The Deep End Productions

An Interview with The Liar Show's James Braly & Martin Dockery

What follows is an excerpt of a February 2008 article written by The Insights & Revelations Performance Series producer, Anna Becker for The Examiner of Pleasantville.  Included are interviews with James Braly and Martin Dockery, both of whom are established storytellers that will be appearing in The Liar Show on November 19th.

  

James Braly Martin Dockery

BEYOND WICKED
Exploring the Arts Off the Beaten Path

 

YOUR STORY OR YOUR LIFE

By Anna Becker

I am currently in the trenches, producing solo shows by two of New York’s finest storytellers. One is Life In A Marital Institution (20 years of monogamy in one terrifying hour) in which James Braly tells tales from the home front about married life, and the other is Wanderlust, where Martin Dockery leaves home to backpack through West Africa. I believe the attraction to storytelling – for audiences and for me – has a lot to do with our current screen-induced hypnotic state.  Being in the room with a live person telling a story about their lives provides, believe it or not, an even stronger rush than bowling on the wii. 
<form class="at-page-break"></form>But why would someone choose to publicly bare themselves in this way?  There is no character to hide behind, or other actors to blend in with; they stand alone, telling their stories, stripping away every socially artificial layer to connect to us.  I asked James and Martin to talk about their creative drive and, like the two shows themselves, found their answers to be vastly different but uniquely compelling. 

AB:  James, you once mentioned to me the concept of telling your story so you can live your life – can you elaborate on that?

James:  This suggests another question:  As a troubled-life-management strategy, what is the difference between autobiographical storytelling and psychotherapy?  The answer is, in therapy, you can be a victim: “She STILL won’t do the dishes!”  Because you are paying someone to listen.  Versus storytelling: “I married a woman who I knew would constantly irritate me by refusing to do the dishes.”  In storytelling, you’re a protagonist, a chooser, therefore much stronger.  By recasting your life as a series of events that you choose to participate in, you see why you need your life, what you’re getting from it - which makes you want to live it, or change it. 

AB:  Martin, when did you start writing and telling your stories and why?

Martin: A good portion of my childhood was spent in deep space. I’d employ Star Wars figures to act out my own Star Trek episodes, which, while slightly confusing character-wise (Chewbacca playing Spock), allowed me to perform a wealth of truly cosmic tales. After getting an MFA in playwriting from Columbia, I began to feel like the plays I wrote were an unnecessary intermediary between the audience and the stories I was trying to tell. So I got on stage and told them myself, directly, in my own voice. What I’ve found is that speaking honestly and passionately, with an appreciation for life’s absurdities, creates an incredible dynamic within a room, allowing for anything to happen, for the night itself to become a story.

AB: Why tell your stories instead of publish them? What happens because you are telling your story live?

Martin: When you’re performing a story, you’re really engaging in a sort of dialogue with the audience. They’ll let you know whether they’re with you or not, whether they’re laughing or shifting in their chairs. A spoken story has present tense energy, unlike typeface which is bound to a page. A written story will wait for you; it can be picked up and put down. When a story is told aloud, though, it’s a real-time exchange… there’s no intermediary between the person who’s lived the story, and the person experiencing the telling of the story. There’s intimacy, and as such, electricity.

James: Originally, I had planned to use performing as a developmental tool to prepare my stories for publication.  I found that performing in front of a live audience strengthened what Hemingway called a writer’s most important asset: a 100% shock-proof b.s. detector.  You can hide on a page in a way you can’t on stage.  The more I performed, the more I realized that spoken language and written language diverge in significant ways, and that I had to choose.  I chose the stage.  The irony being, that shortly after I made that choice, a literary agent saw me perform and sold my show as a book. 

AB: Martin, why did you choose, as your first full-length solo venture, to tell your story about your trek across the Sahara?

Martin: Well, the trip itself is about the search for a story. It’s about how, after a decade of temping in New York, both in work and relationships, I realized that life wasn’t going to happen, it was happening.  So I went to Africa, to the Sahara, to Timbuktu (a place whose very name connotes distance) with the notion that if I went far enough, I should have to find purpose along the way. Something that might suggest there is a larger story at work. It’s the story I believe we’re all hoping to find ourselves a part of. The details will be different, but the search for meaning is universal.

