 Get to your seat. I'm just kidding. Welcome back. I am Dayfina McMillan. I'm the director of communications and conferences here at TCG. Thank you. It's been such a joy over these past few days meeting with old conference friends and making new ones. We work all year to put this conference together. And then it's over in just a few days. But what happens here inspires us to keep going all year long truly. And that's because of the generosity of spirit that so many of you bring. We know how incredibly busy you are, but the fact that so many of you clear your schedules, make the trek so that you can ask questions together, share knowledge together, dream to the mountaintop together, and take the risk together in order to move towards a better world means more than you know. So before we jump into the thick of things, I just simply want to say thank you. Thank you for being here. I also want to send a special thanks to the Actors Fund for sponsoring that last coffee break. We all needed it. They've left some flyers out about the wonderful programs and services they offer checked by the registration table. So with that, let's jump in. Please join me in welcoming to the stage Steve Scott, producer and artistic associate at the Goodman Theater, who's going to present the Visionary Leadership Award. I first met Rox Shulfer on my 30th birthday when I came to the Goodman Theater to interview for the job of director of educational programs. Now, I had moved to Chicago literally days before from the wilds of central Kansas. Yeah, insert your own joke here. And I knew of the Goodman as a venerated decades old institution. So I was pretty sure that the executive director of the Goodman, which I think was then called the producing director, had to be someone as venerated as the theater itself, a John Houseman type, perhaps, sitting in a paneled office, smoking a pipe, reminiscing about his days with Geraldine Page and Morris Karnofsky. You can imagine my surprise then when I was ushered into the office of a guy who appeared to have come just from his high school prom, or at least from fraternity pledge week. As we began to speak about the job, I kept waiting for a door to open, through which the real producing director would emerge, since this guy was obviously his assistant, or his intern, or maybe his nephew. We talked, and eventually I heard him offer me the job. Of course, I eagerly accepted. But as I left his office and walked up the long staircase that was in the lobby of the Old Goodman Theater, I began to wonder, is he actually running this place? Well, it's 34 years later now. I look like this. And Rock looks, well, due to a fortuitous gene pool, and a portrait hidden in somebody's attic. Pretty much the same. But I learned a long time ago that his youthful countenance was, and still is, rather deceptive. By the time of our fateful first meeting, Rock had already been working at the Goodman for six years, working his way up, Horatial Alger style, from the box office, to the assistant to the producing director, to the producing director of Goodman's experimental series, Stage 2, to the top job itself. As the producer of Stage 2, he had already brought to the stage, among many other things, a little play called American Buffalo, which quickly took Chicago's audiences and critics by storm and, of course, launched the national career of David Mamet. His work with Stage 2 also brought wider exposure to such rising talents as Frank Galati, John Malkovich, Michael Majo, and Robert Falls. Rock had been one of the founders of what would become the League of Chicago theaters, the organization that brought the ever-increasing number of local companies together into what would soon be recognized as the most dynamic theater company and community in the country. He had helped to guide the Goodman theater through the often fraught transformation from a department of the Art Institute of Chicago to an independent cultural institution. And he had helped bring to the Goodman main stage such projects as A Christmas Carol, which in retrospect may seem to be a no-brainer, but at the time was a massively risky and costly undertaking with no guarantee of success. Now, today, of course, that decision has become our city's most beloved holiday tradition, and it has brought literally millions of audiences through the doors of the Goodman theater, introducing generations of young audiences to the power of live theater. Now, since then, Rock's career has become something of an American theater legend. There is no one in this room who has not benefited from his tireless advocacy efforts during the past four decades with his leadership of such organizations as the Performing Arts Alliance, the League of Resident Theatres, the American Arts Alliance, and of course, TCG. And you can read his bio yourself for those details. At the Goodman, he has overseen well over 300 productions, including nearly 130 world premieres, works including American Buffalo and A Life in the Theater and Marvin's Room and Ruined and many, many others. When the old Goodman space of the Art Institute proved to be too antiquated for the kinds of productions that we wanted to do, Rock spent nearly two decades researching, planning, cajoling, weedling, and fundraising until in the fall of 2000, the Goodman's new state of the art home was a reality. In the often fractionalized and segregated Chicago community, Rock was an early and passionate advocate for diversity and inclusion on stage and off well before these ideas were adapted by other local cultural leaders. And his belief that the theater should not only reflect the community in which it works, but should also affect changes in that community has resulted in an unparalleled series of engagement programs for students, teachers, senior citizens, and many, many other special constituencies. And the artistic successes that Rock has overseen are legion, reflected by dozens of local and national awards, a 90% average attendance level, and a five-fold increase in ticket sales revenue during his tenure. But these statistics, as impressive as they are, don't really capture the essence of Rock as a leader or as a man. He can be a demanding and exacting boss, but he takes equal delight in empowering his staff to do what they do best and is unstinting in his praise and support. As many of you know, he can be a tenacious negotiator, but never at the expense of what is fair or just for the artists whose work is the reason for our existence. He does not suffer fools gladly, but never rejects out of hand any idea, knowing that some of the most seemingly outrageous suggestions may lead to the most exciting projects. Although he has spent more than half of his life at the helm of the Goodman Theater, he approaches each new project, each seemingly insurmountable challenge with the enthusiasm and optimism and energy of someone just starting his career. And for those of us and you who are just starting, he is boundlessly generous. I doubt that there is a theater or a theater leader in our Chicago community who hasn't come to Rock for advice, advice which he gladly and patiently gives. And remember, there are over 200 theaters in our community. It is a community and an art form that he loves and supports with every fiber of his being, through his mentorship, through his attendance of theaters large and small, and through his own personal contributions. Rock also loves a lot of other things. The Chicago White Sox, his wife, Mary Beth, his family, the garden at his house in Michigan, and golf. He is absolutely the best gift giver ever. Knowing my propensity for trashing movie star biographies, he delights in giving me every year for my birthday a whole stack of the best and the trashiest. And due to Rock, I am now the proud owner of two editions of the autobiography of Ricky Martin in both English and Spanish editions. He is a gracious and often hilarious host at Goodman staff parties, which are frequent and lavish. And he loves and cherishes