(Elizabeth Bishop in WP’s ‘Dear Elizabeth’) has appeared in numerous theatre productions off and on Broadway. Highlights include Our Country’s Good (Tony® nomination), Sarah, Sarah (Drama Desk nomination), Fuddy Meers (Outer Critics and Drama Desk nominations), and As Bees In Honey Drown (Obie award, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics nominations). Recent credits include a critically acclaimed run as the title character in Juno And The Paycock at the Irish Repertory Theatre in NYC, as well as Richard Nelson’s Sorry and Sweet and Sad (Drama Desk and Obie awards) at the Public and That Hopey Changey Thing by the same author. Also Midsummer Night’s Dream at La Jolla Playhouse and The Starry Messenger by Kenneth Lonergan at the New Group. TV work includes a Series Regular role on SUNDANCE’S “Rectify” and a Recurring Role on HBO’s “True Blood.” Recent film work includes Frank Whaley’s “Like Sunday, Like Rain” and J. also stars opposite Anna Paquin in Kenneth Lonergan’s film “Margaret”, which won her the Best Supporting Actress award for the International Cinephile Society.
As both poets and personalities, Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell could hardly have been more different. She: intensely shy and self-doubting, producing gemlike, allusive poems so infrequently that…read more here.
Featuring a rotating cast of award-winning actors, week one of DEAR ELIZABETH by Sarah Ruhl stars Kathleen Chalfant, Polly Noonan, and Harris Yulin. Kate Whoriskey directs.
Take a peek behind the scenes and watch interviews with Sarah Ruhl and the celebrated actors that play ‘Elizabeth Bishop’ in the New York Premiere of DEAR ELIZABETH.
See Sarah Ruhl, Kate Whoriskey, Kathleen Chalfant, Polly Noonan, and Harris Yulin Celebrate Opening Night of Dear Elizabeth: View Pictures at Playbill.com
Go behind the scenes and view pictures of a videotaping with all of stellar actors playing “Elizabeth Bishop” in the New York Premiere of DEAR ELIZABETH by Sarah Ruhl and directed by Kate Whoriskey. Featured Actors: Kathleen Chalfant (Week One), J. Smith-Cameron (Week Two), Becky Ann Baker (Week Three), Cherry Jones (Week Four), Ellen McLaughlin (Week Five), and Mia Katigbak (Week Six).
The Public Theater announced today that John Krasinski has been cast in the role of “Seth” in the world premiere play DRY POWDER by Sarah Burgess (WP Lab Member, PIPELINE FESTIVAL). Directed by Thomas Kail, this gripping, razor-sharp new play about the people molding and messing with the American economy begins previews on Tuesday, March 1 and runs through Sunday, April 10. Read more here at Broadway World.
Learn more about THE PIPELINE FESTIVAL by the WP Lab, including Playwright Sarah Burgess: http://bit.ly/pipelinefestival.
Check out pictures from yesterday’s fun-filled TheaterMania BLOCK PARTY on 3rd Avenue. WP Theater, Lincoln Center, Signature Theater, Playwrights Horizons, Roundabout Theatre Company, and many more joined the festivities!
The two-character drama is on tap for the organization’s 2015-16 season.
David Gordon • Off-Broadway • Aug 24, 2015
Off-Broadway’s Women’s Project Theater has announced its 2015-16 season, set to take place at the organization’s new home, theMcGinn/Cazale Theatre.
The season will kick off with the New York premiere of Sarah Ruhl’s Dear Elizabeth, under the direction of Kate Whoriskey. Performed with a rotating cast (still to be announced), the drama follows the friendship between poets Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell, whose relationship spanned 30 years and included more than 400 letters. The play will run from October 26-December 5.
Next is Martyna Majok’s Ironbound, directed by Daniella Topol. A coproduction with Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, the work follows Darja, a Polish immigrant cleaning lady, over the course of 20 years as she negotiates for her future with three different men who can offer her love or security, but never both. The work runs March 2-April 10.
Closing out the first season at the McGinn/Cazale is the first-ever WP Pipeline Festival, in which WP Lab playwrights, directors, and producers present five brand-new plays from March 24-April 23. The writers are Sarah Burgess, Monet Hurst-Mendoza, Martyna Majok, Riti Sachdeva, and Susan Soon-He Stanton. Directors are Adrienne Campbell-Holt, Lee Sunday Evans, Sarah Krohn, Danya Taymor, and Tamilla Woodard. Producers are Rachel Karpf Reidy, Pearl Kermani, Kristen Luciani, Liz Olson, and Rachel Sussman.
