Hey there.

Hey.

We’re doing this again? An interview with yourself?

Yep. I’m stuck for the next 45 minutes and need something to do. So here we are.

So what’s going on?

Well, I’m sitting in a laundromat washing spandex.

Umm… Dare I ask?

It’s for auditions tomorrow. I’ll be directing The Tempest for Shakespeare in Clark Park with Catharine Slusar as Prospero and Catherine Palfinier as Caliban. It’s the first time in a while I’ve directed for any entity other than my own. I’m excited and a little nervous.

So what’s with the spandex?

Well, during Lady M I had a lot of ideas about the witches materializing out of the set. A human body pushed into stretchy fabric creates an interesting shape – something clearly human but smoothed out. Like a neutral mask for the whole body.

In the first iteration of the show we didn’t really get to implement a lot of the experiments we explored in rehearsals. When thinking about Tempest I was interested in stage elements that felt genuinely magical. I really liked the idea that Ariel, the spirit imprisoned by Prospero, could appear and disappear magically by using this material in the set design.

Sounds fun.

Yeah. I’m pretty psyched actually about getting to come back to a previous idea I didn’t get to take to its fullest vision.

So, I have to ask. You wrote before about being really freaked about the audition culling process. How’d it go?

I know I had a lot of apprehension. I still don’t know how I feel about the cold call submission thing, but I have to say, there were some pretty amazing people that showed up for the first round. I’m psyched to see the folks that are coming to this next one.

So maybe auditions aren’t so bad?

Maybe. I always wish there was more time. And it reminds me how much scheduling sucks. But on the whole, yeah, it’s been awesome to see all the talented folks that I had no idea lived in this city. It’s a little humbling in a way.

How do you mean?

It’s easy as one starts to transition out of newbie status (oh the eternal emerging artist) to feel like you know everything that’s out there. It’s nice to remember that the landscape of the arts community is always growing and changing. That once I was part of that new groundswell and less than a decade later there’s a whole new “generation” of artists to discover.

So I get why you’re using the spandex. Why are you washing it?

Swim Pony bought all this spandex for SURVIVE! We turned a dirty basement into this:

(Thanks JJ Tiziou for the photo ww.jjtiziou.net)

Those light up walls? A million miles of spandex. Since then it’s been sitting in my basement. It’s not nice to make people roll around in smelly fabric.

And there’s no one else to wash it?

It’s a glamorous life I lead.

So what are you looking for from the people that come in?

Hmmm. I don’t know exactly how to answer that. It’s the funny thing about collaborators, if you knew exactly what you wanted you’d just go out and get it, right? But sometimes you just meet someone and you know that they have some quality that inspires or challenges you in a way that you need.

So when I think about what I’m looking for, I want to create some space for people to be as much of themselves as possible. To bring in whatever of themselves they are most excited to show. The rest will be the chemistry of how I do what I do with how they do the same.

Anything else?

Nope. The fabric is done and I need to go take it out of the dryer.