Speaking as someone who was both entertained and deeply moved by both of these shows long before I decided to produce them, I am glad that James and Martin have as strong a need to tell their stories as I have to hear them. 

 

photo credits: James Braly photo by Jaisen Crockett, Martin Dockery photo by Alan Haywood

Interview with the Director of "The Really Big Once"

What follows is a New York Times interview with David Herskovits, Artistic Director of Target Margin Theater and Director of our upcoming presentation of "The Really Big Once?"

Keep your eyes peeled....there's a hint in that interview about our June 2010 presentation...let's just say there's some relation between David Herskovits and the June show.  First one to guess correctly by writing in a comment (below) wins a pair of free tickets to "The Really Big Once!"

Back to Tennessee Williams’s Surreal Road

Tony Cenicola/The New York Times

David Herskovits, artistic director of the Target Margin Theater in Brooklyn, will present Tennessee Williams's "Ten Blocks on the Camino Real" at the Ohio Theater in SoHo.

By CELIA MCGEE

Published: December 24, 2008

TEN blocks is no longer half a city mile as far as the Target Margin Theater is concerned. Led by its artistic director, David Herskovits, the company will spend Jan. 14 through 31 at the Ohio Theater at 66 Wooster Street in SoHo exploring Tennessee Williams’s “Ten Blocks on the Camino Real,” a one-act. This series of 10 uncharacteristically hallucinatory scenes, originally staged in a workshop by Elia Kazan at the Actors Studio in 1949, eventually turned into the 1953 Broadway play “Camino Real.”

Considered a freakish, avant-garde misstep at the time, “Camino Real” — about an ex-boxer, Kilroy, washing up among very surreal company on an unquestionably strange shore — was still central to the Williams-Kazin collaborative partnership that also encompassed “A Streetcar Named Desire,” “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” and “Sweet Bird of Youth.” Next season Mr. Herskovits will present a loose adaptation of “Camino Real” called “The Really Big Once,” interweaving the Williams-Kazan relationship. Near the company’s rehearsal space in Brooklyn he spoke with Celia McGee about laying the groundwork for the larger project with the smaller one. These are excerpts from their conversation.

Q. How has Target Margin, which is known for experimental work, ended up doing Tennessee Williams?

A. I met Frances Kazan, Elia Kazan’s widow, at an event at the Kitchen a couple of years ago. We had a really nice conversation, and she said: “You know, I have these old notebooks and papers of Elia’s that are fascinating. Would you like to look at them?” They were more interesting than I could have imagined, and they opened the door for me to the collaborative process between Tennessee Williams and Kazan, in particular on “Camino Real.” These two guys worked really hard to expand their horizons with the play, and that is enormously poignant to me. Kazan once said, “The closest I ever came to the avant-garde was ‘Camino Real,’ and I never got it right.”

Q. Was their project a failure or was it the timing, trying to do experimental work on Broadway?

A. I don’t know, which is one of the things that drew me to it. What was its particular place in American history, and how does that context inform the work? It was very wrapped up in Kazan’s experience with the House Un-American Activities Committee — that was taking place in the run-up to “Camino Real,” and he writes about how ostracizing it was. The play is about finding a place in the world — here a surreal, crazy, mythopoeic environment — with Kazan dealing with his sense of ostracism, and Williams, his sense of alienation. But Williams is a bigger, more capacious writer than he is given credit for. The poetry and the myth making are always in his plays. It’s just that in “Ten Blocks” it’s all there without the kitchen sink of his naturalism.

Q. And in the title of the play, you pronounce it REE-ul?

A. Yes. It’s interesting. If you look at the published stage directions, Williams was explicit about that.

Q. Do you see any similarities between the Actors Studio, which Kazan helped found, and Target Margin Theater, which you started?

A. Stylistically we seem to be so different, and yet the feeling of intimacy, of collaboration, of having a specific artistic purpose and pushing that to its extremity as rigorously as possible, is the same. To me theater should be fun, challenging, entertaining and mysterious. I want people to have the same experience of traveling as Kilroy does in “Ten Blocks.”

Q. In some ways, then, “Ten Blocks” connects to the classical Greek material you’ve produced recently?

A. Yes, though to me it’s also like an old saint play, following through a series of mystical experiences strung together like jewels on a necklace.

