 Welcome to Dear to Dream. This is Debbie Dashinger, pleasure to be with you today. Today's show features Sheldon Epes, one of the most successful and universally respected leaders in American theater. Sheldon radically changed theater through his leadership, including his insistence on making diversity a priority both on stage and off. I'm very much looking forward to that conversation. This show, Dear to Dream, has been nominated for two People's Choice podcast awards for a Webby Award. We are currently listed in Welp Magazine as one of the top 20 best podcasts to listen to. Listed in Apple Podcasts as a top self-improvement show and recently won the Coalition for Visionary Resources for the Best Podcast and Radio Show. I thank all of you for joining us and staying on this journey. This show is sponsored by Dr. Dane Heer and Access Consciousness. They do beautiful energy work out into the world. If you'd like to become a facilitator or take one of their classes, go to drdaneheer.com or accessconsciousness.com. I'm Debbie Dashinger and I am a media visibility expert. I am a book writing coach and I help you get from the idea of your book to a finished book and published. I also have a company that takes your book to a guaranteed international bestselling status and I do all the heavy lifting. And finally, I show you how to be interviewed on radio and podcasts and get massive results. I've got a gift for you. So if you're ready to become visible and learn some of these aspects, writing books, getting booked on podcasts as a guest, go to debbiedashinger.com. And get your templates and videos and learn how to. It's D-E-B-B-I-D-A-C-H-I-N-G-E-R dot com slash gift. My guest today is Sheldon Eaps, who is one of the most all time influential African American theater leaders, as well as a prolific director of television. He's directed on Broadway, the West End, and is the director of the upcoming BET Plus movie, Christmas Party Crashers. He received the NAACP Community Service Award and the prestigious James Irvine Foundation Leadership Award for his many accomplishments. His new book, A Memoir, is titled My Own Directions, A Black Man's Journey in the American Theater. Mr. Eaps is a longtime member of the executive board of the Society of Directors and Choreographers and served as chair of the SDC Foundation Board of Trustees. He's a two-time recipient of the Theater Communications Group, Pew Charitable Trust National Theater Arts Residency Grant, and currently, he is honored to serve as senior artistic advisor at Ford's Theater in Washington, D.C. And with that, I welcome the amazing Sheldon Eaps to Dear to Dream. It is so great to have you here today. Welcome. Good to be here. Thank you. Thank you for the nice welcome and the great introduction. Yes, it's my pleasure. You know, I majored in theater at USC. No. And I'm sorry we didn't cross paths because that was a momentous for me. But I did major in theater and that was my life, my livelihood for a very long time. And of course, I know who you are. Well, great. We have common ground and that's wonderful. We absolutely do. And I know you're busy. I want to just start by asking, do you have a website? Is there a Sheldon Eaps website out there? You know, I'm so not great at all of those social media things. I probably should spend an hour with you talking about that personally. I am on Instagram under my name Sheldon Eaps. So people can go there. That's fine. But no website. Lots of stuff on Google that people want to know more than they find out today. Okay. And then to that end and to further correct myself and anybody who's interested in going to Instagram, it is Sheldon, which is easy enough and E-P-P-S. So. Yeah. Beautiful. And you know, that is a name I grew up with. I'm a very common name. I'm from New York. I know you're from Teaneck, New Jersey. Yes. And nobody names their children Sheldon anymore. It's a great name. Well, I'll tell you something funny. It's a name that's usually associated with men of the Jewish faith. A lot of people when they just speak to me on the telephone or just see my name, think I'm Jewish. So when I show up face to face, they sort of look past me. That's hilarious. They think you're a Muslim. My mother's got a sign or a store or something. So it's not a family name. It's just a name that she saw somewhere and she liked very much. So I think it's a great name. It is a great name. Yeah. Greatly underused, but I'm glad you have it. And you have directed many major, major productions on and off Broadway, London, theaters across America, and you've had a very active television career. And now, as we said, your artistic director at Ford's Theatre in Washington. So with all of this, how is it for you now, this phase of your life, this beautiful phase of your life, compared to the trajectory getting here? I would say that it's been great to have in my in my dotage and my old age here, just a terrific last year, working on some some great theater projects, continuing to work on television. And then having the time to write and edit and then get get this book published, you know, which really tells the story of my life and all the things that led me to being artistic director at Pasadena Playhouse in my 20 years at that theater. And to have all of that in the in the space of the year has really been pretty, pretty phenomenal and kind of overwhelming. It didn't really hit me until towards the end of the year. You know, when you get to New Year's Eve and you start to think