 Welcome everybody back here at Segal Talks, at the Monteney Segal Theatre Center, at the Graduate Center CUNY, in New York City, in Manhattan, at the City University, and another day in New York, and it's summer, it's hot, it's almost tropical here, and we are still inside that catastrophe movie where the reality is stranger than fiction, and we are part of it, it's like an absurdist with game-age play or something, and we are still really, really in the middle of it, back in 60 or 1,000 infections yesterday, and the Center for Disease Control says most probably the number of people infected is 13 times higher, so the 3.7 million are confirmed, it means actually 40 million people, most probably in the United States, numbers are stunning and shocking, it's the most in the world, and we have to see where this all is leading, we have such a strange week and irresponsible government, there's a deep distrust, people are out of job over the time, over 40, 45 million applied for job endurance, they lost their jobs, New York City lost 1 million jobs, restaurants are closing, stores are closing, if you go down to the streets, it's empty, a friend who lives close to 8th Avenue and 36th Street says people who are released from prison are in all the hotels, the city bought the hotels, out from 32nd Street to 56th, people are outside, big groups, 40, 50 people on launches, people are not safe, I can go there and people who are protected from Corona or maybe already had it, nobody knows, they have to all be, you have a curfew, you have to be back at five or six, so it's quite a strange time you live in and then the scenes in Portland, there's, for good reason, several unrest on the streets and the Black Lives Matter movement galvanized it, but now the Homeland Security Forces, as someone said, it looks like fascism for TV, for live TV, they are moving in, it's unprecedented times, we go through, nobody knows what's going on and but what we do is to talk to people where we think who have always experienced life and the present, anticipate the future on the right side of social justice, on the right side of the complex fight for liberties and freedom and these are artists, in our case these are theater artists and we should listen to them much, much closer, what is on their mind, what they think about and because it is of significance and might help us, our lives, the city, the country, or to really think through what is it all about today, we have with us another significant writer who has been at the Seedle before and he is, how would one say, is part of the landscape of New York City Seedle, it's Carl Henko Grax and he is an American poet, playwright, novelist, essayist, actor, director, singer, and songwriter, he authored many books and we've got an Obie Walt for his play Talk, which is what he is also very much known for, he has four CDs recorded to his credit and he has been supported by the Doris Duk Foundation, Doris Duk Award, he got the Bessie Award and many many things on, he is a visiting artist at Yale University and importantly he's an associate director at the Mabu Mainz Theater and anybody who had the time and listened to Lee Brewer and Maude just last week knows what this great theater, this great work is about the great Ruth Maluchak who we lost already earlier, who also often was visiting us. So Carl, thank you, thank you, thank you for joining, it's an honor to have you with us and I apologize for my next speech, it's a lot of listening but then I can start talking but hope you will forgive me Carl, where are you now? And normally I say what time it is but I guess it's your summer clothes. Right, so I'm in New York City, so I'm in the same city I think that you are in, right? Because you are doing, yeah, I'm in New York City, I'm in Brooklyn, I live in Fort Greene. What street? Carl and Carlton, so I'm on Carlton Avenue, very strange, that was a coincidence, that wasn't planned. And so yeah, so I'm not far from the Brooklyn Academy of Music and you know that whole area. So how is it going for Maude? How are you experiencing this time? In many ways, I mean it's a very interesting time, it's very dystopian and in a strange way, the dystopian is not unfamiliar to me, you know, it's, in fact, it endeared, you know, something about dystopian times have always fascinated me, whether they were real or imagined, you know. My particular neighborhood is very charming, it's always charming, it's always sort of a hip, you know, neighborhood with lots of restaurants and bars and things like that, but because of this coronavirus, a lot of restaurants have been, you know, seating outside, so there are lots of people who are, you know, seating outside and there are lots of, and the bars you are not allowed to walk into, so the bars are serving from the doors or from windows, you know, right to the street, to the patrons on the street, so it feels very much like a cross between New Orleans and Paris right now, which is kind of nice, you know. It's almost like I wish that there are some things, I was thinking about this and I was thinking that there are some things that have happened during quarantine or at least during this sort of pandemic that sort of changed cultural and social norms that I wish will never go back to the way it used to be, you know, to the formal way that it used to be. I think I actually really love the idea that everybody, especially in the summer, is out on the street, you know, and that everybody's meeting and, you know, and we're all, you know, everybody's together and no one seems segregated, you know, in their own way. Of course, everyone is in masks and everyone is social distancing and that's important. But there's a... Yeah, it looks like we lost audio for a second. I can't not... Oh, my audio? Now you're back. Can you say again the last sentence? Oh, yeah, I was just going to say, I can't say that at this moment, I should say at this moment my neighborhood is quite charming. I mean, the weather's hot but beautiful and the people are out on the streets and, you know, congregating, you know. There's something about danger. There's something about danger