the people with whom he works, celebrating the successes, both personal and professional, offering consolation and much needed emotional support at times of tragedy and hardship. There are things that Rock hates, too. Liars, whiners, exploiters, those who pretend to be what they're not, or who attempt to victimize others. In my 34 years of working with him, I've learned that you can put absolutely nothing over on him. And if you screw up, you better be able to explain why. I've also learned that there is no one who better has my back or who will stand up for me or will sing my praises and those of my colleagues more heartily and more fervently. This season is Rock's 40th of the Goodman, an anniversary that we've been celebrating all year. Rock says that he's sick of all the hoopla. I kind of doubt that. But anyway, at this venerated stage of his life and career, he's often referred to as the godfather of Chicago theater. That may be an overstatement, but actually I don't think it is. Like hundreds, maybe thousands of other theater artists and managers, I owe my life and my career to Rock Shelford. And many millions of theater audiences in Chicago, in New York, and in other cities across the country and around the world, owe the hours that they've spent being entertained and delighted and it's sometimes provoked and enraged by our work to his remarkable leadership, tenacity, and humanity. Rock has often said that he's done all of this simply because he loves the theater, what it can do and say, and the difference that it can make in all of our lives. It is that love that we honor today and it is my great honor to be able to present Rock Edward Shelford with his very much deserved Visionary Leadership Award. Rock. Goodness. It's very hard to go on after that introduction. Thank you, Steve. I have your back and you have my back and I'm very grateful for that. I would like to thank TCG for the chance to open for Taylor Mack and Craig Lucas. I know that it will do wonders for my career. I can't wait till my agent hears about it. I am the only thing standing between you and Taylor Mack. So thank you, thank you to TCG for this honor. It is especially humbling because there are many of my colleagues who deserve this recognition. My professional partner, Robert Falls, the Goodman Artistic Collective, thousands of artists and staff and trustees and patrons have made my life in the theater possible. It's wonderful to be able to publicly express my gratitude to them for all that they have done. And most of all, I want to thank my wife, Mary Beth Fisher for her extraordinary love, support, and her artistry. For around 30 years, we've worked at the Goodman to create a large theater institution that is based on the values of supporting artists and theater professionals, aesthetic and cultural diversity, inclusion, and an intrinsic engagement with our community. This includes, as Steve talked about, being very involved with many individuals and organizations in the arts and elsewhere in our society, like TCG, Lort. I am the only person who's worked with every TCG executive director, actually. So I can tell you all the stories that you'd like to know. And anyway, the Performing Arts Alliance, as was mentioned, and many others. Goodman Theater, like the American Theater, is not perfect and never will be perfect. All of the ways that it's not perfect are what keep me up at night. Although actually, thinking about it, that question was asked in one of the breakout sections as kind of a conversation starter. And it occurred to me, it really should be not what keeps you awake at night, but what keeps you awake during the day. Because during the day, you have a chance to do something about it. It's kind of like wanting to support the right to fail, which I've never understood either. I mean, who wants the right to fail? Nobody wants to fail. Everybody, all we want is the opportunity to succeed. Anyway, I digress. So despite the fact that we're not perfect, I am optimistic about the future of the American Theater and the Goodman, because the Goodman has been transformed by the work of many, many, many people into a community institution that is permanently committed to the values that I talked about before. And it will be committed to those values long after Bob Falls and I have ridden off into the sunset, not that we plan to go anywhere yet. It can be done. Transformation can take place. Finally, I believe it's important to remember that the idea of professional theater as an art form in our country is really relatively new. As a movement, it began with a small group of artists who wanted to produce theater that was very different from the world of Broadway. In only 50-some years, we have seen incredible growth in the quality, range, reach, and development of the not-for-profit theater. I mean, the change from when I started, no one could have imagined it. No one could have imagined the change then. I'm grateful to have had the opportunity to participate in that evolution, and it fills me with a tremendous sense of responsibility. So in closing, my hope for all of us in the American theater is that we continue to recognize that whatever our differences appear to be, and whatever tensions exist, all of us in the theater have far more in common than we sometimes think or admit. I believe that together our artists and theaters will continue to move to the forefront in illuminating the changes that have and will take place in our society and our world. It is challenging, it is not easy, but it is very exciting, and I can't wait to see what happens. Thank you. Thank you, Rock, for those beautiful remarks and truly all you've done for our field. Thank you. And now, I'm very excited to welcome two amazing theater artists to the stage. Craig Lucas is an OB, award-winning director, and a Pulitzer Prize finalist playwright who has authored such beloved works as Prelude to a Kiss, Blue Window, and the Book for the Light and the Piazza. Taylor Mack was called one of the most exciting theater artists of our time, the best theater actor of 2013 by The Village Voice, and the New York Times wrote of Mack, fabulousness can come in many forms, and Taylor Mack seems intent on assuming every one of them. Please join me in welcoming Craig Lucas and Taylor Mack. CHEERING AND APPLAUSE Thank you very much. Hello! Did you turn it on? I don't know what to do. There we go. Taylor Mack is a playwright who doesn't repeat himself. He's written a Greek comedy, a lot of Aristophanes in the fray, a realistic family drama in here, a five-act no-drama, The Lily's Revenge, a Commedia dell art, the walk across America for Mother Earth, and he's now doing his bidding on Molière. He's a lyricist, an actor, a performance artist, a singer who found in amazing grace the chord progressions of The House of the Rising Sun, and who managed to tie Don't Fence Me In to the murder of Matthew Shepard. And he is a gender-toyer wither. In my humble estimation, he is the most protean and rigorous, humane, empathic artist we have. He has an all-embracing vision which brings flaws and imperfections into the light in a theater that grapples with shame and fury, knowing that these things are on a continuum with love and tenderness. His work is, as he has said, chaotic, beautiful, ugly, disturbing, male, female, all at once, and it accords dignity and respect to everyone, even Lin, Cheney, and Saddam Hussein. In these plays, no single character remains the problem for more than a few minutes. He is, as one of his characters, accuses another of being an egalitarian empathizer. My work is finished here. Taylor, for those who haven't had a chance to see any of your 24-hour song cycle, you are doing durational work. Yes. That's the wackiest shit I've ever heard about. Please tell these people what that means and why you... All right, so my first time doing a durational play was the Lily's Revenge, it was five hours long. Depending on the production you saw, sometimes they were four hours