about, okay, what did I do this year? When I realized all the things that had been accomplished, I was pretty impressed with myself, I guess. Pretty amazing. Did you ever feel like somebody was helping you from the other side that you had angels that the universe in general was for you? Yeah, actually, I do feel that I wouldn't say that my my life has been a bit of roses or that it's all been easy. There's been challenges. There's been obstacles. There's been things to overcome. But I have really been blessed and fortunate and had the rare opportunity to do almost all of the things, maybe all of the things that I ever dreamed of doing. So I don't think you accomplished that by yourself. You need some some help from the universe or the spirits or, you know, spiritual fathers and mothers and all of that. Yes. What are the qualities, Sheldon, that you think makes a good theater director? Number one is patience, not to rush the process, not to try to produce results. I think you have to be a very, very good listener. One of the things that I think I've learned is that listening in the rehearsal process is as important as talking. You have to be a bit of a psychologist, a bit of a therapist. Actors like people are all different. There are certain things that help some people and other things that help other people. So as in any good relationship, you really have to be sensitive to who the person is and what their needs are and what is helpful to them and work from there. And then good taste, I think. You've got to have good taste. And you have to want to be a storyteller also. You know, you have to love storytelling. Yes, absolutely. What did you mean more specifically by good taste? I often think that you see productions, you see movies or stage shows or whatever where everything is just thrown in together. It's every idea that everybody has. And it's a little like the great fashion critic Deanna Vreeland said about dressing, or maybe it was Coco Chanel, I'm not sure. But one of them said, you know, when you get, when women get dressed in the morning, they should put on every idea they have, and then they should take two or three things away, and then they'll be perfect. So you have to have the taste to know that just because just because an idea is there, you shouldn't try to use every idea in every production. You need the taste to say this is appropriate for this production and the style of this show and for this story, but not for every show and not not every story. Some things need other simplicity, some things need more complications. Amazing. So there's a lot of discernment in there. Yeah, yeah, I guess that's that would be another another way of saying good taste is discernment, you know, selectivity, maybe. And your life, as you said, in the entertainment business, there were highs, there were lows. Can you talk about some of that, some of the low times that you experienced and how you got through them? Yeah, again, I don't think it's distinct to me as an artist. I think anybody's life as an artist in America is a roller coaster ride, you're never going to be working all the time. It's not a clear trajectory from beginning to to heights, you know, it's ups and downs, peaks and valleys all the time. But I think there's more challenges that have been involved that are involved for artists of color, because on on top of the normal challenges of a life in the arts. You also have those restrictions that are placed on you not by yourself, but by our society. You know, that says, you can do this, you can't do this, this is available to you, this is not available to you. You can be a follower, but not a leader, all of those things. So we're talking about dreaming, daring to dream. I still believe that you should dare to dream, absolutely. But you know, there are forces out there that want to inhibit those dreams and tell you not to have those dreams or kill those dreams. So, you know, I've certainly experienced that in my life and had times when I don't think my dreams were ever diminished, but they've been challenged. I'll put it that way. Was it mostly early on in your career that you experienced that or has it been pocketed throughout? I would say throughout, I would say throughout, certainly early on, early on, you know, you put into as a as a black theater artist, you're put into what I call the black box. And you're told, OK, here's the list of 25 plays that you can direct. Don't think about directing anything else. You know, and usually they're they're placed by black writers, which is great. And certainly I admire many black playwrights. But my admiration for black playwrights doesn't mean that that's all I want to do. You know, I also want to do Shakespeare. I want to do Noel Coward. I want to do Tom Stoppard. You know, I want to have the freedom and the artistic range that any white director would have any director who is not a person of color. So certainly I had that challenge early on in my career and had to make it clear to people in all kinds of ways that I wanted to go beyond the black box. But later as the leader of a major American theater, there were people who felt I had no right to the job. I shouldn't be there. How did I get the job? You know, was this an accident? How long is it going to be before you fail in the job? And that was that was certainly true at the beginning of my time at Pasadena Playhouse. But I can't say that those feelings from some, not from everybody, but from some didn't follow me all the way through my 20 years as