that brings people together. I remember New York City during the 9-11 moment and everybody came out of their houses and it forced people to talk to each other and to meet each other and this is doing the same in a way even though we're socially distancing. It's forcing people to kind of come together. So there's something about these kinds of tragedies that affect all of our lives that force us to communicate and to have interaction with each other in ways in which we normally don't because especially in cities like New York City where it's a very crowded city, it's a very busy city and people tend to be, you know, in their own bubbles. They tend to be, you know, all sort of on their own paths and, you know, barely have time to say hello, you know, or to stop and to sit and to talk and right now there's a lot of sitting and stopping and talking and that's the world that I drive in. Yeah, so when were you, when it started, when it happened? I was here in New York City. I was here in Brooklyn. I was, you know, the period of quarantine when everyone had to remain in their homes was very different from what I'm explaining right now because, you know, it was around March and so it got darker early. The weather was still a little cold. The streets were vacant for the most part. You know, it was so quiet that it was eerily quiet, eerily quiet. And I just, and I just remained in the house for the most part, which, thank God, knock on wood has kept me pretty safe. Now, I then found myself forced to join the world or to go outside. And I don't mean just for the normal things that one goes outside for like shopping or things like that. But when the Black Lives, when the Black Lives Movement matter, when the Black Lives Matter movement, sorry, when the Black Lives Matter movement started, I was getting a lot of calls and I also felt compelled to join, you know, that protest and to be a part of it. And so I threw caution to the wind. I wore my mask and I went out and I marched with people. So I was there marching as well during the quarantine. And then in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn, there was the first mural that was painted in New York City, the Black Lives Matter mural that was painted here. I was asked to inaugurate it at the unveiling. And so I spoke at that and I went there and the press was there. So those have been my outdoor activities for the most part. What did you say? Well, one of the things I was saying was that letting people know, first I was explaining what I think Black Lives Matter means, because I think there's a lot of confusion around that. I think there's a lot of confusion or misunderstanding around like what the phrase itself means. There's this idea that if there's an idea that the phrase Black Lives Matter means no other lives matter. And that's not true. The phrase is basically saying, please pay attention to the fact that Black and Brown people have been disproportionately abused and suffered in a certain kind of brutality and sudden death at the hands of police force in this country, an authoritarian rule, in a way that other lives have not. And we need to pay attention to this. It's no different than saying save the whales. It doesn't mean that none of the fish matter. It means that the whales are endangered. So we're speaking about an endangered species of humanity. And if we can understand that, if we can understand save the whales, if we can understand save the snow leopards, if we can understand save a species of bird, if we can understand saving a species of plant, if we can understand saving a tree, then why can we not understand saving a species of humanity? And that's what the Black Lives Matter movement is really about. The other thing I spoke about very clearly was when they painted the mural was that I wanted the people in that community to treat that mural as if it were sacred ground, as if it were a totem to all the lives that have been lost and all the lives that may be threatened in the future to allow the painting not to be marred or ruined in any way, but to revere it, to revere it with a certain kind of honor, if you will, to honor it. And that became almost prophetic, which is very interesting right now because in New York City, in the last few days, we've been dealing with people destroying the Black Lives Matter murals, like the one outside of the Trump Plaza, the one and then they hit the one in Brooklyn as well, that I inaugurated. I think they've also thrown paints or destroyed the one in Harlem. From what I understand, these are pro-Trump supporters, make America great again, enthusiasts and whatever. So it really brings home the fact that we are in a divided country right now, and not only are we in a divided country in a divided moment, but we have someone at the helm of this country who is actually antagonizing and further advocating that divisiveness. And it sort of brings it all home to me in a very clear way that we need to recover the damage that has been done over the last four years by this administration, but certainly, even more importantly, the damage that has been done over the last 200 years since the founding of this country. And we need to deal with the damage that has been done to our psyche, to our social understanding of who we are, to our language and how we define each other, to how we perceive each other, to our realms of love and hatred and tolerance and intolerance and education. We really have been damaged in so many ways. And so there's so much work for America, and not just America, but for the world to do, psychically, intellectually, spiritually. So this moment is, I think, bringing that to everyone's minds. I would like to think that it's bringing it to everyone's minds, and that's what I've been focused on. Yeah, I know this is a stunning moment, and we are too close, I think, even to really understand and at least talk. We're trying to catch a little bit of that reality about this for everybody. The one day in April was over 800 dead people. New York City, luckily, has now five or six days without corona-related deaths, but in the corona neighborhood, funny enough, as by the