Women’s Project Theater is currently under the leadership of producing artistic director Lisa McNulty and managing director Maureen Moynihan.
For more information on WP’s New Season click here.
Women’s Project Theater, under the leadership ofProducing Artistic Director Lisa McNulty and Managing Director Maureen Moynihan, just announced the 2015-2016 Season and the beginning of its three-year residency at the McGinn/Cazale Theater (2162 Broadway, at 76th Street), creating an artistic home for women in theater.
“I’m thrilled for WP Theater to set down roots in this wonderful space with such a storied theatrical history, and to bring all of these brilliant women together in one season,” said McNulty. “Our upcoming season features such an exciting range of talent: from Sarah Ruhl, one of our most treasured and accomplished writers; to Martyna Majok, who is making her Off-Broadway debut; to a festival fully dedicated to new work from the emerging artists of the WP Lab. This is the essence of what WP Theater does-creating a theatrical home where female-identified artists are welcome at every point in their careers, a place where women’s voices are central. I’m also really excited to partner with The Kilroys and The Lilly Awards this year on a series of events that will celebrate all of these invaluable organizations under WP Theater’s new roof. With the generous support of The Royal Little Family Foundation, WP has been given the opportunity to make 76th & Broadway the destination for some of the most exciting new theater in town.”
WP Theater’s inaugural season at the McGinn/Cazale Theater will commence with the New York premiere of DEAR ELIZABETH, written by two-time Pulitzer Prize nominee and Tony Award nominee Sarah Ruhl (The Oldest Boy, In the Next Room, or the vibrator play), directed by Kate Whoriskey (Ruined, Sweat) from October 26 to December 5, 2015. Drawn from the famed correspondence between Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell – two of the twentieth century’s most brilliant poets – DEAR ELIZABETH tells a tale of unconventional friendship and intimacy that spanned thirty years and more than 400 letters, with postmarks from Maine to Key West, from London to South America. Performed with a rotating cast of the theater community’s most brilliant and beloved performers – to be announced shortly – DEAR ELIZABETH is an insightful and impassioned examination of Bishop and Lowell’s lives, their work, and the true nature of friendship.
In a co-production with Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, IRONBOUND by Martyna Majok (Petty Harbor), directed byDaniella Topol (When January Feels Like Summer, Row After Row) will make its New York Premiere March 2 – April 10, 2016 at Rattlestick Playwrights Theater. IRONBOUND is a darkly funny, heartbreaking portrait of a woman for whom love is a luxury – and a liability – as she fights to survive in America from award-winning playwright Martyna Majok. At a bus in a run-down New Jersey town, Darja, a Polish immigrant cleaning lady, is done talking about feelings; it’s time to talk money. Over the course of 20 years, three relationships, and three presidents, Darja negotiates for her future with men who can offer her love or security, but never both.
To cap off the first year at the McGinn/Cazale Theater, WP Theater will present the first-ever WP PIPELINE FESTIVAL in which WP Lab playwrights, directors and producers’ two-year residency culminates in the presentation of five brand new plays – written, directed and produced by the fifteen women of the WP Lab – from March 24 to April 23, 2016. As the artistic heart of WP Theater, the Lab provides rising stars in the industry with a vital professional network, entrepreneurial and leadership training, rehearsal space, and most significantly, tangible opportunities for the development and production of bold new work for the stage. The Lab artists featured in the inaugural WP PIPELINE FESTIVAL are:
Writers: Sarah Burgess, Monet Hurst-Mendoza, Martyna Majok, Riti Sachdeva, Susan Soon-He Stanton
Directors: Adrienne Campbell-Holt, Lee Sunday Evans, Sarah Krohn, Danya Taymor, Tamilla Woodard
Producers: Rachel Karpf Reidy, Pearl Kermani, Kristen Luciani, Liz Olson, Rachel Sussman
Some recent successes by WP Lab artists include: Director Adrienne Campbell-Holt’s theater company Colt Coeur’s production of Dry Land, by Ruby Rae Spiegel, earned rave reviews from New York’s top critics and was listed as one of New York Post’s Top 10 theater experiences of 2014. Playwright Majok’s IRONBOUND is a part of the 2015-2016 WP season, Lee Sunday Evans earned a 2015 Obie Award for her direction of A Beautiful Day in November on the Banks of the Greatest of the Great Lakes (New Georges, in association with WP Theater) and Sarah Burgess’s play, Dry Powder, is slated for the 2015-2016 season at the Public Theater, directed by Thomas Kail.
