 Perfect. Hi everybody, this is Lauren. With me are three of the greatest writers in America right now and we're going to talk about a couple of things but mainly they're amazing work for theater for young audiences which just to make it simple we'll call TYA from this point on. Lauren Gunnerson pronouns she her hers. So yeah I would love to let's just go around say who we are and I'll brag on you for a little bit and then we'll talk about theater for young audiences. Jacqueline would you start? I think we need to unmute. Yep, try not to cough in your ear. Jacqueline Goldfinger my pronouns are she they and you can just call me Jackie. Awesome thanks Jackie. Idris would you do it? Hi Idris Goodwin he him is. And then the wonderful Karen. And Karen Sacarias she hers hers. Awesome so the reason why I wanted to gather you partly because we've gotten a lot of questions about writing theater for young audiences how it works how you do it what are the ways to rethink this form what are all the the crazy ways that the misconceptions about what it is and what it's for but particularly because the three of you represent iconic voices in the American theater just master classes a form for the the normal main stage put it up at the arena and that organ Shakespeare festival and you know major theaters major stages major theaters major plays and you have this ability to write for theater for young audiences as well so I love that already that pops the kind of myth that theater for young audiences is a kind of less than a freshman thing to do a side thing instead of for me and the one of the reasons that I do it too is and I did it before I had kids is it's fundamental it's we are creating the first time that many kids go to the theater they see these plays and so creating lifelong lovers and supporters of theater so I want to talk about all those things how do you take all of the great work that you do and the award-winning careers that you have and turn it into theater for young audiences is it different is the process different for you how do you start thinking about these plays what are the differences between writing for young audiences or for families and for normal main stage audiences so we can talk about all of it but perhaps I'd love to start by going into some of the plays that you've written for theater for young audiences like a little bit about them and just kind of tell us some about that part of your your career Karen would you mind starting no it'd be a be a pleasure so I have loved writing for TYA I was the artistic the founder and artistic director of a theater company that still exists here in Washington DC called Young Playwrights Theater and what Young Playwrights Theater does is we teach kids how to write plays to find their voice and put things on and get professional actors to do the plays written by children and young adults what we came obvious is there were not a lot of plays that were relevant to kids to my students living in Washington DC that dealt with all of the aspects and all the confusing aspects of being a kid and that's what kind of brought me into TYA and there's such great theater companies that were taking chances on young writers back in the day by putting on original work and I think that's that's something that's been been an interesting chasm in TYA is original plays and musicals and then adaptations and I've done both and I love both but they both have a different place in in the canon per se and as someone who moved to this country when I was 10 years old that idea of being an outsider or feeling like a kid of feeling very strong emotions inside and trying to manage them is something that I can access very easily and I do believe children's theater should give kids the tools to navigate the world not just escape it so that was kind of the thinking that I put into my work for TYA. So awesome. Idris what about you? So in like 2004-ish I got a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to be a playwright in residence at a theater company and the theater that I chose to work with what is a theater called Free Street in Chicago. Free Street I believe is like one of the had some of them either the first or the most racially integrated cast in the city and they were in and they were a theater company a community based theater company in a park building on the west side of Chicago and have been around since the 60s and over the years had had become a theater company that worked with young people from at risk neighborhoods but you know kids around that area and the idea was to devise work to get those kids using theater techniques to tell their own story not necessarily getting those kids to do pre-scripted work. So my very first experience and I was pretty young I was a baby playwright myself at the time but what was cool is I got to work with teenagers mostly to create plays in a collaborative format and that's where I started I didn't even know that what I was doing was called EYA or children's series or whatever it just was like you know and so that was my first foray. The point at which I found out that what I was doing had a name was around the same time I got commissioned by Steppenwolf's Theater for Young Audiences to write a play with my friend Kevin Koval about graffiti writers in Chicago and this real event that happened where a group of graffiti writers threw up a mural a 50-foot mural in a snowstorm in March on the side of the modern wing of the artist to the Chicago and so we wrote that for and then at the same time I wrote a play about the young life of Muhammad Ali growing up in Louisville, Kentucky for stage one family theater where I was just formerly the artistic director and so those plays opened around the same time and we're running around the same time. It was so real quick I don't want to belay with this all day but I'd be remiss if I didn't mention because this goes to the thing about like when did when did I realize that there was what TYA was up to that point I'm like I'm just a guy right in place like what's the job what kind of suit do you want how many buttons you know the play about graffiti writers there were some critics who were like this is inappropriate essentially this is inappropriate for teenagers and I was like what do you mean this is inappropriate for teenagers Romeo and Juliet commit suicide at the end of that play and and I read that when I was in high school you know before before like Vanny hip hop and all that like y'all was y'all was propagating