Q. And do you see any kind of gay subtext, given that this is Tennessee Williams?

A. “Ten Blocks” is charged with desire, erotic desire specifically, and Williams’s own sexuality is inseparable from that. It’s absolutely breathed in and out, but not to the exclusion of other kinds. The work has a kind of deep homemade theatricality that I love — a little bit like Jack Smith [the director of “Flaming Creatures”], if you know his work — and is a good example of what I value, which is work about manifesting the possibilities, not about telling people one thing.

Q. Is there anything contemporary about it?

A. The obvious lens to focus with is that it’s about America’s relationship to the world around it. There’s that line of Esmeralda’s, the Gypsy’s daughter, about “the monetary system has got to be stabilized all over the world,” though of course she’s talking about Bretton Woods. And if you want to see Kilroy as America — a powerful but stupid America, stumbling around trying to figure out where it fits in the world — sadly, we find our relationship similarly so clumsy now that people throw their shoes at us.

Q. Speaking of the Williams-Kazan collaboration, you’re married to the novelist Jennifer Egan. Do you ever talk about collaborating?

A. Every now and then we laugh about it. We have a great symbiosis, because our work is so overlapping, and we can feed and nurture each other. We each like being the partner of the other.

A Conversation with 2008 Arts & Letters Prize-Winner Alethea Black

We are anxiously awaiting our presentation of Marriage & Other Odd Occurrences: An Evening of Short Stories by Alethea Black! We recently caught up with Alethea to ask her for some insights into her process, and the stories we'll be presenting. I hope you will find her answers as intriguing as I did.

 

Alethea Black

Question: Can you tell me a little about what inspired you to write the two stories ­ The Thing Itself and That of Which We Cannot Speak ­ that we will be presenting?

Alethea: "The Thing Itself" owes a debt to Michael Curtis at The Atlantic. I¹d had a couple of very encouraging rejections from him when someone told me that The Atlantic really likes stories where something happens,which fortunately I do, too. So after I heard this bit of advice, I wrote the opening line: "Something was about to happen, he could feel it." And immediately I thought: Aha, now I¹ve got him! Then, in the truly gloomy days that followed, it dawned on me that now that I¹d set the tone, I was going to have to find a way to live up to it. Which of course wound up being a tremendous gift, and in the process of trying to do so, I allowed the story to surprise even me.

"That of Which We Cannot Speak" was written after I decided one winter that smoking should be my new fun hobby. I got a wicked sore throat, but even though I was sick, I thought it would be a good idea to keep on smoking, and I wound up losing my voice for more than a week. There was a party I wanted to go to nonetheless, and I still have the things people wrote on my clipboard. It was amazing. Cartoons, spontaneous haiku... It made me realize that there's a whole deeper level of communication that might take place between two strangers, if you just gave them the means.

Question: Both of the stories are told from the point of view of married, or recently divorced, men ­ what did you draw upon to be able to find their voices in such a finely nuanced, astute way?

Alethea: Oh, thank you. I don't know, for whatever reason, I don't seem to have too much trouble writing in the male voice. I was very close to my father; maybe that has something to do with it? Plus, I feel for men. I'm not one of those people who think men are on Mars and women are in Australia. I think we're all in the soup together.

Question: Both of the stories contain a great depth of emotion, as well as longing, and regret, but they also have a somewhat mischievous sense of humor ­ is that something you seek to infuse in all of your stories, or is it your own wicked sense of humor breaking through on its own?

Alethea: Well, the humor, or lack of it, would be a function of the character, so I try to be loyal to what would exist in that person's psyche. That said, I do think I'm drawn to characters who are flamboyant or charming or have a certain wildness to them. The kind of person you wouldn't mind being stuck in a foxhole with. Because when you write a story, you're essentially sticking the reader in a foxhole with your characters, so I try to make them the kind of people with whom the reader would have a good time.

Question: When and how did you start writing?

Alethea: At Thanksgiving 1994, my sister Ashley gave me The Best American Short Stories anthology from that year, edited by Tobias Wolff. Those stories went straight to my heart; I found them to be so moving and beautiful. I felt as if they were speaking to me, and I guess I wanted to speak back. When I saw my dad that Christmas - this was the year before he died - I told him I wanted to be a writer. He said I always used to say I wanted to be a writer when I was a little girl. But I must have forgotten, because I don't remember that at all. So I said, Why didn't you remind me?