the artistic leader of the theater. So yeah. And then, you know, even after that, I think that there are opportunities that come to. That come to white folks that don't come to people of color unless you really fight for them. Is there anything to date that you have not yet done that you really would love to sink your teeth into you would love to be at the helm of and direct. You know, it's a great question. I actually, after all the theater I've done and after all of the episodic television that I've done, I've never done a movie. I've never done a full length movie. And I did get to do a very sweet, charming holiday film that you mentioned Christmas Party Crashers. That was on BET. And it was a great experience, a lot of fun. But that that that left me with a bit of a hunger to do a real feature film. You know, a real big movie. And there's there's one that may happen. I have a script now that may occur. Okay, great. Well, this is your year. I see that for you. Thank you. So once again, your book, My Own Directions, a black man's journey in the American theater, and you were talking about the some of the challenges you experienced and the black box. Very interesting term. I hadn't heard that before, but I completely understand what you're saying. And so that that was some of your personal experiences in a more global sense. What have you seen. And has it gotten any better? Are there still a lot of areas that where there is a black box, whether it's TV film or theater that could use improvement. Well, let me first talk about the fact that things have definitely improved. Let me say that there is a lot to celebrate. There was a time early on in my tenure as leader of artistic playhouse when I was one of the only and for certain years, the only black person who was the leader of a major theater. That's not true anymore. There are many, many men and women of color who are artistic leaders, executive leaders. We're seeing many more faces of color on screen in movies and television and behind the scenes as directors and writers and all of that. So there's no doubt that that things have gotten considerably better. But we don't want better to mean that everything is perfect. You don't want better to mean that there are still challenges there. And we don't want better to mean that there's nothing more to be accomplished because it's a constant constant battle, I think. And even with those, you know, since 2020, the Black Lives Matter movement, we've seen a lot of hiring of people in executive positions. My fear is that it's a moment and not a movement, that it was a knee jerk reaction. I hope that's not true. I hope I'm wrong about that. But I do have sort of this nagging fear in the back of my head that, oh, maybe we'll do this for a while. And then we can say we did it and then we can move on. So I think we've got to be on our guard against that as well. Absolutely. And so what I hear you saying is, yes, things have indeed gotten better, but better is not done. Yeah, right, right. And you can't judge, you can't judge success by things being better. You know, if something was really, really bad, and it's better, it still could be not as bad, but bad, you know, and certainly doesn't mean that things have been healed. That's the other thing, you know, racism is an illness. And what do you do when you have an illness? You take medicine. You don't take medicine for as long as you want to take it. You take it until the illness goes away. And that illness has still, as demonstrated right now by so many things we hear in the news, the illness of racism has not gone away in our country. Yes, agreed 100% and it's sickening. Yeah. I would love to give you this platform to speak very freely. What specifically do you see as infractions and or what specifically Sheldon do you want to be different? Where do you want to see the difference made? You know what, I would like to not have to talk about this. That really would be the ultimate goal and the ultimate measure of our success. When the doors were all open, when there were no impediments, so that we didn't have to, so that diversity was a fact and not an effort. So that we weren't fighting for these same things that we've been fighting for so long, they would just be the reality of our existence. And yes, it's gratifying to have been one of the first, one of the only, one of the few in the event anymore. If there were so many people of color being successful and in leadership positions that it wasn't an event for somebody to be the first. You know, when there were no more first would be a very nice thing. You know, at the Super Bowl, there was such a big deal about, you know, for the first time, there's two black quarterbacks and you go, oh my God. Number one, is that true? But should we, should we be well beyond that by now? You know, so that's, if I'm really being a dreamer, that's what I dream of. Beautiful. You know, when we're not even having to, we don't need to have these discussions anymore, but right now we do need to have. Yeah, we're shining a light on something really important. And I know that two decades at Pasadena Playhouse, you as a leader, it was a lot of strategy to radically change its diversity. Can you talk about what your strategy was and maybe some ways that you employed that? Yeah, I can. When I, I'll tell you a story first. When I arrived at Pasadena Playhouse, it was acknowledged that I was the first black person to lead a major American theater on the West Coast, really. And there was a