like young suicide but then on the flip side I went and saw when I saw my Muhammad Ali play being shown to like 500 kids and seeing how they reacted to it that's when it hit me that's when it hit me it was it was the combination of that's not appropriate for that audience because we presume to know what kids what's appropriate for them but also seeing the positive side to that that's when I was like oh this is different this is the the reaction and the rules here the context the way that the information is is received and presented is Jackie why don't you tell us about your forays into theater for your audience and kind of how you came to it. Sure I didn't know much about TYA I grew up in a part of the rural south where we didn't have you know drama programs and things but when I was in my early 20s I fell in love with the man who had become my husband and he had a young daughter and so I became a stepmom at like 23 like it was very exciting to a five-year-old and you know I started going to shows with her just because like I was a theater person and that's what I did and they were terrible like the writing was terrible the characters were like a little pervy like Karen was saying like I'm also a believer and I've learned this from reading all that Karen's work too like these should teach you how to cope with the world and a lot of the plays we saw taught really bad coping skills and really unhealthy habits um so I was not happy so I stopped taking her to the theater for a long time and we built a puppet theater in our apartment where we were living at the time and we made our own puppet theater and we had a great time um to that end today she is a very popular graphic designer who I'm like all of her graphic designs look a little like puppetry so I take a little bit of credit for that um but what happened was I uh was also I started out as a dramaturg um if you don't know what that is you can check out the Drump dramaturgy podcast uh which just covered in an episode of what a dramaturg is um but uh I was a dramaturg and I was working at North Coast Rep in uh Southern California and they needed a Christmas carol that was family friendly and that fit the members of their company and I couldn't find one and so the artistic director's like well you write a little on the side and I I was it wasn't great but I was writing some and he's like why don't you do an adaptation for us so it went really well I had the opportunity to I read a slew of TYA plays and figured out like so saying there tends to be a narrow boundary unfortunately at some theaters about what is or is appropriate for kids and I would agree that I would argue that we could widen those boundaries significantly because kids are really smart and and a lot they're exposed to a lot of things especially on mine now when they're young and they need to learn how to cope with it when they're young um but I did so I started through adaptation and all but one of my TYA plays our adaptation it kind of took off people really liked that and I think one of the reasons they like my adaptation is because what I look for is I maintain the soul of the story I try and look for what was the author's intent and what is really the heart of the story but I I take my freedom to revise around it um for today's audience and today's families I just want to like we can open the space for a moment to talk about terrible TYA that maybe we have seen because I similarly took my kids through a few and was like what is happening and it's amazing how weirdly unprogressive it can be in terms of gender roles all the girls just want to talk about kissing the boy and it's just like what really come on so I I I might have drug my boys out of one once um oh I definitely have there was one where it was like she had to give her grandpa kiss in order to do something and I'm like no we're we're not saying that little girls have to kiss anyone that they don't want to like this is not my really bad coping mechanisms yeah a lot of more teaching and then because it's a throwaway I'm sorry sorry to cut you off but it's because for a long time it was considered throwaway it was like oh you just be kind of entertaining kids so hey what kind of animal costumes we got back there okay we got a monkey hat and a bit okay just go and like juggle and like you know what I mean it was it was throwaway it was just like kids will eat up anything um real quick I'd be remiss but I didn't just bring it up to as we're having this conversation and on this tip about you know I think the chasm of time between you know there was a there was a period in time where there were these people like the Moses Goldbergs the the Susan Zeders who were like these real pioneers in it and then there was sort of a time of where things kind of like chilled and then there's this sort of new newer push in generation um they recently put out a study the NEA did a study a pretty comprehensive study of theater for young audiences and it was the first one of its kind in like many decades and that just got published that just got released um which has a lot of you know this conversation that we're having right now so I just want to encourage you know the millions of people that are viewing this right now they're like yo see what I never knew that um that it's really don't I mean just drop it's actually a really cool read I assume everyone on here is also just as excited about data and statistics and infographics as I am so I throw that out there yeah and Ed Shockley who was a leader in the TYA movement back in the 70s and 80s doing really great on the Ed stuff just got the lifetime achievement award and from the Philly theater community so I think it's actually the work is starting to be acknowledged like with the TCG Survey and other programs oh yeah yeah yeah it's great and there's both a national community like with new vision new voices and a lot of other um development programs plus there's a global community of children's um and TYA work that I think a lot of people are not even aware with that they're theaters from theaters that do work for young people all over the world gather every couple of years to share um what they're doing so that's it's it's it's it's a little bit more of a phenomena and you're right it used to be a throwaway it used to be like oh here's the leftovers yeah um yeah and I think one one thing I want to bring up that's something that you talked about Karen is what is possible in theater for young audiences and really anything