In addition to the two New York play premieres and WP PIPELINE FESTIVAL, WP Theater will also produce a series of events with other gender-focused theater and advocacy organizations, including The Kilroys (thekilroys.org) and The Lilly Awards (www.thelillyawards.org). WP Theater is invested in making its new artistic home a place where the theater community can come together to celebrate women’s talents and voices onstage. Details on these events to follow.
For details on WP subscriptions, visit WWW.WPTHEATER.ORG or call (212) 765-1706. WP Theater makes its home at the McGinn/Cazale Theater thanks to the generous support of The Royal Little Family Foundation.
WOMEN’S PROJECT THEATER (WP) is the nation’s oldest and largest theater company dedicated to developing, producing and promoting the work of female theater artists at every stage in their careers. WP Theater supports female-identified theater artists and the world-class, groundbreaking work they create, and provides a platform where their voices can be heard and celebrated on the American stage.
Founded in 1978 by visionary producer, Julia Miles, WP has been the launching pad for many of our nation’s most important theater artists. Eve Ensler, María Irene Fornés, Katori Hall, Pam MacKinnon, Lynn Nottage andLeigh Silverman, among many, many others, all found early artistic homes here. Throughout its 38 year history, WP has produced over 600 main stage productions and developmental projects, and published 11 anthologies of plays. No other producing institution in the country can claim this kind of ongoing history of advocacy and support for women in the theater, and we look ahead to the next generation of artists who will also begin their careers here.
WP Theater accomplishes its mission through several fundamental programs: the WP Lab, a two-year mentorship and new play development program for women playwrights, directors, and producers; the Playwright In Residence commissioning program; the Developmental series; and the Main Stage series, which features a full season of Off-Broadway productions written and directed by extraordinary theater artists.
Lisa McNulty (Producing Artistic Director). Lisa is about to enter her second season as Producing Artistic Director of Women’s Project Theater. Lisa comes to WP from Manhattan Theatre Club, where she served as Artistic Line Producer for eight seasons, working on more than 30 productions both on and off Broadway, including plays byLynn Nottage, Sarah Treem, Harvey Fierstein, and Tarell Alvin McCraney, among many, many others. Lisa has a long history with WP Theater. She was originally hired by the company’s founder, Julia Miles, as the Literary Manager from 1997-2000, where she dramaturged work by María Irene Fornés, Julie Hébert, and Karen Hartman, among others. In 2004, she returned to WP as its Associate Artistic Director where she served as the company’s casting director and literary manager and again ran WP’s Playwrights Lab. Her independent producing career includes projects with Sarah Ruhl, Todd Almond, and Lucy Thurber, all at 13P. Lisa has also served as the Producing Associate at the McCarter Theatre, acting as Line Producer on McCarter’s mainstage, as well as developing McCarter’s commissioned short series.
Maureen Moynihan (Managing Director) Maureen started her career in Chicago working for the Steppenwolf Theatre Company and commercial producer Fox Theatricals. Prior to joining WP Theater, Maureen spent over a decade working for Blue Man Productions in several positions including serving as their Executive Director for five North American Productions. Since moving to New York, she has worked for several nonprofit and commercial organizations including Manhattan New Music Project, York Theatre Company and the immersive theatrical experience Queen of the Night.
Selected through a highly competitive process, the WP Lab is the only program in America putting playwrights, directors, AND producers together in the same room. Providing both professional development and leadership training, Lab participants obtain executive coaching, make professional contacts, and receive training that proves invaluable to their development. The benefits of the WP Lab extend well beyond the two-year residency. Having forged strong working relationships in the Lab, both with fellow Lab artists and outside professional contacts, Lab artists continue to work together and with other brilliant voices in the artistic collective long after their official residency ends. WP’s top priority is to achieve a standard of excellence for these artists, advocating for women by producing stellar work featuring extraordinary talent.
For more information on WP’s New Season click here.