lot of applause for that, a lot of celebration, which was great. But then there was a very sort of left wing newspaper that did an article saying that it was a, it was a fluke or a mistake or somebody was just asleep at the wheel to let this black guy come in and be head of Pasadena Playhouse, which is in a conservative community and was really quite blatantly a white theater company, no doubt about it. And accompanying that article was a little line drawing of me being boiled in a pot of oil with rich Pasadena socialites dancing around the cauldron. And the reaction you're having right now is the same reaction that a lot of people have. So that, that's where I started. That was within my first couple of weeks at Pasadena Playhouse. And the article was, the article was predicting, you know, Pasadena is never going to stand for this. They're going to run him out of town on a rail or something. So, you know, that's where I started. I also started by sitting in Pasadena Playhouse is a beautiful courtyard outside the theater, which is kind of like the lobby because of the great Southern California weather. And I used to sit out there and so frequently I would be the only person under 60 and the only person of any color going into the theater, both of which were dangerous things, you know, it meant that the audience would be leaving us shortly if we didn't develop younger audiences. And in no way did that reflect the diversity of Pasadena, certainly not the diversity of the city of LA and not the diversity of our country. So I did determine that had to change. The first way to go about it was through the programming through the selection of material to make sure that there were other than white people on the stage and involved in the work. But then, you know, you also have to make sure that you get the message out there to new audiences that you're doing the play and that there really is a genuine invitation to them to come and share the experience. If you've been locked out of a place, a home, a restaurant, a bar, whatever it is, a theater, if you've been locked out for years or decades, somebody's got to make it very clear to you that things have changed. And that's a marketing effort. That's not really related to the play itself or to the craft or the artistry. That's marketing. And it's also, you know, going out to the community, not waiting for the community to come to you, but going out to the community and saying, listen, I am here now, which is a big step. And I really want you to come into my home. I really want you to come and be a part of what I'm doing. What was the greatest reference point? What was the biggest marker of all of what you did around that that was really well received and created the most diversity and maybe change? I think it was a particular production I did. I threw a lot of good luck and good fortune. I was able to attract Lawrence Fishburne and Angela Bassett to star in a production of Fences that I did, the great August Wilson play. And that great combination of a wonderful play with not just well known but spectacularly good actors in a play where everything really came together completely drew in a new audience. An audience of passenger playhouse had not seen maybe in decades full houses. I think we sold out, you know, within a week of announcing who was in it. And that celebration of everything coming together artistically as well as in terms of diversity was a great moment for me personally, but also for the theater and really put us in the map in a great way. Well, it's an amazing play. Amazing playwright and you got amazing actors. What attracted them? Was it you, Sheldon Epps, or was it me? I think it was the play first and foremost, you know, August Wilson so greatly admired and deservedly so. It was that particular play, which many people think is his best play. The fact that that play had such a great role for Lawrence Fishburne and such a great role for Angela Bassett, then attracted other well known actors to fill out the company. So it was the play. And I do believe that that people understood what I was trying to accomplish at the theater. You know, all of those people were aware of passenger playhouse but had probably they certainly never worked there. They may not even have been there in many years, but they understood that I was trying to break down the walls of the theater, so to speak, and give this theater to each and every community in Los Angeles, not just the community that had been supporting it over the last 20 years. So they were supporting my mission, you know? They were supporting the play. And it's a whole mission, isn't it? Yeah, exactly. It's a mission that they believed in and that they wanted to help them. Amazing. Beautiful. I actually saw the playbill for that. Oh, did you? Yeah. Yeah. I think it's up. Yeah. No, I sometimes have to, there are a couple of situations like that. Angela and Lawrence together is one of them, but I did another play with Felicia Rashad and Diane Carroll in the same play. Wow. I sometimes have to look at pictures of whatever and say, wow, that really did happen. Happen. Those people were really in that play together. That's kind of amazing. That's beautiful. Yeah, I know the playbill is sort of orange with their faces on it. Yes, yes, you're absolutely right. Yes, beautiful picture of that. Yeah. Today you are in Washington. And yeah, can you talk about what you're doing there? Are you allowed to talk about what you're doing there? Yes, I can. I can. I'm working