long. The current piece that I'm working on is called a 24-decade history of popular music. I'm taking a decade at a time from the 1770s to the present decade. Each decade is about an hour's worth of popular music and I deconstruct it all and put it back together again from the 1770s to the present decade and when we ultimately perform it all, it will be 24 hours long non-stop and there'll be 24 musicians on stage with me and every hour we're going to lose a musician until the final hour is just me having stayed up for 24 hours performing non-stop. There's going to be food and people are encouraged to bring their toiletries and their bedding and there'll be a medical tent and... We've been doing these decade performances all over the place and a lot of Joe's pub and at the Public Theater in New York City and also at the Museum of Contemporary Art and I did a tour of Australia with them so we've been doing them all over the place in Lincoln Center and Dick's in place and so we've been doing them all over in lots of different kinds of venues and different sizes and I'm just... It's really a 24-hour concert but really it's a multi-year experience because the idea is that you keep performing each decade in all the various places that you go to over the next ten years and so people see it and they become part of the community that we're building but actually it happens that while we're performing it happens that why I love durational work is because it does actually happen in this way where if people come back they get to know each other audience members get to know each other and I've had people they've started businesses that have been coming to these concerts in the last two years two people are getting married they send me an invite to their wedding lots of things have happened and they would meet online and these two people also got married in that experience and then other two people got divorced as a result of the play so when you do durational work it cracks people out of there sometimes it takes more than a 90-minute play to crack people out of their 8-hour work day and so I like the idea of doing these durational works that just become events commits to it in a way that they don't always commit to just a regular one act play or two act play instead they really they say oh I'm in it I'm in it for the duration and that means I'm committed to listening more and opening myself up to the ideas that are being present and to the people around me so that's why I'm really interested in the form and I don't only work in durational work but right now it's what excites me it's kind of a pyramid scheme yes it is no it does make you want to come back it makes you want to go again and see the next one and then you have continuity you've said that imperfection fosters community and I'd love to know what the hell that means well it sounds really true I I'm interested in we joke about community all the time everyone uses the word it's obnoxious but I really am interested in community not because of the heart shaped feeling of it all but because of how dysfunctional it is I really like I I really just like how it works, how it doesn't work I'm just curious about it so when I say I'm building community I'm really sure I'm doing that but I'm in it more for how does this how does it tick that's part of what I'm doing but in terms of how imperfection builds community I don't know I'm curious about how it does and that's why I'm making the 24 decade concert I think I have a hypothesis that it does not to say that imperfection can't but I think that for example a popular song is imperfect in the scope of a range of a classical song and a popular song they often use imperfect rhymes and they're simplistic and their chord structures and different things like that so you could argue that they're imperfect and what is it that brings people together more than a popular song so it's that ability to kind of expose your vulnerability in a way to show your imperfection that I think is bringing people together I've noticed it on stage a lot that when I expose something myself that is not perfect it often makes everybody in the room go like this as opposed to when I'm doing all my stuff and it's all well crafted sometimes people go like this so I'm just curious about it it's not to say that it's one way of working or I do believe in everything on stage all at the same time and that includes perfection and trying to reach perfection perfection to me like a classical song is like trying to reach the hem of God that's reaching for perfection to me a popular song is trying to reach the people and so both are interesting but that's where I'm at it's all through your work this sense of the flaws, the frailty you find such humanity and comedy in the ways that we are complete hypocrites and fuck up there are children here oh good the way we fuck up I said I wanted an adult afternoon excellent excellent I love children not all the time no I just think sometimes we cater our culture to children way more than we should you guys know whatever and I wanted to be able to talk about sex honestly that's true because that's a big part of what I do on the stage so I wanted to be able to talk about it well now that you've said that you very glancingly mentioned to me once that attending orgies let's get into it actually pardon the expression spurred you on to artistic horizons did I say that I think you said that it triggered something artistically so I started in the theater and it seemed to me although this probably wasn't true but from my perspective it seemed to me that I couldn't find my way in that the gatekeeping was so intense I couldn't find my way in and so I went to the clubs where they'd take anybody because Mercedes came to my acting class one time and she said she tried to get in every school she could get into she auditioned for every school and they turned her down for everything and so she went to the HB studios where they accept anyone and I said okay and it was such a beautiful talk that she gave and I said right I'm gonna that's what I gotta do I gotta I'll go where they'll take anyone so I went to the clubs and they would take anyone and at the clubs I would be performing and there would be orgies happening in front of me there wasn't like the continental baths it was where they're often the other rooms or anything like that it was like right in front and so I really learned a lot in that world I'm not saying I didn't partake sometimes but I really learned that that if something is threatening to take the story away from the storyteller then it is your job to incorporate that threatening thing into the story at all costs so I incorporated lots of blowjobs into my performances and you know I've got my ukulele a lot of things bothered where they're doing it and then everyone watches me while they're watching them so it was a way of working that it taught me how to be spontaneous on the stage it taught me how to always live in the moment when you got drunk screaming people and you got to tell a story and they came for the story but they don't always know it they come because once the show is over they would immediately leave so they come for the show but sometimes people get distracted by life and sex and they would indulge in that and so the trick was always to figure out a way to work in whatever environment and that has really done me service that training because I've been able to play tents and basement bars and opera houses and all different kinds of theaters inside and out as a result well this brings me to something you wrote in your manifesto that I love which is the theater is a service industry it's like being a plumber and theater artists or blue collar workers who wear better clothes for the most part I believe theater artists should be students of humanity I believe to learn what your audience needs is the job but caution that sometimes we confuse need with want giving our audiences what they want is not the job I believe you