I mean we you're so right Jackie that kids especially now are getting a lot of messages a lot of crises that they need language and need to understand how to process these feelings and of course theater being the great tool for society building and and empathy and congregation that it is a lot it gives us that so you know when I when I was approached I most of the theater freeing audiences that I've done have been musicals um I've done one adaptation um and then two originals and all of them have science in them and so of course getting that like I mean can we can we talk about solar fusion you know for first graders and I'm like I don't know let's try and then write a song with the amazing Brian Laudermilk I mean yes those kids walk out of that sing theater singing about literally solar fission so you can do all things um and you can talk about death you can talk about politics you can talk about the real things that if they're not gonna learn how to talk if theater isn't a safe space for those things and what the hell is it for it's not entertainment you can go online and watch a paw patrol but like theater has a place that has to I think teach kids not only you know context but the the the content is like you're you're able to deal with this you are able to have an opinion about this I want to hear your opinion about it um so have y'all had in terms of the the stories that you're writing what are the kind of big ideas that you have explored in your theater for young audiences that kind of touches on that well uh there's there's a couple things that are going on in every single play and I know Jacqueline and I just have this too that when you're writing it you realize that there's different ages in the audience so this idea of of inclusivity that um that's also about age you know it's not just gender it's not just race but also age um that certain jokes are for the as a our gift for the parents and certain jokes are for for other people so I love that idea of weaving that in together but you know I have a play about um Albert Einstein having a really bad day um and finding out the theory of relativity that I wrote I mean I be remiss to not bring up Debbie Wicks Lapuma who's been my longtime collaborator and composer on all of that and then we did an adaptation of Oliver Twist said in Brazil with the street children and what was interesting in that was that um when it came to the murder of Nancy we stopped the play we stopped the play and the audience the Oliver the the character playing Oliver who was a little girl was like why why is this happening right now why does this have to happen and they were able to stop the story and not have her die and so that idea that that you can have a voice in literature of what what is this death teaching you and why does it have to happen why are we watching this abuse of this young woman um and it was it was electrifying to be in that theater and have kids be shouting no no no you know and we we we she didn't die right and Oliver twist we made as a society a choice that we didn't think that she should be sacrificed and so I think I think that type of thing can be you know life changing for a lot of kids and the idea of agency um is the most important one all of my plays and I think what all of us are talking about is is no matter what the subject is you're looking at it from the point of view of a young person so it's not just a play about a young person it's a play that sees like the world from a young person's perspective and I think that's what makes a difference than other pieces that's right yeah Susan's leader always says she says I don't write for young people I write about young people yeah I would go ahead I just I would agree it's really interesting I'm doing an adaptation of a wind in the door which is a follow-up to Madeline Gold's wrinkle in time so second book same characters new adventure and first stage adaptation and the reason it's the first stage adaptation of it I think is because of the fact that the ideas are so big they're huge they're about being able that no matter what your size is you can impact things so she has the characters they go to the universe and they create an impact and then they go literally inside Charles Wallace's mitochondria inside his body and help convince what one of the mitochondria to do something to make him healthier and so like it's it's entirely inside outside that you have more control of the world and you have agency um and I think that that is wonderful especially in a world where now kids do have so many options that they need to understand they can say no or yes or maybe or walk away in a way that I think that they may not have had to in the past and you know that makes me think about I mean what stopping the play does and what this impossible journey that you can put on the stage it makes it about theater and there is something even radical for today's kids of going this is into movie this is into tv show theater is different let me show you why because you can stop the show save the girl's life and pick it up and keep going like you can interact when my one of my characters is of course the dog turns out we were using the dog costume that Adrienne referenced earlier um and you know the dog asks you a question it needs you to help with this this this experiment and all the audience does the experiment together and then you go back like that's the thing that tells kids teaches in the theater is different and is a live here now you us this kind of thing instead of a rewind it while I go pee no I think I think that um that's actually something kind of innate in them and I think that's actually what they have to teach us as theater makers I think over the years as we get older and we get more um uh self um what's the word I'm looking for just just like more um self-aware and more um insecure is not the right word but we just we become very self-aware and so we don't just we that you know kids willingness to engage in and and engage in a very real like wow I am very interested in this and this is my whole world right now and of course if you stop the play I'm with you of course if you talk to me I'm gonna talk to you like it's when we get older we grow out of that we grow into this sort of like like I'm not supposed to the performers here they'd be doing this even if we weren't here right and and that's that's what I dig is that like to me like that's um we so I wrote this play for this plays at home thing um and uh I wrote this