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Paula Vogel, Tina Landau, and the Room That Made 'Mother Play'

Originally published by American Theatre Magazine on June 5, 2024 Once begun, the play took just two weeks to write. But in many ways it had been decades in the making. So had the collaboration. Paula Vogel and Tina Landau have known one another since the 1990s, the same decade Vogel’s late brother Carl and a version of herself first appeared onstage in her play The Baltimore Waltz. Later that…

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Larissa FastHorse on Indigenizing Theatre

Originally published by HowlRound on June 6, 2023. Katie Finneran in The Thanksgiving Play by Larissa FastHorse at Second Stage Theater. Directed by Rachel Chavkin. Scenic design by Riccardo Hernandez. Costume design by Lux Haac. Lighting design by Jeanette Oui-Suk Yew. Sound design by Mikaal Sulaiman. Video/projection design by David Bengali. Photo by Joan Marcus. This year, Larissa FastHorse…

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The Wicked Witch of the West (Exploring Evil, Ep 1)

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-mefti-14fbe78 We’re kicking off a podcast series called “OutThink the Classics,” part of my own personal quest to contextualize classic pop culture for modern families. Our first series is “Exploring Evil,” where we will explore the concept of evil in classical kids’ stories. We start this journey with the Wicked Witch of the West– can’t you just hear her…

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Announcing ”OutThink the Classics,” and Series 1: Exploring Evil.

https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-cc9fe-14f86ad OutThink the Classics is a new podcast where my guests and I will activate your brain, and give you the historical and cultural context to decide which stories in pop culture have a place in your life today. Join us for our first series called Exploring Evil: I’ll talk with experts in mythology, therapy, psychology, and more to show you how…

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The Story and the Teller Videos

It’s hard to believe it’s been two years since I got to work on this play with the amazing Calley Anderson. If you didn’t get to see it, here are some video excerpts, feat. student actors at the University of Memphis.

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Recognition and Reversal in the Plays of Lauren Gunderson

A dialogue originally published by the Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism Spring 2022 In this introduction to a dialogue with Lauren Gunderson, the author argues that the disparity between critical responses and audience responses to some of Gunderson’s plays can be understood as the product of a devaluation of her use of surprise to evoke an emotional reaction from audiences. Despite the…

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Shared Leadership

Theatres Find an Inclusive Model Spurs More Diversity and Innovation Published by Southern Theatre Magazine Winter 2023 Theatres across the country are rethinking their organizational structures in light of the forced changes brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic, calls for change from We See You White American Theatre (WSYWAT), and a recognition of the lack of diversity in theatre programming…

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Performing the Peace

Police and Former Prisoners Use Playback Theatre to Build Trust in their Community. Originally published by Southern Theatre Magazine Fall 2021. At a time when George Floyd has become a household name and police-community relations are strained across the country, a program in Memphis called Performing the Peace – which uses theatre to bridge the divide – may serve as a model for other cities.…

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Using Critical Fabulation in History-Based Playwriting

Using Critical Fabulation in History-Based Playwriting

Originally published by HowlRound on March 3, 2021 When the pandemic hit last March, the University of Memphis, as with most theatres and universities, went online for the rest of the semester, and our spring musical—one week into rehearsal—was canceled. Our chair, feeling deeply the loss to our students, wanted to provide them with a special experience when we came back in the fall. The idea…

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Forget the Times: Stream This Feminist Playwright's New Work Now

Forget the Times: Stream This Feminist Playwright’s New Work Now

Gathering us together virtually through her play, The Catastrophist, Lauren Gunderson invites us to celebrate and mourn with her as we have not been allowed to do together for so long. Virologist Nathan Wolfe has hunted viruses from the jungles of Cameroon to the basement of the CDC. Lauren Gunderson’s play, The Catastrophist, tells his story. (The Marin Theater) Originally published by Ms.…

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The Art and Craft of Intimacy Direction

The Art and Craft of Intimacy Direction

Originally published on HowlRound on January 30, 2020.

Tonia Sina in rehearsal.

In case you haven’t noticed, we are experiencing a revolution in the way artists and entertainers rehearse and perform intimacy.

The seeds were planted at least ten years ago, when a few highly trained movement specialists started noticing that they were often called upon to handle scenes of sexual intimacy in…

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The Ms. Q&A: Why Holland Taylor Wanted to Act Like Ann Richards

The Ms. Q&A: Why Holland Taylor Wanted to Act Like Ann Richards

Originally published by Ms. Magazine on September 16, 2019. 

I’ve always looked forward to being old enough to play Ann Richards in a one-woman show—so imagine what happened when I saw that Holland Taylor’s Ann was on Broadway HD and running at Arena Stage, with Jayne Atkinson in the starring role.

I was eager to talk to the actor and playwright about her career, the things that led to her…

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#MeToo and the Method

#MeToo and the Method

Originally published by HowlRound on June 13, 2019.

#MeToo has raised many questions about what kinds of intimacy are created in rehearsal rooms and classrooms, and to what end. As I’ve listened to the stories of survivors, I’ve been struck by the fact that the abusers in these cases, mostly men, weren’t doing anything that their predecessors in the American theatre didn’t do openly and without…

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Storytelling for Social Change: Inside the #HealMeToo Festival

Storytelling for Social Change: Inside the #HealMeToo Festival

Originally published by Ms. Magazine on April 15, 2019.

Hope Singsen.

Hope Singsen had done very little producing before she began putting together The #HealMeToo Festival, which just wrapped in New York City.

She started with a plan to find a space to produce Skin, her solo show about the road and obstacles to healing and reclaiming intimacy after childhood sexual trauma, and to share that space…

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#MeToo Power, Complicity, and Collective Responsibility

#MeToo Power, Complicity, and Collective Responsibility

Originally published on HowlRound on April 11, 2018.

My #metoo theatre story is from high school. Our theatre department consisted of five women and whatever hapless guys we could convince to come play a part so that we weren’t limited to just doing Steel Magnolias over and over. The women referred to our teacher as the Dirty Old Man, or D.O.M. for short. He did everything guys like that…

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Manahatta's Gender Flip: Equity in Action

Manahatta’s Gender Flip: Equity in Action

Originally published by HowlRound on April 2, 2018.

As an advocate for creating equity in the American theatre through consciously changing whom we choose to represent on stage, I am often told, “but that would interfere with the creative process.” The playwright’s vision, some argue, would be compromised by any effort to pursue casting quotas. The dictum “don’t tell the playwright what to…

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A Feminist Retelling of Sovereignty

(L to R) Kalani Queypo (John Ridge), Jake Waid (John Ross/Jim Ross), Kyla García (Sarah Polson) and Dorea Schmidt (Sarah Bird Northrup/Flora) in Sovereignty. Photos by Tony Powell. Originally published by Ms. Magazine Blog on January 10, 2018 As a student at Tulane Law School, activist, writer and lawyer Mary Kathryn Nagle once persuaded her Critical Race Theory professor to let her write a play…