may be saying to yourself that's very presumptuous of him to think he knows what the audience needs but I believe if I were a plumber you wouldn't think it was presumptuous of me to say my job is to learn what your plumbing needs you would say I was a good plumber that is so refreshing when I moved to New York I was taken under the wing of Steven Sondheim who said the audience doesn't tell you what they want you tell them what they want and that was very eye-opening to me and I have always carried a certain contempt for the audience in my manner because after all they are paying me and that's infuriating Taylor you've also said that we must communicate with everybody you can't exclude anyone in the audience that means if there's a right wing loony at your performance you have to find a way to communicate to them how do you do that? it starts with the beginning it's always about the invitation to listen so I'm trying to think of an example well with the show I would do for a long time it was called The Beast of Taylor Mack I would come on stage I was crazy looking in my theatrical drag and it was kind of the beginning of the whole piece was funny funny funny funny so everyone comes on board and then once everybody is on board then you can bring in the other stuff you can bring in the darker material and so that's part of the equation it's also just to always keep an ear out for what's happening in the room again I was in Australia in Darwin Australia which is real it's a mining town and military town and there was a guy and his wife had obviously gone to the show and he was like from the very beginning he was not going to enjoy this show with this drag queen on the stage and I I had to acknowledge him and I try to do it in a generous way so he doesn't feel put on the spot but he was taking the story away from the storyteller so the trick is to just acknowledge what he's going through right now so I often will just say wow you really hate this show and then we'll talk about it and it usually works out because they feel seen and heard sometimes and that's all they wanted was to be seen and heard he felt like there was no room for him in this show and then I just said I just made room for him in the show so that can be complicated sometimes because you don't want a certain prejudice to take over your work and so it's a constant juggling act and I do this in my plays that I write too that there's at least the ones that I perform in I definitely leave room for there to be some sense of let me check in with what's happening in the audience right now if it's a realism play I still try to invite the audience into it as best I can we were doing this play at San Francisco at the Magic a new play of mine and we were in previews in the beginning it was horrible in my head it worked and then the audience got in and I thought it was the actors in rehearsal I thought the actors aren't making this work and then I realized in the first preview oh this is horrible this is why it doesn't work and then the audience finds into it and so I rewrote I was so proud of myself I rewrote the opening of the play at Intermission I was so jazzed I had this and really it was just about giving them a little bit more time Romulus Linney was a mentor of mine and he would say he took me to the library at one point and he said Taylor look at all the plays that have been around for more than 100 years and in every single one of those plays you'll see that they start the playoff slowly because the audience is still getting comfortable and you can start it all fast but then you've got to start it really slow right after that quickness and you always have to remind yourself about these techniques that you learned and I was starting to play off fast and so I just had to ease them into it I had to tell them that it's kind of a hoarder home I think so they're already uncomfortable by looking at it and then I just had to let the mother of the play acknowledge that it's a hoarder's home and it's awful and that everyone should be disturbed by it then suddenly everyone could laugh and it was okay so you learn these little techniques that are quite useful Everything about this play if you get a chance to see it is in a lineage with the glassman Barry and Barry Child and Long Day's Journey into Night it is a family play in which the American landscape is held up for scrutiny but this play takes place actually now not in a nostalgic version of America it takes place now with a bunch of people who don't know what gender pronouns to use to refer to people who are changing their genders and more radically than that the ethical center of the play the humane aspects of the play reside in the heteronormative bullying father and his Iraq war veteran dishonorably discharged crystal meth addicted son and the progressive characters in the play are in many ways not so nice they have no room for people who are carrying the old forms into the future no room they literally kick them out they don't belong in the house anymore and so the play leaves you with a tragic sense that if we aren't careful we will throw the baby out with the bath water I've never seen that on stage before I've never seen it from a progressive artist and it convinced me that in all the world among English speaking playwrights the greatest living one since Beckett died is Taylor Mack and not only that he's a great lyricist listen to this this is from a play like from now this isn't John Webster but you wouldn't know it the floating down a flower tree to be as tears descend decree the cheek home but with the weight of all they learn must cling then fall and seek to roam a journey from yearning tomes a flower falls much faster than a wish and so our longings lay are late lost and we are left to know our fate to land to lose to ache and so will die upon the grating frost and I would rather end my life with all the sound the wind as fife abound with all the smells of morning air to see the sun arise and blare its color all about the world and this last moment we've unfurled the beauty of what can be here it takes away all that I fear from death oh the breath floating down girl girl now at the beginning of this play time appears and time has our glasses here that are slowly emptying and as the sand floats out her breasts are revealed that's good and there are these crack hoes on stage and they're former audience members who were not able to leave the play has turned them into degenerates this makes me so happy and terror comes and sits in the audience as a lily and time says look get out of here you don't want to be here it's about longing and it's going to trap you this story nostalgia the god of nostalgia has trapped this audience in this cock and bull story with institutionalized narrative little by little they have turned from lively questioning individuals like you to cliche crones of mediocrity while gathering junkies a thing of this tale will reduce you to an addicted coagulation of nostalgia and hope so and then he says this play will use the promise of a climax a climax in the shape of the most banal and contemptible contrivance of all the wedding and then the lily who represents all audiences says there'll be a wedding come on, what do you want from theater anyway Taylor you said the two new plays are part of a larger project and I'm really interested in what that is you haven't mentioned that the Greeks had these you guys all know it's an audience of people who know they had these play festivals and they would do three tragedies in a comedy and the play and they would do them all day long and that's those were their festivals and so I decided that I've been trying to figure out a way to do rap because I come from a theater I produce a lot of my own stuff in New York City because it tends to be the kind of thing where you gotta do it first before people will do it because they don't think it can be done so then you gotta do it so you do it and then everyone's like oh you can do it and before that