play so my kid my son uh he does not like when we're at the dinner table and he's not involved in the conversation um and when and I don't apparently I can get long winded I don't know Karen why they hate notes like this but um so when when my time is up when I've spoken too long he will just be like okay that's enough of this guy like like who's ready to talk hearing pot with me okay I've got some you know um so I wrote this play I wrote this like thing we're like and I'm and I'm thinking about this more like I'm now like I'm now obsessed with with dinner like dinner conversation and like how you facilitate different conversation and uh so I wrote this play where like you know it's four people and they could be of any age and you're supposed to do it while you're eating and uh and and my son like and I and I and I'm like if if if he's engaged and he likes it then this play is going to work like if my seven-year-old is engaged with this and so now we got you know my mother-in-law who's in her sixties and my and my son who's seven engaged and then in yesterday and this is like one of those moments that feels really good if he was like hey let's do that play again it's like you know like hey man enough top come with that play though um so but that's what I mean like like that that's what I that's something that I wish that this that is something that I for my crusader that I want all of theaters who understand is ultimately like children are a part of our lives they're part of our families and you have to consider them I think it was it was uh Karen you said this where there's some there's levels to it right like ultimately we want a story that it's just a story and it can function and it's ageless and whatever like a good a story is a story is a story I mean the Pixar people know this you know what I mean like there's something and it grows and as they grow up it means different things like you know all that you know so um you know I I see this movement really as a movement as as a real intentional like arts movement that is about expectation and it is about um the role like why we do this and what it's for and the the role of story period like aside from these boxes and labels because really what we're saying is that like oh this is like educational and this is like you know this is for the youth you know like this is not this is not for like the oh you know the adults in their you know coats and their scarves and you know what I'm saying and the chandeliers and all of that like that is serious that's serious story but this and I'm like no it's I don't I don't I don't I don't think so like if you can't rock my seven-year-old like my seven-year-old doesn't my seven-year-old has the best taste my seven-year-old is not rocking with what you're doing then you need to throw away everything that you do with style because it's it's interesting because there is theater for young audiences that specifically like this is a family play it's 45 minutes to an hour there's probably some singing there's you know there's that design for a family something to do on a Saturday afternoon sure was interesting and kind of broke my brain about theater for young audiences is there's also because wait I did an ad one of my adaptations I don't do a ton of them but I just did one of Peter Pan for Shakespeare Theater Company who of course had never ever done a play that would be appropriate for anyone under eight like just don't it's Hamlet it's big plays it's Shaw it's like no they're not going to go absolutely they're not going to go to there but this they the new artistic director Simon Godwin was like well this is what we do at the national we have a big play that's like real ass play but one that you yes you can bring your five six seven all of you know and that kind of made me think like oh right there is a different kind of theater for young young audiences that really just means theater for all you can just go and you can bring it and you will be shocked that your six-year-old will not want to leave it in remission and not make too much noise because if it's gripping if it's great theater if they know what's going on and who to care about a young person is gonna gonna jam like my my little kiddos we're like in it they saw the Lion King on Broadway and I was like all right if we if we need to bail at an remission we'll just say that's the end of the play and it's fine they were like we're not leaving I'm sorry Simba has not completed his arc we need to see this so like they in some ways if you think that it's like not not good enough for kids maybe it's just not good like the kids are going to tell you straight up I mean is there good there's a reverse of that and that kids are not polite right yes perhaps we'll we'll listen to your play and be like oh and they will not often admit to boredom which I think is the the antithesis of theater and a kid will still hear them when they start scribbling around so I have found that my work for young people has actually really helped give it kind of mass muscularity to my work for adults and I've also come to like miss the reaction that my plays for young people get and want that for my adult audiences because I go to plays and there's no there's no feedback from the it's just at the end and I love it when people gasp in a play or do this or laugh or spontaneously clap like that is why you're part of a community and that's what happens and so I've started to try to push my adult work to be to go in that direction too that is it'd be so engaging that you have to gasp um in some way at the end of Peter Pan Captain Hook is going down you know spoiler this is what we did he's off you know at the lip of the ship and no no no and there is a little girl front row who is balling who was just like he's gonna die I mean going oh just histrionics and then you know her mom was so embarrassed and was like oh my god no and I was like no that's correct she's about to watch a person die yes and then afterwards the some one of the ushers the admins came up to her and was like are you okay and she was like that was amazing like she would just she wanted to it's like she's a big feeler so like feel big this is great what theater is for so I totally agree I I love what an audience can like go for it I don't know it's the reader the rediscovery of the journey that you don't have to sit back and judge that you can just be in the story and you can be with the characters like an adult audiences like theaters are trying to