on a new musical called Shout Sister Shout, which opens the middle of next month, middle of March. And it's about Rosetta Tharp. Do you know who Rosetta Tharp is? I do not. Okay. Well, that's one of the reasons we're doing the show because everybody should know who Rosetta Tharp is. Rosetta Tharp was a great gospel singer. Beautiful. She was also a great, great guitar player. That combination was very unusual for a woman and very unusual for a black woman. And over the course of her career, she was the one who sort of combined gospel music with R&B and was a precursor to great singers like Aretha Franklin and Brooke Benton and, you know, so many others. Sam Cooke, you know, so many others who did the same thing. But Rosetta was the pioneer of that, of sort of combining the sound of gospel with the sound of popular music. And along with that was playing, not only singing these great songs, but was playing these great guitar licks that everybody started to steal from her. You know, and everybody from VB King to the Rolling Stones gives a lot of credit to Rosetta Tharp as a guitar player as well as as a singer. So it's her life story told through her great, great music and wonderful songs that she made so famous. Are you casting now or have you completed casting? No, we're in rehearsal now. We're in the middle of the rehearsal period and have about another week or so of rehearsal in the rehearsal room and then we'll move into the theater shortly. And it's at Ford's Theatre in Washington. Great. So if you want to fly there or if you live there, that sounds like the show to go see. That sounds amazing. How was the casting because, okay, you know, singer, you could do that, you could find somebody amazing. But the guitar playing at the level you're talking about and a singer, how was that going through the casting process? It was, it was quite, quite a hunt. Quite a hunt because, you know, she's, I would say that the character is on for probably 75% of the show offstage very little. She's either acting, singing or playing the guitar or all three at the same time. So you can imagine it's a hugely demanding role and takes skill in all of those areas equally. You know, it's not that she, she can be a good guitar player and then kind of slough through the singing and the acting. You know, it's all got to be of a certain level. Exciting stuff. Yeah. Who has been your favorite actor or actress? What kind of story can you tell about something really momentous that you got to experience? Well, we talked about Lawrence and Angela. That was a great experience. Felicia Rashad was, was wonderful to work with. A real consummate pro, you know, she's, she just knows her instrument and knows it well. Diane Carroll was, was great to work with. But I'll tell you the funny thing about Diane Carroll is it actually was a little hard to rehearse with her because she was so charming and so entertaining. And she had so many great stories to tell and was very open about telling them, whether they were about her career or her love life or, you know, people she knew. So I, it was actually, I had to pinch myself sometimes and remind myself that I was the director because I was such a good audience for her. She was great to work with. Della Reese was another person who was wonderful to work with. And I worked with her a couple of times and she taught me a lot. She actually taught me a lot about music and theater, but, but a great deal about life. She was a great believer. You'll appreciate this in creative visualization of seeing very, very, very clearly what it is you want to happen and having a real clear picture of it. And if you had a clear enough picture of it, you would get it. She, she told me years before it happened that she wanted to be the star or the secondary star of a major television program on one of the big networks. And this was at a time when she wasn't working a lot, but she said, Sheldon, this is what's going to happen. We're going to be the star of a major television series on one of the big networks. And I said, Oh, okay, Della. Well, two years later, she was the star of Touch By An Angel, which was one of the highest rated television programs on CBS. I watched it. So, yeah, we all did. So that was a great lesson. And, you know, really putting out into the universe exactly what it is you want, dare to dream. Exactly. Incredible, incredible that she would impart that. I can imagine her having that kind of spirit. I mean, she came across even in her acting and her performances like that, really incredibly full of life. Yes, she was, she was. And then, of course, so gifted as a singer and musician, as an actress. So, you know, I'm always grateful to her for all of the things she taught me in many, many ways. You yourself performed. Is that correct? You originally were. A long time ago. Yes, I trained as an actor originally and went to Carnegie Mellon University, which was a four year training program. So, my degree was in acting and then I acted for about about five or six years after I graduated. And then I shifted lanes into directing. What caused the shift? It was really somebody else's suggestion. A very talented director named Norman Renee went to college with went to school with and then worked with five or six years after we graduated. And he said, you know, when I direct you and we disagree about something, I usually think that you are right. I may not admit it at the time, but I usually think that you're right. I come back round to your point of view