they're like you're not gonna be able to do that you can't do that you can't do that nobody wants to do that no one wants it one time I said to this person the lilies revenge I was like it's five hours long and she said that's just selfish I said I'm not gonna tie you to the chair you can leave if you hate it you know so you know they tell you you can't do it you can't do it so then you do it and then people like it and some people don't but most people did and other people will do it right and so I don't know I forgot what I was saying but it's a larger project yeah so the larger project I wanted to create this rep company because in my producing myself people were talking earlier today you know at your tenth preview you know you might want to rewrite something and I was like tenth preview I usually get one preview one preview before the critics come you know so I've been trying to figure out how can I make my plays last longer because I've been touring a lot and I will do one of my solo pieces for 200 times and on performance number 75 I'm like oh yeah I think I understand how to do this play now and so so the ensemble stuff doesn't quite get that life in it usually 16 performances or whatever and it's out how can I have longer runs and what I used to do with my solo stuff is do it once a week in the basement bars for six months and so I thought well how could I do that model and I thought well I'll write these four plays and I'll do a Greek go back to the Greek she always got to go to the root that's what Robin Kelly says go to the root so you go to the root you go to the Greeks and they would do these all day festivals and I thought well that's a way maybe that I could have things run in rep because if I can't produce it a show one show that will last for six months maybe I could produce four shows that combined will last for six months so that's kind of my crazy theory and in the process I'm sharing all the plays separately but then hopefully in New York we'll get to do them in some kind of rep either at four different theaters or all together at one theater and that's kind of the goal so I've written two of them so far one is called Here which we premiered at the Magic Theater just this last February and then the other one the Children's Theater Company in Minneapolis is commissioned in it's called The Frey and then there's two more I'm doing a musical version of the Bacchai and then the fourth one is kind of performance art play so there's some variety there and also they're all about kind of the the American experience that's what they're about The Frey takes place in the interstice between a platonic heaven and a very muddy dirty real America where people roll around in the mud and the stage is filled with mud and the audience is dragged onto the stage and pushed in the mud I've never been happier when they make the audience members of the audience pick up bunches of mud and pretend to poop now let me just say I'm a little poop phobic I still do not believe that women actually do poop I'm told that they do but I refuse to believe it and I know I'm a horrible, horrible sexist but I'm just admitting my flaws anyway you have never ever laughed as hard as you will laugh when you read this play because it invites the world into the kind of piggy headed Philistines that we want not to be and it presents the perfect queer as a rather at first unlikable fellow he speaks in rhymed couplets he's been living in the platonic heaven and the play and it makes you love these pig people who are running around in the mud and the play slowly shifts the scale so that the one goes down and the other goes up and the person who wants to live in a perfect world realizes he'd rather stay in the mud and the person who lives in the mud realizes that he has terrible fears and fear is always really the villain in Taylor Mac's plays like in life people do the worst things when they're paralyzed with fear that's a great play and it is the miracle of Taylor Mac and I guess really the writer that you resemble the most I think in many ways is Brecht because you use comedy and burlesque to convey ideas in a way that they don't seem like ideas they feel like live life and you simply refuse to bore the audience every ten seconds you surprise them I don't know how you do that I can't keep my own focus for ten seconds the internet has destroyed every last synapse that's a bouffant thing you know that red bastard talks about that wonderful bouffant and he says I don't know how many seconds he says but he's like something interesting has to happen every ten seconds and I take that to mean that could be a combination of words that's surprising it could mean something drastic that happens a flood descends on the stage it could mean a kiss it could mean just a breath but something surprising happens when people actually feel something and so your job is to surprise the audience the perfect queer in the fray turns out to portray a cockney lovesick crazy killer homosexual clown I'm not making that up and that's better than teenage mutant ninja turtle I think Taylor talk a little bit about you shared with me your approach to building a character the duality of a performer and an actor I was trained in method and Meisner I like that that has really served me quite well but I learned in the clubs that there is something quite special about the duality of seeing both the character and the performer at the same time that there's something extremely brave about that not to say that hiding in the character I don't like to use the word hiding but dissolving into a character isn't also brave and has its beautiful merits but finding yourself in the character in front of an audience is really deep and it works extremely well for things like Brecht which I learned this year and a lot of the plays that I write the characters have that duality where it's the performer and the character at the same time I saw a play I won't say what it was but I saw a musical where they were asked to be the characters and as a result you everything was cut off you didn't it just was dead it was so dead on that stage and there was nothing authentic was happening and that's the challenge when you play a character is to find the authentic thing so often I see in theater where people are trying to hide themselves in the character and it's just it's such a relief when somebody shows themselves in the character because when you discover yourself through the character then the audience can discover themselves through the character that's the joy of it and it's all about discovery you're just trying to discover I say this to actors in my plays all the time discover that moment discover it and I think about that as I'm writing the great joys I have when writing is when I discover something rather than when I try to tell something or it's always about the action what I'm hearing you say and what excites me and I think it does come from the clubs it is a live audience it's not a movie, it's not television it's not frozen it should change it's a character they're either breathing with you or they're not you know if they're not and you have to find a way to let them in that's what's special about it so to pretend they're not there is false in a way it's a balancing act you've said that audience when you use audience participation you want them to be uncomfortable again a man after my own heart why do you want them to be uncomfortable I don't think that art makes people comfortable I mean it all talks about art is about attacking the status quo and whatever that means that doesn't necessarily mean a group of people but it means whatever your status quo is in you and I do think that that's a lovely way to do art is that it's not about being comfortable but what you can say to an audience is it's okay if you're uncomfortable so I say come and participate on the stage and everyone goes and I say yes, everything you're feeling is appropriate and then we get them up on the stage and then they