find their way back to that for adult audiences whether it's Dominique Marceau's program note in all of her new york shows or long morph long morph now has playwrights right we write like this is how you should respond to the show if you laugh that's great or you know whatever you want to say to the audience but like we're having to teach adult audiences how to be more like kid audiences because the kids that are audiences which is so interesting yeah yeah controversial question I mean isn't that like kind of sad though like you know me like the playwright wrote the play for christ sake like they gotta also tell you how to your grown ass how to act come on now what is going on what to do but it's true but but but listen ain't no theater right I mean like you know I mean this is the time this is the time like what if what if when it come back it looks more like a you know I did this panel with sports people and the whole panel was me just saying man y'all got it made over there in sports like y'all you know people can come people have a good time they want to go and somebody was like well you know when I go to sports you know I can I can have a I can have a beer for what it was all about but it was all about choice it was about it was about I can root for my team I can dress up like members of my team and they're watching theater it's it's all fear let's say like yes here okay it's theater in the round and they got costumes you know there's there's there's court you know there's a chorus you know Jordan for three you know I mean it's the same thing but they just think but they the the rules that they're the construction of it is so much better because it's engaging and it doesn't sacrifice the story of the drama and none of that and so my challenge to theater like with this point which is like if if Dominic Mariso has to tell you how to how to be real how to connect with art has to tell you how to do that that that is something we got to like look at and crack open um and really like where does that come from like what is this what is where does this come from this politeness you know what I'm saying like it's because it's taught that about yeah yeah okay and also not judging how other people react to it I think was what I took away from her experiences being like if somebody next to you is hooting and hollering and having a great time and like making their opinion known welcome thank you fine like you can you can experience it in in your own way but and also I will say that was my entire drunk dramaturgy episode which they're going to release sometime today with me comparing it to sports I know I don't seem like the sportiest kind of person maybe perhaps you've ever met but I was like here is why sport is great theater theater not great sport sport great theater I'm not a killer I will say this though I will say this though uh we are much more supportive though when our players choose to like take a knee and stuff like that I will give that that's true now did all of you write theater for young audiences before you had kids or what is your relationship to your own kids and your work I find that my kids um are really good audience members so I I find that I didn't start writing TYA before I had kids but I found that if I'll read something and like they're off wandering they're off they'll be like no we don't want to see that don't put that in the play mama fix it or I'm like here are three jokes and I give them three jokes and then they laugh at one I'm like that's the joke that goes in that scene um that they are they are terrific audience members and they're terrific sounding boards um I did two adaptations of Little Mermaid I did one for ages nine and up and I did one for ages under nine because I just learned from my kids that like that story strikes significantly different chords and those two separate age groups and in the younger age group it's way too scary so in the younger age group we have it one sister telling it to the other sister and then they acted out with their family so that they to calm them down during a stormy night safe yeah and it's safe and then for the other group for the older group it's more of the real story and so it's also been a good gauge of like okay where do I need to take out some of the scary stuff where does the scary stuff work where does and I end up writing two adaptations because we just developmentally they needed two different stories. Idris what about your kids you wrote before during after after obviously after so no I I didn't have any kids when I was doing the work at free street I still was a baby my dating self um my 20s were pretty much just like an extension of my teens essentially um and then when I wrote those other two shows that was like when like around when my first son was like a baby um and so what's really dope is that now he's seven and very sophisticated and now like my writing is so much better you know like especially my TYA my TYA stuff is like so much better because I because I'm around a kid I'm around a kid all the time and my wife is a writer too and so story like we are my mother-in-law the painter so it's just like constant creativity and imagination and story going on all the time and he says stuff that I'm like oh my god like that's a bar and a half and I'm stealing that and don't you dare you you live my house you eat my food so all the content you create is mine let's come at me later you're like Disney yeah like Loki yeah that's great a black wall Disney not Kanye West hey cut and friends Karen what about you were you ready my first kids were my students so I was in my 20s when I wrote the magical pinata which is about what I remember imagination stage like if we put birthday in it we'll have birthday parties come you know it was that and it's still being done to this day and then I've Alaska just did uh and the also the idea of of starting with idea of diversity and uh bringing in new stories to the stage that not everything had to be Alice in Wonderland done a certain way the idea of not only doing a gender fluid performances but also mixing it up but also original work because there weren't a lot of books that were about Latino culture or African American culture that were specific for kids and so we started to do original work and that was very very exciting as well now there's a lot more books and there's a lot more different plays and and you know the idea of adaptation is is I did an adaptation of Ella Enchanted which is for older uh older kids