two or three days later and claim that I thought of it, which was incredibly generous of him to say. And he said, you know, I think that means you you think like a director, so you should you should try directing. And I did and loved it and then started working very, very quickly as a director and didn't have to audition anymore, but you'll appreciate. I was happy not to have to do that, not to have to be on that audition trail. So, it just seemed like the natural shift of lanes, as I said, to, to the career that I was meant to be in. I've always really admired directors because in my estimation when I was in the acting world. To me, the director had a vision that saw everything was the full matrix all the moving pieces included what it looked like sounded like where people moved, what intentions were connections relationships and the whole arc of the story. And I do not feel I have that skill at all I was, you know, actor. No, I think you're right. I think what you're trying to do when you do a production, certainly in the theater, but also film, television, you're trying to create a world, you know, probably a world that's different than most of us are in. You know, if it's a play like Hamlet or the Cruise of the Bull or Dream Girls, you're creating a world that is different than the world that the audience lives in at the moment. And all of those elements that you talked about that certainly the performance of the actors, but also the design work set design costume design sound design, all of those things go into creating the world. Yeah, it's impressive. Really is. And with your decades of success in entertainment. What have you learned as sage wisdom about the craft of theater or any entertainment modality overall. Well, I think a few things. Patience again. The great, great actor Andre De Shields once said that the quickest way to get where you want to be is to go slowly, which I think is a great way to think about things. Perfection is probably not an ideal goal. Process is a much better goal than perfection. I think sometimes by trying to force things to be perfect rather than allowing them to have a process. You can get yourself in trouble. And then leave yourself open to discovery. I think when I was a younger director I used to enter the room thinking, I have to have it all figured out I have to know all the answers I have to have my vision has to be exact of how I everything how I want everything to go. And I've learned that that's not true, you know, sometimes I think the less you know, entering the room and the more you learn through the process and with the people that you're doing the play with the better. I said once some people like to cut the suit and then make the actors wear it, whether it looks good on them or not. The better way is to get in the room with the actor find out who the actor is, and then cut the suit, knowing what color looks good on them, what fabric looks good on them what works well on their body. Well with their aura with who they are. So leave yourself open to discover things in the process. How interesting it sounds like a really organic experience working with you. And does that mean then that the first thing you start out with is a table read or how what is your process when you work with people. No that's exactly right. I do a table read and then I stay at the table probably longer than most other people do. You know, there's some people may not even do a table read but if they do a table read the next thing they do is they start blocking the play. I don't do that. I sit around the table, talk about the play, talk about people's lives, talk about where their lives intersect with the play, who they are, what they want, you know, what's the arc of the play, what's the rhythm of the play. And to the truth, I think if you do that and the actors have a clear idea of what they want to do and what they want in a play, then the blocking becomes much, much more easy and much more organic than my saying, okay, cross over here, move over there, move over there. Because it's coming from them. It's coming from what they have learned during that table, table work process. What makes you just nuts still about the theater? In a good way nuts like, and I'm sure I could fill in lots of that too, I grew up in New York, one of the things we did was always go into the city, New York City to see the theater. I mean this is a part of my heritage. So yeah, the things you love, but the things that is like, in general, gosh, they could really improve this. Huh, that's a good question. Well, the good thing is that theater, even after all of this time is still magical, you know, and you still have moments where everything comes together perfectly and, you know, it's just like being lifted into heaven because everything is so right. I guess sloppiness on stage, you know, because in New York in particular runs can be long, and you can see plays after people have been doing them for a year, two years, whatever. And you kind of know that the performance you're seeing probably has no relationship to what opened because people have gotten bored, they've gotten tired, they may even be misbehaving. So watching that drives me a little bit crazy. As to working in the theater, the thing that drives me nuts is there's never enough money. Budgets are always lower than they should be. Which on one side is great because you have to use your imagination, but now and then it would be nice to have all the money in the world to do something in the