can have a transformation which is the best thing that art does we get to discover a transformation in the space so I did this one song in the 24 Dickens show the lyric is because they cannot sing three roguish chaps fell into mishaps because they could not sing so I get the audience everyone who's in the audience who can't sing to raise their hand and then we decide who's the worst three singers in the audience and then we get them up on the stage and we teach them the chorus really badly and the audience cheers them and suddenly that wound that they have in their heart that they can't sing is eliminated from the space and there's a transformation so I like to use ritual in the theater because that's what I think it is but ritual requires sacrifice and often that sacrifice or my audience the sacrifice is comfort comfort is often the sacrifice of ideology you have found ways to make people accept their humanity in their frailty and flawedness and awkwardness we all feel like we're totally weird broken things and you say yes you really are and that's what I think is genius it's you have a vision to be which is what's lacking in most theater not just commercial theater I cannot tell you now that I'm writing musicals how often I hear the question will the audience understand that I don't know what to say to that question except if not I'm constantly being asked by producers will the audience understand this and the only answer I can think of so do you never get asked that by artistic directors yeah, dramaturgs a lot I love my dramaturgs I love them I do because I didn't go to I didn't go to playwriting school I went to dramaturgy hangout and so my dramaturgs they taught me they told me what to read so I love the dramaturgs and I really feel like I work well with them not all of them but the good ones I work well with but I guess they asked me that but I guess that's a fair question to ask it is a fair question it's just that when the presumption is it's an intelligent line it might be too much for them no, then tell them to fuck off yeah I mean, real you know everybody loves the Simpsons and they don't know that Matt Granick had a deal with Fox that they could never say cut that line because the audience won't understand the reference so everybody loves it because there's references always in it that some of the audience doesn't understand which is why you pay attention and why at the intermission of a good play you turn to your friends and you go what was the thing about play-to I don't know about play-to and then there's a conversation if you're telling them what they already know I'm preaching to the converted Taylor, I have so many hundreds of questions I could ask you if you form a repertory company please invite me to participate we're going to open the questions up to you and Taylor is going to pick you people who are talking and I'll just sit here I will say that when I was I'm very excited that he was going to do this with me because when I was young and I was trying to find my own voice I basically just copied Craig's voice and now I do my own voice but I feel like I liked it better when you were doing my voice I feel like it's still in there he's the real deal don't hurry don't rush where's the ukulele you know I'm learning the banjo oh wow so I'm trying not to play the ukulele too much because I chose the ukulele for a reason which was that I was so gigantic and the ukulele was so small and I wanted that dichotomy that juxtaposition and so that's why I was playing it it's a sweet instrument it's fine I like it also it's not cool but then it became the burlesque movement kind of neo-burlesque movement came up and everyone started playing the ukulele and it kind of became semi-cool and so it's lost a little bit of its magic for me and purpose and the banjo is cool too right now so I don't know but I just was craving a different sound so I didn't bring it what the yeah I don't want to produce my own work I love it when other people produce my work I love myself son Loretta Greco and the magic theater and you know but I do it I also love Adam Bach I love myself son Adam Bach he had this play I saw a single set and they had I think a month and a half to preview you know it was 90 minutes and I was doing this play that had 14 characters, musical numbers lots of changes lots of pastiching all over the place and I had one day to preview so I would love to have producers because I feel like the work needs that time to be able to rewrite and I'm a re-writer so but that's not really answering your question I guess what I want people to do is trust a little bit more I feel like I see artists all over the place independent artists that prove themselves over and over and over and over and over again and then you hear things from institutions like our audience isn't ready for you yet you know and that to me is well they'll never be ready if you don't invite me you know so I feel like we could do that a bit more just trust if somebody is committed to this art form and shown and proven time and time again they know what they're doing then maybe we could just trust them and book it you know I'm a real fan I'm a real fan in giving people dates don't tell me submit your play and we'll let you know no give me a date give me a date and I will make a play for you and do the play and it will be amazing and if it's not oh well but half of your shows aren't amazing anyway so I carry your remarkable performance in Good Person of Szechuan in my heart and I wonder what you carry with you after having done that after doing that play yeah it was a really hard I haven't had that hard of a time doing a playing a role before I had stress I had a stress rash because well a lot of people don't know about actors is your body doesn't know the difference between pretend and real stress so every day I would you know meet the gods start a business fall in love break up get pregnant blah blah blah blah and and you do that eight times a week that's a producer schedule that eight shows a week thing that is not an actor schedule so you do that eight times a week and it's very taxing so I had to really learn how to take care of myself in that process and I do five hour plays I'm used to knowing how to take care of myself but it was a different experience that one I think I'm still kind of recovering from it a little bit and not to say I wouldn't have done it again or do it again it was glorious experience and I think in terms of the themes of the play I am constantly now looking around and asking how I can be a better person and but also how I cannot shame myself and everyone else around me there's a lot of shame that we're doing we're constantly shaming everybody so I'm trying to figure that out too and I just fell in love with Brecht I didn't fall in love with Brecht before and I fell in love with Brecht so that was a big present I'm Jet Harper and something that I've noticed lately is that society is just starting to talk about this concept of the gender binary and sort of that it shouldn't exist and I wanted to ask you what's it like performing and writing to that dialogue and what can you say to those of us who want to participate through theater hopefully there'll be a place for you in the producing theater and until there is make it yourself don't wait around for permission to be creative just go make it yourself and because you make it then there will be a place for it right that's the trend that's happening everybody's presenting now so make it yourself and then someone will present you it's the trend in the American theater people aren't producing as much anymore they're presenting and so get yourself a company and start making it raise the money to if you're not a writer raise the money to commission a writer to do it that's all I can really say about it it's odd right now I thought I made this big breakthrough with good person and stuff and I thought oh everyone's going to be asking me to play all these roles that I don't normally