'm writing for like theater audiences like, I'm in another realm on those.

So I like to write music that people can just hear and now my goal is when you stand up after the production, you can hum the song on your way out.

So when I when I'm composing in in this kind of realm that's, that's something really strong for me.

Like repetition and really touching people with really simple but emotional sounds.

PERNCHANOK: Well always, always starts with the script.

What is the story is and my role is to telling the story.

There's many ways that we can tell the story so that's why Summer who's the director of this play give us about what is her vision.

And so for sound design whatever the audience hear.

So it could be music as well, but the music could be original or something that you can pick from.

For this play I wrote all the music set in the show, and then the soundscape of the play is like do you hear, what do you hear the car go by?

Do you hear it right in front of you, or you hear it from the back of you?

So it's depend on the where the audience sitting, and how do they hear this world?

Is it realistic or is it abstract?

In the beginning the script, when I read the script I have like, I called myself like a palette.

I make like a tone that like oh this is sound like this, and then when I see the rehearsal then I will find out that, oh this is right and this is totally not right and I will help to find something else.

And also what's different in movies and theater is, this is live, and so every day the actors will perform maybe this long maybe this long while the underscore is still going.

So everything is not exact but it have a room for the actors to play and then there's a cue that things shift that's based on the actors and how could I create something that shift with the actors.

So it's something that's live.

♪ ♪ (car passes) ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ (exhales).

(horn honking).

SUMMER: "Jump" is about a young woman named Fay returning to her family home to pack up after the loss of her mother and then weird things start happening to her.

And through the story and unfolding of the play we learn that they're actually mourning the death of another loved one that was quite a surprise, and it unfolds as the story unfolds, so it feels a little bit like a mystery as you're moving back and forth through time.

NOAH: "Jump" is by Charly Evon Simpson, who is an incredible young artist, and she has a very specific point of view in terms of family and spirituality and, this play in particular is about um, rebirth after, after loss.

And so as theater makers we want to support the next generation of voices.

And "Jump" is a perfect example of a piece that's leading the way in terms of, the kind of conversations we're all having and, and want to be having with our audience as a community.

VINCENT: I'm so glad we produced "Jump", a play that had serious things to say about a family going through grief and loss of family members and, you know, everything from suicide and, and the loss of a mom and, and dad recovering, and yet the play was just filled with humor, and joy, and magic, and all of the tools that we need to use as people to get through the tough times.

Life's lessons come in the form of plays.

And great joy, and great sadness, and great emotional connection.

We can come together in a theater, in a way that you can't in your living room.

That's just never more vital than right now.

ANTHONY: The importance of education and community engagement for Everyman Theater is really to be a beacon for the community.

We have high school matinee, we have theater for teens, affectionately known as TNT night.

Private coaching, and we have a number of after school and in-school programming that we are partnered with other schools, we try to reach everyone where they are.

VINCENT: Our actors' favorite performances are the high school matinees because teenagers are skeptical by nature, and they're always calling people out for not being authentic, and they're always seeking out where's the truth.

And great actors do that every day in performance.

They're digging and digging.

People don't say what they mean, they say what they feel.

And you know, the "mm-hmm" or "I don't like that" or "boo", you know some of them, the bad guys comin'.

And they revel in that feedback from the audience, and they tell me all the time, our high school matinees are our best audiences ever.

JORDYN: A patron wants to come and have an experience.

Since we are that first face that they see, we are the ones that are selling them their tickets, we are the ones that are taking their tickets, taking them to their seats, handing them their programs, telling them where the bathroom is, telling them about our bar specials, right?

Every interaction they have even before the show starts, we want it to be welcoming, positive and just enjoyable, so that patron knows that they are safe, they are comfortable, and they are here for the ride that is the show that we're presenting.

VERONESE: Box office is the art of customer service.

It's a smaller theater, it's more intimate feel to it and it only seats 247 or so.

There's not really a bad seat in the house, honestly.

How can we make the space hospitable, what can we do to bring the show out of the theater?

JORDYN: It's a huge operation in order to put on the show.

VERONESE: All the spokes on the wheel, so far as the back of house, front of house, production, marketing, and devo, and education.

It's like, we all are here to make this soup, the soup is the play.

And everyone brings their own flavor to it.

It's about the art that happens inside there, and how we can all be a part of that.

SISTER (over phone): Hey pipsqueak, it's me!

Dad's birthday is next week and we should probably... we should probably do something, right, like a cake?

Do you want to get dad's cake, or me?

You live closer to that fancy bakery, so you should but I can if you want.

Just, just call me back, like really call me back, don't not call me back!

FAY: She got the cake.

I didn't.

HOPKINS: It's okay.

FAY: I forgot it was his birthday.

She reminded me to get a card.

HOPKINS: When's his birthday?

FAY: April 28th?

HOPKINS: Give me your phone.

FAY: What are you doing?

HOPKINS: Putting his birthday in your calendar and making it repeat every year.

I do the same for my mom's.

FAY: Oh.

(crying).

Okay.

(crying).

HOPKINS: What?

FAY: Let's get out of here.

HOPKINS: Okay.

FAY: But I'm driving.

HOPKINS: Are you sure that's a good idea?

FAY: No but I'm driving.

HOPKINS: Uh, okay.

FAY: You didn't bike here, did you?

HOPKINS: No I drove.

Biking gets tedious.

FAY: Uh, yeah.

Lead the way.

HOPKINS: Oh I thought you said... FAY: I said I wanted to drive, I didn't say I had a car, I walked here.

(audience laughs).

HOPKINS: Oh, uh, it's this way.

FAY: You first.

♪ ♪ KYLE: We've already seen, coming back from the pandemic, the joy in the audience to be sitting in a room again.

To be live, witnessing live art.

I think there's been a resurgence in the joy of witnessing the live experience.

Even if they had witnessed it before, they're appreciating it in a whole new way now.

♪ ♪ Artworks is made possible in part by... And by...