theater. Speaking of money, I know theater really took a hit during COVID. I mean that was so painful to watch. How are we doing now post-COVID? I think we're still recovering. I know that theaters I'm working in or when I talk to colleagues at theaters that box office sales are not nearly what they were. They are getting better, but it's still a tough road right now. A lot of people have just fallen out of the habit that you talked about where people used to get on the bus and go into New York City once a week, once a month. They just fell out of the habit of doing that. And also frankly, I think that ticket prices are a real issue. It's really inhibiting to buy a theater ticket now. And I don't know what can be done about that, but something's got to be done about that because I think it really is keeping people from going. Even those people who want to go have a hard time going because prices are so high. Yeah, I just wonder how much could be subsidized. And I wonder, do grants play, I would imagine that theaters can apply for grants from state or federal? Yes. Oh, yes. Yes. No, that pays a huge amount. We just got a little increase with the national endowment for the arts, tiny bit if you compare it to the national budget. But thank God that means that there's a little more money to spread around to arts organizations. But we're close to what they do in Europe. You know, in Europe where things are so hugely subsidized, you know, wouldn't it be great if we have those kind of subsidies in American theater? Absolutely, it would. It makes way more sense where arts are benevolent. Yes. And, you know, in this country, the military is where all the money goes. And that being said, that was reversed. What about arts in school right now? Do you ever play around in that area at all? Are you still going to universities and so forth? Yeah, I do. I'm not on a faculty anywhere, but I do guest lecture, master classes, things like that. But if you're talking about arts in public schools, that's another woeful area, because as budgets get cut, that tends to be the first things to go, you know. And in a way, you know, it used to be that there was a lot of money around to take kids in school to see things, you know, to go to see plays, to go to see ballet and music events. That's kind of all disappeared. And now it falls on the arts institutions to try to make student tickets available, which is good. And a lot of theaters and performing arts organizations do that. But that then becomes a drain on their budget. So, you know, it's tough. But I think it's essential that people are like you and me and they get in the habit of going to see things early in their life. Yeah. So we mentioned COVID and I want to relate this to your book, My Own Directions. Timing wise, was it the pandemic that caused you to write the memoir? What elements went into committing because I know, as a book writing coach, I know what it takes to write a book. So I know you did a big thing. You gave birth to a baby there. No, you're absolutely right. I first started thinking about it in 2017 when I stepped down from my position at Pasadena Playhouse. And actually it was other people who made me think about it. People kept saying, oh, you should write a book. You should tell your story. Why don't you write a book? So I started thinking about it and thought about it a lot and thought about how it might be put together and all of that. But I was also working, you know, I was also directing television and going around the country and directing at theaters. And then this little thing called the pandemic hit and we were all isolated at home. And both I told myself and my wife told me, okay, now is the time for you to sit down and write that book. You have absolutely no excuse in terms of schedule for not writing it. And she was right. And I made it my job during the pandemic over the many, many months of the pandemic to really force myself to write for a certain number of hours every day. Did you read chapters to her? No. Did the whole draft? I did. I did. She didn't read it until at least the second draft, which she gave me hell for it because I didn't let her read it. But I wanted to get closer to what was in my head. Once it was pretty close to what was in my head and what I wanted to achieve, she was the first one to read it. And what was your method for writing? Did you architecturally lay out the book and then know where you were headed? Did you just let it pour out of you? What was, how did this manifest? I went pretty much chronologically, though it starts with, it actually does start with my arriving at Pasadena Playhouse and the story I told you about the article and the terrible drawing. And the book begins with the question, how did I get here? How did this kid from Compton, this little black kid from Compton, how did he arrive at Pasadena Playhouse as the leader of the theater? How did that occur? You know, when those kind of opportunities did not come to so many others of any color, but certainly so many people of a color. How did that, how did it happen? And then I jumped back to birth, really, and all of the things, all of the steps. Living in California, moving to New Jersey, discovering Broadway theater, starting to do plays, going to college to study acting. Many of the things we've talked about today, all of those things that eventually led me to Pasadena Playhouse. Then I get back to where we started with, okay, I'm here. And then the rest of the book is about my 20 years as