get to play because I show that I can do it time and time and time and time again but you know and all I've gotten are narrator roles or gender roles you know so you will find that people will put you in the box and say no say no to things if you don't want to be in the box say no and make it something else that's what I do thank you hi Taylor how are you doing once upon a time you spoke about surelocking your work so that is coded the pain that you've been working feel on the inside is coded within your storytelling can you speak a little bit more about that well I sometimes I'll say what's the one thing I don't want the audience to know about me and then I'll say okay that's what the show's about and it's one technique you could also say what's the one thing I want everyone to know about me but when you risk something like that on stage I think it brings people together and presents an idea in a way that is tangible often so I but what I like to do and the great thing about the theatre is you can say all those horrible things that have happened to you or that you that are you the awful things that you do in the world but they don't necessarily know it's true I think this is what you're talking about so because the theatres both lie and truth at the same time so they don't really know if it's true or not so you're protected in that way and I had in Meisner work they always would say I don't know if everyone does this but my teacher would say Sherlock Holmes the text so you basically would say your dialogue is I'm going to the store and so you say going and then you kind of do stream of conscious of the word going and then you do stream of consciousness of who you are what does that mean and so you Sherlock Holmes the text and so I write that way so that actors and directors and designers can Sherlock Holmes the text and find the clues of the character within the text and also the clues of of what may or may not be true Hi so I don't particularly have a question but I'd like to say that I'm a high school student an art school in Oakland and this past February our theater department took a trip to the Magic Theater to see here and it was really important to me and to a bunch of my friends the topics that you were able to broach in that play and just the exposure of those topics that was gained through the production of this play in this community and it really meant a lot to me and my peers to have that experience and it was the only time in my education that the topic of gender neutrality and questioning your gender had been broached ever and to have it in that context of theater that I am so passionate about really meant a lot to me so thank you thank your teacher for taking you and the Magic Theater for making it happen thank you we didn't talk about how my gender pronoun is Judy and I chose Judy because people often judge you when you have a gender pronoun that's not here a her or him and I don't feel like a her or him I do feel genderqueer and so if people were going to judge me when they use my gender pronoun like roll their odds when they say my name and a gender pronoun that would make them camp while they were doing it hi miss Judy yesterday we had some great top speakers talk about the mountaintop when we get there what are we going to do when we get to our mountaintop what are we going to do that's my question to you what do you think our mountaintop is where are we going where are you going and what are you what's the idealized version you'd like to see celebration of heterogeneity as opposed to homogeneity I guess that would be kind of amazing I would love it if we stopped trying to always see ourselves in all the stories needing to see ourselves in the stories instead just having a little curiosity about people who are different that would be that would be pretty cool if we could do that I guess that's my that'd be my mountaintop a little more egalitarianism in the theater yeah thanks anything else I want to be in a lot of new play so I don't know what those roles are but I know they're not narrators and they don't all have to do with gender I do know that um I want Karen Hartman to write me a play I want Jordan Harrison to write me a play I want you know I want a lot of my friends from the dramatist my fellow playwrights to write me parts in their plays um I want I want to play Edmund and Edgar in King Lear I'm really eager I really want to play Edgar I want to be the fool and the hero at the same time um you know but it's uh you have to convince people that what you know of yourself is what they know of yourself and I don't audition I don't audition for the theater I don't believe in auditioning I don't do it um and I gambled for seven years and it didn't pay off I tried to get auditions for seven years I could barely get any so I just stopped auditioning I just don't believe in it I just make the work and do the work but it does mean that I don't get cast in a lot of things that I would like to do so um I just you know trust me I'll figure it out I have never once been so bad on the stage that people didn't have the courage but I've never been so bad on the stage I wanted to be good so I'm not going to get I'm not going to say yes to something that I really don't think I can make it good so just cast me and if I don't think I can do it I'll tell you you know but I mean that plays both ways because Lear de Bacenet she cast me as Shantana I said I don't know how to do this and then I you know she was like yes you do both ways sometimes I don't know and I'll just say that's not just me I mean I said that about me but that's a lot of people a lot of people in this industry just trust them just cast them I we did all the Liliger vengeance in San Francisco we didn't cast a single role we didn't do auditions we just cast we just I met with people I was like oh someone recommended you okay great let's do it and I just trusted them some of them worked out and some of them did it but that's true of any play of any casting process so I'm a big fan of not having auditions and just trusting artists and saying yes you are an artist you've proven you can do it time and time again let me dedicate some time an opportunity for you I believe that and that's going to help us with our diversity issue hi Todd hi Todd is directing a play of mine we're doing a production of the maids Daniel Alexander Jones Louisa Farah and I are doing the maids and Todd is directing it we decided last night okay I was afraid to ask you my question but now I'm not afraid but I want to make a statement first I just want to say Craig thank you for the beautiful reading of another playwright's work that was really astonishing and attentive and deeply loving so my question Taylor which now I am not afraid to ask you is will you sing us a song I think I would know 240 songs because I'm memorizing them for my concert this is a little acapella one we've nothing to fear but fear itself fear itself fear with nothing to fear but fear itself fear itself itself well I'm a fearful people and violence from fearful people I'm afraid politicians and ammunition and all religions nationalism and patriotism and jingoism and I but we've nothing to fear but fear itself fear itself beautiful thank you Taylor thank you Craig thanks for leaving us with a reminder to take risks to not fear to be curious to not be forced to check a box to be in a box I want to introduce Loretta to the stage Loretta Greco is the producing artistic director of the magic theater on the very first day of my very first TCG conference 200 years ago my mentor Emily Mann took me urgently by the elbow and began pushing me through the crowds of my future colleagues and theater luminaries with great agility when I asked where she was taking me she stopped and with an unusual display and all replied I'm taking you to meet Peter Peter of course was the great Peter Zeisler the father of our tribe who dreamt of a regional theater movement outside of Broadway and then rolled up his sleeves