Question: Are there recurring themes or elements in your work?

Alethea: I like to write about those moments in life that can sneak up on you when you suddenly see yourself or the world in a different way.

Question: Are you primarily interested in the short story form or do you also write poetry, full-length novels, etc.? Alethea: I started out writing poetry, and I used to teach a poetry class for kids when I was just a kid myself. I like to try to capture some of that same way language can startle you or transport you in my stories, but most of my poems are happily dormant in their little nest on my computer. Lately I've been working on a so-called novel, but I wouldn't call it a full-length novel. It looks as if it's going to be about 100 pages. In a way, it's like a long story. I feel as if I'm watching a movie in my head as I write.

Interview with Wanderlust's Martin Dockery

I caught up with Martin Dockery, writer/performer of Wanderlust, our March 1, 2008 presentation, and asked him a few questions about his solo show.

AB: I understand that you are an extemporaneous storyteller - that there is no actual written script - can you tell me a little about how that works - how is the piece built? how different is the show each time you perform it?

MD: I think the process is a bit like preparing a meal, the recipe for which you’ve never written down. Each time you use the same ingredients, but in slightly different proportions. And when finally you taste it, the dish is what you intended, while at the same time unique.

AB: Did the events in Wanderlust actually happen to you?

MD: Yes, everything described actually happened. But as all storytellers know (which is to say, everyone) tangential truths will be omitted, convoluted details streamlined, and only the most pertinent themes brought to the surface. A tale can be told from an infinite number of perspectives, all of them valid. And so, while everything I tell is true, I’m aware that it can never be the whole truth.

AB: Did you get the idea to write a solo show based on your experiences in Africa after you came back, while there, or did you go to Africa to get a story?

MD: I very much went to Africa with the intention of finding a story. I kept an almost obsessive diary that was more akin to a sprawling novel than a journal. I would track themes and introduce characters I met, detailing their journeys, conflicts, and intentions. It was as if the emergence of a plotline might serve as evidence of a grander, hidden agenda within the whole of life itself. Of course, as it turned out, the more I wrote, the more I found I could never quite write enough. In trying to record everything, my journal became a perverse reminder of all I was leaving out, of facts and clues omitted, of a picture growing evermore incomplete.

AB: Are you working on a new project? If so, can you tell me a little bit about it?

MD: I tell stories at various venues around New York City, sometimes once or twice a week. Over time, I tend to notice a theme emerging, as if on its own - a larger, over-arching story, which seems to be telling itself. And so, lately, I’ve been drawn to desperate tales about being a teenager, about girls and beer, about the awkward stumble towards adulthood. (To which, yes, I might still be stumbling.)

An Interview with James Braly

Series Producer Anna Becker (AB) asked James Braly (JB) some questions to provide a preview of the content of Braly's piece, and a sense of his unique perspective...then come to the show and share your thoughts with him in the post-performance discussion and reception.

AB: What moved you to write "Life In A Marital Institution?"

JB: I was going through an unhappy time, both personally and professionally, and after careful examination I traced the source of my unhappiness to two things, neither of which -- conveniently -- had anything to do with me: my wife and my job as a corporate speechwriter. Somehow, it seemed to me, I'd landed in my marriage and career by accident.

An Interview with Bloomberg News theater/cultural writer

Last spring, Philip Boroff visited the Series to see James Braly's "Life in a Marital Institution." I asked if he would like to be interviewed for our site. Philip goes to the theatre as much as five times a week to write reviews, feature stories, producer profiles, and to report on industry trends. I thought it might be interesting to hear from him. And do check out his online column for his up-to-the-minute impressions.

AB: What have you seen lately that you would recommend?

PB: "[title of show]" at the Vineyard Theater, a musical about making a musical, was one of my favorites of the past year. It's funny, tuneful, satiric and warm. A particular treat for anyone immersed in musicals, because of the inside jokes scattered about. I'm also enjoying the new cast recording. I read, but haven't yet seen, A.R. Gurney's "Indian Blood" at Primary Stages. Funny and moving. I saw "Sweeney Todd" three times and will try for a fourth before it closes on September 3rd. The score is brilliant; add to that ten performers who sing, act, and play instruments without so much as a conductor to guide them. The show has only gotten better as the performers became more comfortable with the demands.