Women’s Project Theater, founded in 1978 to develop, produce and promote the work of women theatre artists, has announced its upcoming season lineup at its new artistic home.
To begin a three year residency at the McGinn/Cazale Theater (2162 Broadway, at 76th Street in New York) artistic director Lisa McNulty announced that the season will include the New York premieres of Sarah Ruhl’s Dear Elizabeth and Marytyna Majok’s Ironbound.
New this season will be the inaugural “Pipeline Festival,” which will include five new plays written, directed and produced by WP Lab Artists.
McNulty issued a statement calling the McGinn/Cazale Theater “an artistic home for women in theatre,” adding “I’m thrilled for WP Theater to set down roots in this wonderful space with such a storied theatrical history, and to bring all of these brilliant women together in one season. Our upcoming season features such an exciting range of talent: from Sarah Ruhl, one of our most treasured and accomplished writers; to Martyna Majok, who is making her Off-Broadway debut; to a festival fully dedicated to new work from the emerging artists of the WP Lab.”
She said, “This is the essence of what WP Theater does—creating a theatrical home where female-identified artists are welcome at every point in their careers, a place where women’s voices are central.”
Here’s a closer look at the season:
Dear Elizabeth (Oct. 26-Dec. 5) is written by two-time Pulitzer Prize nominee and Tony Award nominee Sarah Ruhl (The Oldest Boy, In the Next Room, or the vibrator play), directed by Kate Whoriskey. “Drawn from the famed correspondence between Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell–two of the 20th century’s most brilliant poets–Dear Elizabeth tells a tale of unconventional friendship and intimacy that spanned 30 years and more than 400 letters, with postmarks from Maine to Key West, from London to South America.” It will be performed with a rotating cast of “the theater community’s most brilliant and beloved performers.”
Ironbound (Mar. 2-April 10, 2016) A co-production with (and performed at) Rattlestick Playwrights Theater. Written by Martyna Majok (Petty Harbor) and directed by Daniella Topol. Described as “a darkly funny, heartbreaking portrait of a woman for whom love is a luxury – and a liability – as she fights to survive in America. At a bus in a run-down New Jersey town, Darja, a Polish immigrant cleaning lady, is done talking about feelings; it’s time to talk money. Over the course of 20 years, three relationships, and three presidents, Darja negotiates for her future with men who can offer her love or security, but never both.”
The WP Pipeline Festival (Mar. 24-April 23) Five brand new plays – written, directed and produced by the fifteen women of the WP Lab: Writers Sarah Burgess, Monet Hurst-Mendoza, Martyna Majok, Riti Sachdeva and Susan Soon-He Stanton. Directors Adrienne Campbell-Holt, Lee Sunday Evans, Sarah Krohn, Danya Taymor and Tamilla Woodard. Producers Rachel Karpf Reidy, Pearl Kermani, Kristen Luciani, Liz Olson and Rachel Sussman.
For more information on WP’s New Season click here.
Women’s Project Theater Announces New Season in a New Home
On the slate are Sarah Ruhl’s epistolary play about Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell, and a co-production with Rattlestick of Martyna Majok’s ‘Ironbound.’
BY AMERICAN THEATRE EDITORS
NEW YORK CITY: Women’s Project Theater announced their 2015–16 season of plays, which will run in their new Upper West Side home at the McGinn/Cazale Theater. Producing artistic director Lisa McNulty and managing director Maureen Moynihan announced the beginning of a three-year residency at the theatre on Broadway at 76th Street.
“I’m thrilled for WP Theater to set down roots in this wonderful space with such a storied theatrical history, and to bring all of these brilliant women together in one season,” said McNulty in a statement. “This is the essence of what WP Theater does—create a theatrical home where female-identified artists are welcome at every point in their careers, a place where women’s voices are central.”
The season will begin with the New York premiere of Sarah Ruhl’s play Dear Elizabeth(Oct. 26–Dec. 5). The play, which will feature a rotating cast, examines the relationship between the poets Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell through letters they wrote to each other.
Rattlestick Playwrights Theater and WP will then partner to present Ironbound by Martyna Majok (March 2–April 10), in its New York premiere. The play follows a woman for whom love is luxury.