um but it was fascinating take somebody that's been a book and then it's been a movie that was very different from the book and try to find the world in between using six actors right so that's the other thing is the limitations that you get from theater that have to activate your imagination what you were saying Jackie about still honoring the source material the voice and the purpose like why does that source material exist um so then my kids started going and that was really fun and like yours they have definite opinions about what works and what doesn't work but they're all they're teenagers now so they're now objects towards the older stuff but I mean all of us have been traumatized or remember a moment of seeing something at the theater or at the movies that you were like I mean for me it was Bambi right uh right the death of and and I'm glad I saw it but it was this mind boggling amount of of of learning and so trying to do work that's age-appropriate pushing people towards honest emotions is something that we deal with a lot in TYA and so much mythology and you know things that we've inherited stories that feel very fundamental are terrifying I'd say Carol yes Christmas I mean Christmas Carol actually like look I know everybody does it but I remember going and I was like what the f is this this is horrifying this is a ghost story there's like dead kids what what what is this have to do with Christmas so you know fast forward later when let's find some new Christmas stories to tell but but even as a kid no oh I'm sorry please keep going no no no I'm I could rant all day about how perfect ghosts have changed like what what are the chains why did they chain down maybe but why did they get caught up in like something and were they on a construction site maybe like are these are these ghost chains the same as a ghost i.e can the chain go through you like a ghost goes through like what is the physics in this are they metaphor is the metaphor like I'm weighted I'm held to death like I don't think it's a little bit of a metaphor your chains till to earth you're not allowed to be released to heaven and be free or whatever you need to do but you're right I have never thought about why you'd be dragging around some heavy ugly chains because it's scary that just means that's just short answer he did no but see this though because he got he did it's true this is a question a kid would ask right so this is part of like when I was there I was asking those things I was like great question are we time traveling here are there different mentions what is what is the what is the what are the roles that's one of the things I think getting back to your idea of poor TYA TYA theater the thing that upsets me the most and I see the most often and poorly made TYA theater is they don't respect the rules of the world they set up the rules the world and they don't respect them and I think often they don't respect them because they think something gets too hard or scary but like you said we take kids to christmas carol we read them the bible you know like the talk about scary stories teen suicide Romeo and Juliet so I think that we have to not be afraid to really be true to the rules of the world when creating it and if something bad happens it's going to happen but then you have an opportunity the scary thing is an opportunity to teach a coping skill like Karen was saying right all those things that you think you have to take out of TYA with some exceptions for like developmental differences in different ages but everything you have to take think you have to take out is actually an opportunity and I wish people would see it that way it's the mr rogers of it yeah yeah there's things allowed in tv and movies that we're not allowed to do this in theater like harry potter is a baby that was almost murdered and his parents were murdered right and he's got a thing from it and he's living with terrible people who are abusing him and we all think because the world building is so great but if we had come to a theater with the original idea of harry potter and said guys I have this idea of an orphan baby whose parents have been murdered during a war that he has a scar and there's going to be all they they would say no they would say I'm not deal with that and I'm like why is idea that being alive and acted why do we have to be a lot there's so much more hand-holding in a sense when all of this literature and all these other movies get a you know little mermaid I mean death of the mom or I mean even Nemo the his mom gets eaten by somebody in the first two minutes right so one of the great one of the great stories yeah that's why I love it and I love invoking Pixar I'm pitching if someone's asked me to come into pitch to adapt something for them because if I can show them sometimes in the pitch that connection between oh we do this in Pixar they did it in this movie or Christmas Carol or whatever that they're familiar with then I can get it past them sometimes but we have to build that context for them because for some reason a lot of TYA producers cannot put it in that context themselves and that drives me banana crackers like that just drives me nice what do y'all um in the last like 15 minutes what about hopes for the future of TYA and like if we could make the great stuff I mean I would love to see more of that what the experiment I think that was very successful at Peter Pan what are like mainstage big-ass beautiful productions that everybody can go to and that are riveting and funny and accessible enough that you can take that six-year-old and you can take your 90-year-old and we can all kind of come out be like oh it's great you know that would be my my my dream what about what's what's on your mind I'm living in that space right now all the time this this moment that we find ourselves is exciting it's held to me because it's reshuffle it's force it's reshuffling everything like it's it's we've got to now kind of read we have an opportunity to do some some some really long-awaited infrastructural work um and we have an opportunity and so me myself um I I am trying to like write those solid pieces that I can't be understood by anybody that are not you know that are still specific but have just multiple points of entry and you know that that's kind of what the challenge that I'm putting on myself but I'm also having more fun the stuff is better in my opinion um yeah and yeah and yeah that's where I'm living. What about you Karen? To find about it