and built it the Peter Zeisler Memorial Award recognizes an individual or organization whose work reflects and promotes Peter's vision and artistic integrity the honorees exemplify pioneering practices in theater are dedicated to the freedom of expression and are unafraid of taking risks for the advancement of the art form past winners of the Zeisler Award include Kinan Valdez Will Power 24th Street Theater Jack Ruler Mildred Ruiz and Steven Sapp Elevator Repair Service Theater this year's winner is the fearless change maker Taylor Mack whether you have experienced his recent and definitive conjurings of Puck Shantay or the hopeful Lily or been transported by the angelic longing of Taylor's voice and ukulele in concert or had your DNA altered by his insightful work as a playwright or are getting your first dose of theater today you know that he's breaking new ground Taylor's a raucous community builder who knows inclusion is not just desirous but essential after a decade of trying to be invited to the party Taylor through his own through his joyful drag revolution he began creating a body of cabaret and concert work which broke down barriers in favor of posing possibilities as a playwright he began to enlist and consider the idea of community within both content and form with his largest work to date he throughout the model of auditioning and instead invited a group of passionate and diverse clowns drag queens faux drag queens musicians politicians strippers dancers singers and yes even a few actors to star in his lilies revenge Taylor's ingenuity theatrical vision artistic integrity and passion for taking risks is undeniable who else would emulate the Japanese no play to create a five hour five act 40 character epic allegory in order to subversively and yes communally explore who has the right to love who has the right to marry only Taylor would risk following the flamboyant lilies with his latest play here a staggering redreaming of shepherd which explores transgender odyssey inside the broken promises of middle class America I love this man I love Judy every time he walks into my theater he makes me want to be a better artist and a better person he has a way of making you want to raise the bar just a little bit higher Taylor knows who he is and he truthfully and generously brings it all to the table the sublime and the ridiculous the masculine and the feminine the fabulousness and the humility in order to make heightened theatrical works that have the power to alter us in communion with his audience he engenders his own brand of joyful abandon while also demanding the emotional rigor required for real change Taylor passionately believes we as artists are responsible for dreaming a better more inclusive world and then like Peter Zeisler rolling up our sleeves and leading our culture towards it please join me in celebrating the 2014 recipient of the Peter Zeisler Memorial Award the incomparable Taylor Mack Deja Vu I don't want to say too much because I just was talking for a long time but I did want to say that my mom is here and and Shirley Shirley Fishman Shirley Fishman was she's one of those drama turks that I love and she said to me Taylor what made you Taylor what made you that's how she talks and I well what do you mean she's like how did you become who you became and I said well my mom there was always creativity in the home always encouraged always lots of creativity and she said also you didn't come out of a petri dish and that basically sums it up in terms of the Ben Franklin concept of the self main man is not actually true I do want to say this too real quick yesterday I was really excited to come here and I saw all these people that I know who sent them to my mom and then I came in here and the event started and Teresa would everyone please stand for the national anthem and I'm not really a patriot you know it's alright but I stood I was like I got them going to stand I'm going to stand here you know military town I'm going to do it you know and I hadn't been I realized I hadn't been asked to stand for the national anthem for at least 20 years because I don't go to sporting events and I don't have a kid so I don't go to school events where they ask you to stand and things so it's been 20 years since I've been asked to stand and I felt like a teenager again kind of angry about having to angry about this nation and the world that we're living in and why should I be proud of this country and blah blah blah blah and I wanted to rebel against it all and my mom she was kind of humming along and the people in the back were kind of singing along a little bit but kind of quietly because they knew they were at a theater thing and they felt a little shame about their being we're subversively singing to the national anthem you know so they weren't really like shouting it out there was conflict in the room and I said I'm going to look at my friend Shanta and how we're going to rebel is we're going to roll our eyes and I looked at Shanta and she didn't look at me and I got Shanta look at me but she didn't look at me and I was stewing and stewing and I thought well and then I realized oh this is because Shanta was telling the story about going to the border and seeing the border go off into the ocean and how they used to have chain link fences so that family members that had been deported could come and at least touch their loved ones and pass letters to them and kiss them and now they've even stopped that and there's just a little hole that you can stick your finger through and they've cut down the hours that they can even do that and we're using our nationalism as a way to shore up our culture of fear and we're using our culture of fear to put borders around and we're stopping people from actually nationalism to be cruel to people in ways that we were cruel before and were being even crueler so I thought why should we be proud of this but then I thought that obviously it's kind of lovely to be in a country where you get to have those thoughts and express them on a stage and even though half the country might attack you for it but still you know you want to express those thoughts and I thought Theresa did that on purpose she was making theater she was asking us all to do that so that we could have that conflict in the room and have our multifaceted feelings about this and that is why I'm a theater artist because I like to take something that is homogenous, something that is one country under God and break it into lots of different pieces and say no, it's heterogenetic and look how it is and to discover myself through that and hopefully allow the audience to discover that so it was a really beautiful piece of theater yesterday and I just wanted to acknowledge that that's all I wanted to say thank you very much I will try to continue to be an innovator in an art form that is about innovation thanks a lot just a few things thank you Taylor, thank you Loretta at 5 p.m. so just in a few minutes in Sapphire 410 on this floor Blue Star theaters will be hosting bass track a multimedia performance produced by Ann Hamburger or godmother of site specific theater inspired by the words the words of Marines serving in Afghanistan and their families along with the town hall discussion engaging with military families that are actually coming to this piece bass track will actually premiere in the fall at BAM so check that out in room 410 the theaters of color meeting is happening in sapphire 400 also on this floor and some of our dine arounds are getting started that early so if you haven't already signed up for one please head to the host committee table and the exhibit hall and after your dine around or whatever shows you see tonight at 10 o'clock the San Diego host committee is having a late night party at the San Diego rep with food, local beer and lots of fun entertainment but please don't go too crazy we've got a bright and early start again tomorrow with some great programming as early as 8 a.m. some of the roll based