Closing the season will be the first WP Pipeline Festival, running March 24–April 23. The festival will feature five new plays developed during the WP Lab’s two-year residency. The artists involved are Sarah Burgess, Money Hurst-Mendoza, Martyna Majok, Riti Sachdeva, Susan Soon-He Stanton, Adrienne Campbell-Holt, Lee Sunday Evans, Sarah Krohn, Danya Taymor, Tamilla Woodard, Rachel Karpf Reidy, Pearl Kermani, Kristen Luciani, Liz Olson, and Rachel Sussman.
WP Theater will also produce a series of events with other gender-focused theatre and advocacy groups, including the Kilroys and the Lilly Awards. Details of these events are yet to be announced.
For more information on WP’s New Season click here.
Director Kate Whoriskey most recently directed Lynn Nottage’s Sweat at Oregon Shakespeare Festival. Other productions include Ping Pong and Manahatta at the Public through Public Studio, Ruined and Tales from Red Vienna at Manhattan Theatre Club, How I Learned to Drive at Second Stage, The Piano Teacher at the Vineyard Theatre, Oroonoko at Theatre for A New Audience, the world premiere of Fabulation and Inked Baby at Playwrights Horizons, and Massacre by Jose Rivera at the Labyrinth Theatre Company (of which she is a member). Internationally, she directed Magdalena at the Chatelet theatre in Paris and Teatro Muicipal in Sao Paolo. Regionally, she directed Ruined, Vigils, Heartbreak House, The Rose Tattoo and Drowning Crow for The Goodman, The Tempest at Shakespeare Theatre, the world premiere of Intimate Apparel, The Piano Teacher, Life is a Dream, Caucasian Chalk Circle, Antigone, and The Clean House at South Coast Repertory, and Master Builder at the American Repertory Theatre. Nominated for a Drama Desk and Lucille Lortel for her work on Ruined, she has also directed at the Huntington, The Geffen, Baltimore Center Stage, Perseverance Theatre, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Sundance Theatre Lab, The Fisher Center and The Eugene O’Neill Center.
Playwright Sarah Ruhl’s plays include The Oldest Boy, In the Next Room, or the vibrator play, The Clean House, Passion Play, Dead Man’s Cell Phone, Melancholy Play; Eurydice; Orlando, Late: a cowboy song, Dear Elizabeth and Stage Kiss. She has been a two-time Pulitzer prize finalist and a Tony award nominee. Her plays have been produced on Broadway at the Lyceum by Lincoln Center Theater, off-Broadway at Playwrights’ Horizons, Second Stage, and at Lincoln Center’s Mitzi Newhouse Theater. Her plays have been produced regionally all over the country, often with premiers at Yale Repertory Theater, Berkeley Repertory Theater, the Goodman Theater, and the Piven Theatre Workshop in Chicago. In 2014 she was the second most produced playwright in the country. Her plays have also been produced internationally and have been translated into over twelve languages. Originally from Chicago, Ms. Ruhl received her M.F.A. from Brown University where she studied with Paula Vogel. She has received the Susan Smith Blackburn award, the Whiting award, the Lily Award, a PEN award for mid-career playwrights, and the MacArthur “genius” award. You can read more about her work on www.SarahRuhlplaywright.com. Her book of essays 100 Essays I Don’t Have Time to Write was published by Faber and Faber last fall. She teaches at the Yale School of Drama, and she lives in Brooklyn with her family.
The BIG + EXCITING NEWS is OUT! Women’s Project Theater will Present its 2015-16 Season in a New Home on Broadway & 76th Street
By JONATHAN WOLFE AUGUST 24, 2015 5:04 PM
The Women’s Project Theater will begin its coming season in a new home, at the McGinn/Cazale Theater on Broadway, at 76th Street. This Off Broadway company dedicated to promoting female artists announced its three-year residency at the theater along with its 2015-16 season, which includes two New York premieres.
“Dear Elizabeth,” written by Sarah Ruhl and directed by Kate Whoriskey, is based on the correspondence between the poets Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell, and will be the Women’s Project Theater’s inaugural production at the McGinn/Cazale Theater. The play, a New York premiere, will be performed with a rotating cast and is scheduled to open Oct. 26.
“Ironbound,” another New York premiere, is a tragedy about a Polish maid living in the United States. Written by Martyna Majok and directed by Daniella Topol, the play, a co-production with the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, will open at Rattlestick on March 2.