like I guess I really do want larger regional theaters to kind of embrace the family show and embrace new new work and do exactly like I loved your Peter Panitch's review it was just beautiful but I also want to tip my hat and honor those theaters that have dedicated themselves to children's work from the beginning and that's what they've been doing and they offer classes and all of that so I almost like a bridge finding some kind of bridge or something that doesn't hold those theaters in less esteem than the regional theaters so I kind I want to work I want to work at both of them in different ways and I and I and what those roles are in some way I want people to go at night to the children's theater too um and have the regional theater going here because it really is been like child's play and imagination stage and you know first stage and all of these theaters like it just says we're working at that but then at the forefront of pushing new material out there so I I want both I want yes and um I want yes and uh in different ways and I also want parents because to be open to take up your child to play that you don't know the title of I find you're here uh and so many times theaters do want to do new work but if they don't know the book that you know if it's not associated with a caterpillar or something like that they feel like it doesn't sell and so I do my it's not that the theaters don't want to do it I just want to urge parents just like you need something you don't need the idea of taking risks with your children is something that I want from every audience member both you know so that's something that I would love to talk about more in a in a cultural way and I don't know how you do it and you know reviews if your theater doesn't review plays written by you know for young people then it keeps the escalating and it just has to be reviewed as an art form because you have real artists you have real artists writing and performing in them I mean you have yeah I know right this is part of the whole thing like yeah the tyranny of the title right the tyranny of the title and adaptation and the necessity of adaptation yes and I'm very lucky I live in Philadelphia and the art and theater here in Philly does full-scale full-length children shows that they usually have to commission because there aren't that many of them out there Laura and I am sure they will do your Peter Pan soon because not only is it wonderful but there aren't many out there so it's it's so wonderful that you wrote that but yeah Karen what you're saying what we what what we call it in Philly is the tyranny of the title and so my thought is what if right if we're making we decide to make original children's work but we work with an illustrator so we actually create a short children's book version that we email out and just an e-blast to all of the subscribers and to make it available freely and then go now you've seen the book version come see it on stage oh my god that's so smart and then we are generating the tyranny of the title like we're overcoming it by you know whatever you call it doing the same thing and creating like superstars out of the characters already so the kids can be like that's blah blah blah absolutely you send the costume pattern right like on your cape put this whatever you want but the even the ardent which is a brilliant theater overall and does gorgeous children shows um even they like if there shows that are not known titles they have trouble attracting audiences and it's a shame because they're gorgeous and lovely and make you think about new things and bring new stories to the stage so I think that there has to be a way that we can make parents comfortable enough with it on the front end and kids excited enough to come we just have to figure out what the heck that way is yeah Jackie what you're talking about uh you know sort of you know straddling the line between you know playwright but also um artistic director and this is this is something that I think a lot about too is that we've got to be as intentional and creative and put as much resources into the delivery system and the ring mastering like the ring mat like the circus like those there's a there's a science that I love the circus too because it's the perfect like the perfect formula which is like everybody comes out the parade comes out here's everybody you gonna see and then the ring masters they're to set you up to to make sure it it it matters and so sometimes we just get too much in the theater too much focused on the play and the actors and the costumes and it's like no you got it you got to build that bridge especially now right it's it's it's not that folk are unenlightened or just at a third it's just they just there's only so many hours in the day and they don't go what they know so make so to your point make sure they know what it is like like that's the job right like let them know what it is and there's a science and an art form to that too and I think that that's the responsibility um on theaters themselves um you know because you know I've heard the tyranny of the title for years now on the other side of it and I'm just like well then to your point like well how do we if it's about a book then let's just make it a book first yeah because we've got the illustrations don't cost that much we don't have to publish it and you already have the writer you can just write the little outline and and you know more extensive trailers you know more extensive interviews so that a kid I mean I would love to see one that was to a kid like if I had the playwright could be like hi I'm Lauren I wrote this play let me tell you a little bit about it because I really want you to come and then a kid would hear it be like oh my god she wants me to come that's great yeah and you know who did that was Mo Willems yeah the Kennedy Center and big shout out to the Kennedy Center they have done big shout out so much original new theater viewing audiences I know almost all of us or maybe all of us have all have worked there and they are just such a source of of great generation in this in this movie yes sorry yes no it's okay I just discovered the reaction button so this is what's going to happen all the time now I know but the Kennedy Center they did such a great they did such a great job they made Mo Willems did these like three or four minute videos you could watch with your kid before and after you came and it talked about his process and he talked all about how if you sit and write a