artistic director. Incredible. Today, looking at diversity, looking at leadership, looking at racial parity, on and offstage, how can it be healed? What ideas, suggestions, what wisdom do you know that a healing would occur? Well, the first thing is something I said before, let's not assume that it has been healed. Let's not assume that with all the progress that we've made, that there is no more progress to be made. Let's keep our eyes on the prize that I talked about before of it being so free flowing that we don't have to talk about it anymore. So awareness is the first thing. Conversations like we've had today, open, honest, depersonalized conversations that are about healing rather than blame, I think are really important. And then taking talk into action. We can talk about things for days and days. And that's useful. But unless we actually do things, unless we actually make things change, make things happen through action, it's always going to be talk and not forward movement. So those are the things I would suggest. And belief, belief that it can, belief that things can be different. That's a big one. Yeah, to drink that medicine, you talked about to cure the illness of racism. Yes, you have to believe that you can be healed. You know, they say that about medicine, medicine, medicine's only half the battle, whatever that prescription is, you could, you can take it, but you've also got to believe that it's going to do you some good. If I could give you whatever you wanted a wand and say you could do any production, and you could do it any way you want with anybody you want, you can fill in the particulars. If you have them, or just an idea of what that creation would look like. Sheldon, what would you do. Well, first of all, I will say I've been so lucky to have had the chance to do most of those dream projects, you know, directors are supposed to keep that wish list of plays or musicals that they want to do. And I've really gone through my wish list and done many of them. So at this point, I would say I would like to find a story about some unsung hero, some, some small person, small meaning, not famous, who did some remarkable thing, not necessarily the changed history but change the way we live together, change our relationship to each other, get a great playwright to write that story, and then find wonderful, wonderful, brilliant actors to tell that story to a willing and open audience would be a great thing to accomplish. Beautiful. So your book is on Amazon, and yes, yes. So folks want to get the book. It'll be in the show notes. And so you can go there. And what about on a daily basis, Sheldon, is there something you do is there a practice you have a ritual that keeps you grounded that keeps you centered functioning well. What do you do. I was just talking about this with somebody at rehearsal today. The most grounding thing that I do and it's not revolutionary. It's not brilliant or anything like that. It's quite simple. I, when I wake up in the morning, I try to give myself at least 10 to 15 minutes of quiet time before I look at any device. Before I run to my phone or my tablet or my computer, just 10 to 15 minutes of time just to be at peace and to express gratitude for the fact that I woke up and it is a new day and that everything is ahead of me. Lovely. This is a dream, Sheldon Epps. What are you next year to dream? What are your future dreams and visions and goals? Well, we've talked about some of them. I'm looking forward to an opportunity to to work more in film. I keep working more in theater and telling great stories, as I said, and I'd like to, this is a really honest thing for me to tell you, but I will tell you. I think there's something about artists that always pushes us to want to prove ourselves more, prove I can do the next thing or the next thing or the next thing. I'd like to relax a little bit more, Debbie, in a sense of achievement about what I've done, and I have been fortunate to do so much to to rely on that and do things, not because I'm trying to prove anything, but because I want to because I have a burning passion and desire to do them. Is there anything here at the end you'd like to say to the listeners and the viewers? Be blessed to be lucky enough to do what I have done, which is follow my own directions as my book is titled, but find your directions, find those dreams, those goals, those ambitions. All of those things that will bring you pleasure, bring you joy, bring you happiness, know what they are and go after them passionately, and know that anything and everything is available to you if you approach it with passion. Thank you so much for being on the show today. This has been a real treasure. Oh, thank you. It's been great to talk with you. Thank you. And today's show with this quote from Willem Dafoe, great theater is about challenging how we think and encouraging us to fantasize about a world we aspire to. Subscribe to this number one transformation conversation Dear to Dream with Debbie Daschinger, please like comment I read all of what you write and I appreciate it so much send it to somebody you know who will enjoy the show. This week on the show I'm featuring the amazing Anna Leverance from Germany speaking about the quantum way of being co creating the new earth and manifesting quantum miracles. Thank you so much for joining us today on Dear to Dream. And remember to go out there and be the change you heard about today on the show be the healing and the change, because you are that important.