The Women’s Project Theater also announced on Monday that its season will be capped by the new WP Pipeline Festival, which will feature five new plays by participants in the company’s artist residency program. It will run from March 24 to April 23.
The three-year residency at the McGinn/Cazale Theater will be the company’s longest stretch at one home since it sold the Julia Miles Theater in 2011, said Lisa McNulty, the company’s artistic director. “It’s so powerful that there is a marquee,” Ms. McNulty said, for a company that is dedicated to women. She added, “That feels very powerful and appropriate to the moment we’re in.”
The lack of diversity and women’s participation in New York City theater recently led to an outcry on the Internet after the Manhattan Theater Club’s roster for its 2015-16 season revealed that the majority of its plays were written by white men.
A version of this article appears in print on 08/25/2015, on page C3 of the NewYork edition with the headline: Women’s Project’s New Season and Home.
For more information on WP’s New Season click here.
The intricate nature of When January Feels Like Summer creates a complex reality with multifaceted characters to match. Mahira Kakkar plays one of these parts, Nirmala, a struggling wife and business owner trying to keep tradition of her native India alive while satisfying her own needs.
What has been the most rewarding part about this production?
I don’t know if I can focus on any one single thing. I have worked with Daniella Topol (the director) before, and getting to work with her again was a gift. I got to work with a dear friend of mine – Debargo Sanyal – and got exposed to three other super smart actors. I love that audiences responded to the character Debargo played with empathy. I am thrilled that so many people come to see the show. What really moved me was when some people who weren’t regular theatre goers came, young people whose story was basically being represented on stage, and they loved it.
What has been the most challenging part of playing Nirmala?
I think finding her steel and vulnerability was challenging. She’s a stronger, smarter woman than I am, and so I had to think of her in those terms and find her. Playing opposite Debargo, who is basically a comic genius, is also hard, because I often want to laugh at the things he does, and Nirmala might not find them as amusing.
Nirmala gathers a lot of strength in order to manage a business by herself, support her brother, and care for her husband. Where do you think this strength comes from?
Nirmala’s pretty businesslike and strong, yes. I think she feels she has to be – she has a lot of things to take care of. Duty and loyalty I think are important to her – more so than personal happiness perhaps. Put another way, it’s a kind of love that she might have grown up with – love as action, as doing, as being there when the chips are down – though I’m pretty sure this is my way of thinking. I know women like Nirmala who would roll their eyes if I were to use language like this in front of them.
How has your own personal background influenced your work in When January Feels Like Summer, since you and Nirmala both grew up in India?
I have had the good fortune to meet and interact with women like Nirmala, for whom family, duty and tradition are paramount. Smart, very capable women who choose every day to fulfill what they think are their responsibilities. I think mostly the accent work comes easily to me, because of my background. I think women like Nirmala exist everywhere in the world, in different cultures.
You’ve worked on some incredible projects in the past, both on stage and film. Do you have any advice for young artists looking to break into the theatrical scene?
Don’t give up, have faith in yourself, take the long line, try and be kind to everyone including yourself, write your hate lists in pencil (the late Ms. Joan Rivers said that last one), work harder than you think you can, give over to this thing you love. Also, know that everything will work out and that you will be just fine. That’s my truth.
What’s the most valuable lesson you’ve learned from theatre, either from When January Feels Like Summer or even beyond?
I’m part of a great tradition – what I do contributes a little bit to the tapestry – so I have to do my work well, but also know that without other people around me, supporting the story, it wouldn’t happen. I think I’m talking about respect for the artist/craftsperson in myself and in other people. It’s also really fun and joyous, and it should be. I think that that’s right, it is ok, warranted and necessary to feel joy in this often brutal world. Oh, and also to drink lots of water.
Left to right: Debargo Sanyal as himself and as the character Indira
For seven years, Debargo Sanyal has seen the development and evolution of the beautifully complex character, Indira, in When January Feels Like Summer. His career as an actor is extensive (acting opposite of Robert De Niro is no small feat), and Debargo has given full life to this character. Debargo has graciously described his journey with this marvelous play.
After the success of When January Feels Like Summer, how does it feel to have the play come back for another New York run?
Debargo: I am quite happy that When January Feels Like Summer has returned this fall. We had such a terrific time doing those initial twenty-six performances during the final weeks of spring. The response to our run was so overwhelmingly warm and loving and heartfelt that we all started to hope that the journey with this production could somehow continue beyond that time. So, it feels really great that, after getting to recharge our batteries over the summer, we will be bringing it back to the stage this fall.