name of Queens, up to 70 percent people ahead of it, people who are in the fringes a bit more of the city, the disenfranchised, the minorities. So it's an x-ray of the world we live in, actually, as you said, we all in bubbles. And then within that, within that, we're also living with the fact that even with the coronavirus, black and brown bodies or black people are disproportionately affected. There's a higher rate of people who are actually dying from the virus, and those people are black. And it's not because of melanin. It's not because they've got this complexion, but it's because of pre-existing, from what I think I understand, pre-existing conditions that really make the pandemic or make the virus life-threatening. And so everything from high blood pressure to diabetes and all of those things. And so that brings home, so it's like, in one way, we've got hundreds of thousands of people who are dying, but then we've got all these black people who are dying disproportionately from the virus. And then you've got all these people who are dying at the hands of police brutality. And then you've got the threat of your own health, your own safety, that one is concerned about, whether you're black or white or whatever one considers oneself. And trying to find peaceful ways to shelter at home and people who are finding that very difficult. And then of course, the complications that come with sheltering at home for some people. We've seen divorce rates go up. We've seen families really have to reckon with each other in ways that they had not before, because they're spending so much time with each other. There is no theater. There is no film. There are no outlets. There's no place to go to. So we're living in a very strange moment, but it's not a moment that is, it is a moment unlike any other moment that I've lived in. But I must say that it's not unlike other moments in history. There have been moments like this. There have been moments of quarantine. There have been moments of pandemic. There have been moments of upheaval. There have been moments of public safety being threatened. We've gone through it. We've read about it. We've learned it in school. And now we are actually in the throes of it. And so even in that way, it makes me understand that this moment is not new. This moment is not new. Pandemics are not new. There have been pandemics for centuries. And there have been people who, yeah, there have been plagues and black plagues, so-called, you know, iron, it would be called a black plague, right? But there have been black plagues and all kinds of, you know, viruses and things where people just love people dying left and right. In my lifetime, I've lived through, I guess, obviously the last huge. I mean, I know there was a Zara's pandemic prior to this, but somehow I don't know that I took that as seriously. But I would say the last pandemic that I took as seriously as this one was the AIDS pandemic, you know, and how it was affecting people and how it affected people's social lives, how it affected people's sex lives, how it affected people's sense of intimacy and culture. So having survived just a few, a fraction, a small fraction of pandemics in my life, and having survived just a few, a fraction of administrations that I find distasteful and also personally threatening to my life and to my way of life and to the arts and to the economy, I am aware that if I were 300 years old, none of this would seem incredibly new, that, you know, that I would be aware of the fact that the world has gone through these cycles again and again and again and again. And for some reason, still has not learned the lessons that it needs to learn. I mean, there is no lesson that we need to learn that's ever going to change the fact that pandemics will come and go. There's no lesson that we're going to learn that's going to, you know, I think, ever prevent pandemics, you know, from ever happening. But there are lessons about how to get through them that we can learn from the past. There are lessons that we need to learn about police brutality. There are lessons that we need to learn about culture. There are lessons that we need to learn about racism. There are lessons that we need to learn about sheltering. There are lessons that we need to learn about ourselves and about our families. So how to repair ourselves and check in with ourselves and be very clear that sometimes we're running too fast, doing too much, and not slowing down enough, that we're living in an epicurean kind of, we're living in an epicurean cultural existence that distracts us from the things that are more important. So I think that we, I think this is almost like the universe. It's almost like the universe is literally telling everybody to sit down, shelter, think, and meditate, and face yourself, look at yourself, deal with yourself, look at each other, and figure out who you are socially, politically, culturally, and of course physically. Yeah. How was it for you? Were you able to write or meditate or sing? How did you spend the days as an artist? How was it? Well, as an artist, I tend to be a homebody, you know, as a writer especially. So this is not that hard for me to be honest. I'm used to being in the house and to writing and so yes, I have been able to write and it's been wonderful. It's been terrific and I've been researching a lot and I've been going through pages and pages and pages of documents and things regarding other periods and time. I've also, like I said, other than my work with the Black Lives Matter movement, I've also been working with trying to figure out how to keep, you know, a theater company afloat and the commissions that we had going, Mabel Mind specifically, because we had some young artists that we had commissioned as part of something called the Sweet Space. And so when all of this changed, I found myself having to, not just alone, but with Mabel Minds, I had found myself figuring out how to involve them in the idea of theater as a virtual, performative project, which is a wonderful and interesting thing. I mean, to imagine that theater, because of the world that we're living in right