AB: Oh, how interesting. When we interviewed Michael Brandt, who performed "A Spalding Gray Matter" for us last April, he mentioned "[title of show] as his best pick too. I should also point out that Primary Stages will be heading to The Ridgefield Playhouse (see the post on this site about Judith Ivey) to offer a sneak preview of the show that premieres after "Indian Blood." So you are making picks that hit close to home here. In general, what form of theatre do you enjoy most?

PB: I have a weakness for musicals. But it's such a difficult, costly art form: So many elements and expenses, for shows that can take years to create. Generally, I'm grateful for anything -- plays, musicals, whatever -- that are thoughtful, original, and done with care.

AB: Are you seeing any trends in form, theme, or otherwise, lately?

PB: The most obvious trend in New York theater is smallness. Whether off-Broadway or on, producers are attracted to tiny casts and simple sets. No wonder. With costs escalating it's tough to recoup investments on even the tiniest shows.

AB: What would you like readers to look for in a review or feature article in terms of making a decision about what they should see?

PB: I'm a fan of most of the New York critics. Yet every so often I think they're out to lunch. Theater is so personal. We all have our quirks. If one relies on reviews, best to read a bunch of them.

AB: Where do you recommend people go to get useful theatre-going information?

PB: I look at playbill.com for news and discounts, talkinbroadway.com/allthatchat for gossip. As for Bloomberg.com/muse, we have theater news and reviews from around the world throughout the week. John Simon's reviews run on Friday.

If you would like to contact Philip Boroff , he can be reached at pboroff@bloomberg.net.

An Interview with Andy Christie, LIAR founder

Andy Christie is the founder and host of LIAR. I had the opportunity to see the show in the city recently (with most of the tellers that will be performing for us on March 17th) and it was an artful and completely fun evening. I asked Andy some questions and am sharing the interview with you here. Call me an innocent, but his answers seem pretty sincere...

-- Anna Becker, Producer of The Insights & Revelations Performance Series

AB: "Liar" adds a whole new dimension to the current storytelling explosion. Can you tell us what gave you the idea?

AC: To tell the truth, the first Liar show came about by accident. I was scheduled to do a half-hour monologue at The People’s Improv Theater. I’d performed there once before and they were happy with the response so they asked me back. So about a week prior to the new show, I’m sitting at my computer reading over what I’ve got ready and, well, it’s not ready. I’m excited about doing new material but, clearly, this isn’t it. So rather than panic--or learn to dance and juggle--I asked myself what was missing from the NYC personal, true-story community. What did I have to offer that would be more reflective of real-world storytelling; the kind we all love to do around the kitchen table? The answer of course was: the lies.

Interview with The Timekeepers playwright, Dan Clancy

Over the summer I attended an early reading of "The Timekeepers" at The Barrow Group. Although there was not enough time to do everything I needed to do to get a presentation going up here, and even though the Rosenthal JCC Theatre was going to be undergoing renovations, I asked The Barrow Group if they would consider coming up to Westchester for a presentation...impulsive, perhaps, but the reading was very exciting to see. The level of energy and commitment in the room, and the intensity of the story pressed me forward. So I have spent a harried summer getting everything together and am very much looking forward to sharing this presentation with our audience.

I asked the playwright, Dan Clancy, a few questions about the play and his intriguing answers are below. I hope to see you at the theatre where, after the performance, you will be able to ask Dan, the cast, or director, any questions of your own.

Anna Becker (AB): How did you get the idea to write The Timekeepers?

Dan Clancy (DC): My usual way of working is that I get an idea for a play, and as my Irish grandfather would say, "Walk the land with it." The actual writing of the play is the last part of the process. This didn't happen with The Timekeepers. I sat down to write another play that I had been walking with, and this one appeared from somewhere - not sure where - and have never wondered about its source. Just grateful.

AB: What to you is the most compelling or urgent "message" in the play in terms of both the play's historical context and contemporary society?

An Interview with Michael Brandt

We thought you might like to hear from Michael Brandt, the Writer/Performer of our upcoming presentation of A SPALDING GRAY MATTER, about his creative process and how he came to write this play. Insights & Revelations Series Producer, Anna Becker, asked him a few questions about that, and about what he finds interesting as an artist in general. Hear what Michael is thinking about in terms of the creation of this piece, then come see the show and share your thoughts with him in the post-performance discussion and reception.