story and you draw you are a writer and you are an illustrator and you can make your books at any age and it was incredibly empowering it gave a little bit I did insight into process it gave a lot of encouragement it gave there were vocabulary were there three vocabulary words each session so you were learning a new word but they were short and I have to tell you my kids responded brilliantly because it's so exciting to see the actual artist how often do kids actually get to see that they get to see the actor sometimes but like the person who actually made it so I think any of those things I think the Kennedy Center has created a lovely model with the Mo Willems residency of how we could possibly do that yeah definitely um as we're approaching the hour maybe just some last thoughts about this amazing field which I feel like we just started getting into awesome stuff about it but maybe also thinking that there's a lot of writers watching this and maybe taking this moment in time to work on that Theta Fringani's play or that pitch and maybe some like practical nitty-gritty advice I mean I will just offer one thing that um beware of the audience interaction because you can do it too much and then you can't get those little audiences back we had one in one of our musicals where they were a part of like a nuclear explosion or some sort of like science experiment thing and it just it took like five solid minutes to get their attention back so use it sparingly use it wisely and have like a big song number right after it so you can get everyone's attention okay practical practical advice for writing uh real quick I'll say that um uh just just to echo again um Susan Susan's leader like don't don't try to write for kids just write about kids and write about the same I mean you know human beings we got the same desires you know what I'm saying so just just and like and you know I always when I started writing plays I was like I'm just going to write the stuff that I would actually want to go see you know I'm saying so like stop stop presuming to know how kids are what they think you know I mean just write a good story yo like just write a good story keep it moving keep it moving you know I'm saying keep it active you know I'm saying be interesting you know I'm saying like just write good and authentic because kids can sniff out if you're not being real just don't but I just implore you like do not write in that like hey Keith you want to go on a magical like just put a pillow over the face of that voice yeah Jackie do you have some some practical writing for kids advice yeah I would yes and all of that it's great um also think about a lot of times people think that because of the tyranny of the title or because an artistic director or wants a specific type of character that they have to write a specific type of play no remember the kids are going to be happy to see the whatever to see the princess to see the mermaid you can tell whatever story you want whatever story you want so either we're putting some of those iconic somewhat say overdone characters you don't have to tell the same stories that have always been told those characters you can say something new you can re-envision them in a way that the kids are excited to see their favorite mermaid on stage but also there's a whole new journey or part of the story they've never heard it's never been told so just give yourself permission to be free I have two pieces of advice and it's the same one I use for my adult plays why this play now why are you telling this story now because the same thing applies to young people as it does to adults and that's that sense and what are the three choices that your main characters is making can you name three of them right away because if you can't then you might have some protagonist issues and the last one is if you're actually writing a play that is about young people and for young people are there young people in your in that I don't mean young but is it are there young characters in your play this is sometimes the issue I have with weirdly with Shrek sometimes because I'm like oh there there are no there's not one child interesting in that that's all adult issues that we're playing and it's very entertaining but sometimes I look at Shrek and I'm like oh this is adult problems made out of the cartoon version for kids because they fart and belch etc but but I've had that issue and that's kind of controversial feeling but I'm like oh so weird to go to you know because Neem was a child right there's so smart so that was the issue with that play when I was explaining to them I was like why are my kids not getting into this and it's because it's about like a love and marriage and this and I mean you know the princess I'm ugly what is beautiful yeah yeah and then there's there's themes in it that are good but I I haven't I don't think I don't think Shrek is is you know I think it's an adult play discussed you know whatever it is it's it's not it's entertaining but even the donkey like gets with the dragon and I was like maybe the donkey's the kid no the donkey's not the kid he's like having babies with a dragon that's my controversial statement I love it I love it you heard it in front of Zachary it's hate Shrek but I keep looking at it I'm like why does this not feel authentic to me that is yeah that's a great point I'm not learning a point of view it's for the parents yeah that movie's for the parent that's for the parent that's totally for the parents oh yeah um yeah that's funny yeah up because you made me think immediately I move you up uh but there's that there's that very adorable boy boy scout in that right and there's a dog and there's a dog and it starts and up the the at the end as a character we see him first as a kid yeah yeah and like the most beautifully sad 10 minutes ever so beautiful on that note being beautiful I'm sad no thank you so much for this amazing conversation it was more than I that I even imagined um you're all such incredible geniuses um both in theater for young audiences and in main stage theater and it's just such a gift to be alive at the same time as your amazing work thank you for what you do and um yeah this is great I'll um to everybody watching I'll go in and look at some of the comments and maybe I can bug some of our amazing guests to do answer some of their specific questions you have for them um thank you yeah all right thank you so much Lauren thank you y'all soon maybe my interest bye Karen bye everyone