What has been the most rewarding part about this production?
Debargo: There are a number of rewarding things about being in this particular production. One is that I love my cast mates– they are all such wonderful scene partners to play with every night on stage. Another is that I have been associated with this play/role for quite a while now, so it is very gratifying that this New York premiere full production is finally actually happening at all–especially considering that this play is very much a NYC play, set in the heart of Harlem. Another major reward is the beautiful energy we get from audiences who are loving the experience of receiving the show as much as we are loving the experience of presenting it to them.
You’ve been playing Ishan/Indira off and on for seven years, both in New York and in Pittsburgh. How have you seen the character develop, both through rewrites and even for yourself as an actor?
Debargo: I first played this role in the very first public reading presentation on September 28, 2007, right here on this very stage at EST, as part of their ‘Going to the River’ Festival…and then again, nine months later, on June 15, 2008, in the second-ever public reading presentation, which was at City Theatre in Pittsburgh, as part of their ‘Momentum’ Festival…and then, twenty months after that, in Feb-April 2010, for the world premiere full production back at City Theatre in Pittsburgh…and then, six months after that, on October 17, 2010, in a reading at the New Black Fest in Brooklyn… and then, three-and-a-half years after that, we commenced rehearsals for this current NY premiere full production at EST. Every step of the way, there have, of course, been helpful edits and rewrites that have affected the development of all five characters in the script. Cori Thomas is a smart playwright, and she has been able to find great ways to clarify and streamline things in the story without sacrificing the unique core of what she had built in to her script from day one. As for me, personally, I know that I have certainly changed/grown/evolved as an artist (and, well, as a human being) over the past seven years–and I would like to believe that it has somehow resulted in a more interesting portrayal of ‘Indira’, a character that I have grown incredibly fond of.
What has been the most challenging thing about playing a character like Ishan/Indira?
Debargo: Hair removal.
How has the experience in Pittsburgh to NYC been different? Either audience reaction, overall success, general sentiments… etc.
Debargo: The experiences in Pittsburgh and NYC have felt quite different. Four full years elapsed in between our world premiere full production in Pittsburgh and this New York premiere full production at EST. In Pittsburgh, my four wonderful castmates were Gita Reddy & John Marshall Jones & Joshua Elijah Reese & Carter Redwood, and our director was the wonderful Chuck Patterson; here in NYC, my four awesome castmates are Mahira Kakkar & Dion Graham & Maurice Williams & J Mallory McCree (and now again Carter Redwood) and our fantastic director is Daniella Topol. While it has been a rather unique and unfamiliar experience to perform the same play/role with a completely new set of collaborators and with such a large time gap in-between regional and NYC productions, it has also, ultimately, been a valuable learning experience that has taught me a lot. With each new collaborator comes a new energy and a new way of looking at the characters and story, and that has turned out to be quite informative over the years. And, of course, the main unifying entity throughout it all has been this beautiful script (and its talented playwright, who I am very glad invited me along on this seven-year journey).
Ishan/Indira is a rather fiesty character with some great lines. Do you have a favorite?
Debargo: I don’t really have a single favorite line, per se. I guess my favorite thing about almost everything that comes out of Indira’s mouth is that it is usually coming from a very brave place of eagerly embracing huge (and necessary) life changes at all costs. She knows exactly what she (and, sometimes others, like her sister) must do in order to find love and happiness, and she makes a very conscious choice to not be afraid to doggedly pursue this, no matter what anyone else may think… sometimes this lands her in humorous situations, and sometimes it lands her in rather serious ones… but, regardless, she always has the guts to really go for it. I genuinely admire that about Indira.
You’ve worked on some incredible projects in the past, both on stage and film. Do you have any advice for young artists looking to break into the theatrical scene?
Debargo: Be unique. Be informed. Be personable. And have a thick skin (…that you, like, moisturize as well.)
What’s the most valuable lesson you’ve learned from theatre, either from When January Feels Like Summer or even beyond?
Debargo: Life, like theatre, is a team sport. You could try to do it alone, but that’s just not nearly as much fun…playing well with others is much more interesting and enlightening and gratifying… and it does require more work sometimes… but it is usually so worth it (or, at the very least, it can make for a good story later).