now, theater cannot happen in the way that we're used to. We're used to it being a very social thing, a very tangible thing. We're used to it being about a building. And if you subtract the idea of the building or the structure or the architecture of theater from the performative aspects of theater, then what do you have? Well, you still hopefully have ideas. You still have creativity. You can still have performance. You still can have exchange. But it might happen via internet. It might have to happen through live streaming. And that's what we've been doing. So I acted in a piece that was live streamed on Zoom, directed by Regina Taylor, called Loving Kindness During Quarantine, with a bunch of playwrights. I'm now trying to structure this program that I'm working on with these young artists who are supposed to perform their work live at Mabel Minds. Now we're changing it so that they can figure out how to adapt their own performative pieces for video so that people can see it in this medium and to encourage them and to let them understand that actually there is something wonderful about this. Because when you go to see a play, usually you buy a ticket to see a play and whoever's in that theater to see that play at that moment are the people who are witnessing that play. Well, we have another opportunity right now. And the opportunity is that if we are doing it through Zoom or doing it through social media, there's an opportunity that many more people then are inhabiting the same space can actually witness a work live. Do you know what I mean? So one can actually have a play online that is broadcast in Los Angeles and that is broadcast live television. I mean, it's all over the world that anyone can access at the same time and can write and can actually even chat if they wanted to and respond or have responses to the thing that they're seeing. So it changes how we approach theater and I've been challenged to try to work very hard with a bunch of like-minded people who are involved in that process right now. Well, it will be interesting how you and Mabu Mines and that space that PS said about but how you what answers you will find and I think everybody is looking, is interested, artists also need to work, they need encouragement I think most of all and this is something you do. Did something change for you in this time? Did you, the time you spent with yourself as you said to look at it is something, did you find something that's different now after these months? Yes, I mean I certainly, I think I found that there were and maybe not unlike many other people, I found that there were people that had not because of the quarantine and because of this isolation, I found that there are some people who I had somehow had now had no way of getting in touch with for whatever reason and some of those people were very unnecessary in my life prior to the quarantine there and what I mean by that is that when everything is available to you, you tend to consume everything. If you're, again, a procurator, if you're passionate about anything and about culture and so it's restricted, it's restricted who I can actually identify as or think of as family and friends and the people that I actually need in my life and the people who I define as part of my coalition so that's been wonderful to begin to redefine my own coalition principles, to redefine my own objectives, to redefine my own personal goals for the future, to redefine the books, redefine how I manage time or have mismanaged time and to allow myself the time to read the books that I haven't read and that I intended to read to learn the things that I needed to learn to reach out to people and also to try to help people psychologically because that's been also part of the process. When the quarantine first happened, I was ending the school year and I had to teach my college students in this forum which was new to me and new to them and many of them were dealing with depression clearly and young students were dealing with just feeling depressed about what was happening and so some of the syllabus in a way kind of went away or was sacrificed for psychotherapy sessions where I became a listener or I moderated or I tried to encourage the conversation and then lead it back to what we were really there to discuss and learn but it sort of rebranded and even changed how I teach that teaching has a personal level to it. That teaching in academia should always have a very personal level to it that you should pay attention to the people that are in the room that you are teaching and actually care about them in the moment so that they're able to understand what you're trying to impart to them so it's changed my values my values have been adjusted and are adjusted my my objectives are adjusting my sense of self and identity is adjusting not shifting not changing I'm not becoming anyone else I'm still Carl Hancock Rucks you know I will still be a writer when this is over if I survive this I will still be who I am but how I perform my identity and perform my my many roles in the universe has been absolutely adjusted and in that way no different than what's happened in the past because when I was when I lived through the HIV AIDS pandemic you know and my older brother died and half of my half of the kids in my high school died it absolutely adjusted and how I lived you know it thrusted I was thrust into a world you know made me get out of this country it made me you know go to the University of Paris it made me go to the University of Ghana at McGon it made me decide to become an artist because I didn't know how long you know I would live or how long any of us could live and I didn't want to be you know 20 years old and having died without having expressed myself or articulated myself you know there's almost there's this there's a there there's a saying that it's not a saying but there's a there's something that someone very important said to me one time and I always say this and I'll if you don't mind I'll repeat it but it's a quote by Dr. Bernice Johnson Regan who is an anthropologist and who's a singer and who's a founder of Sweet Honey in the Rock many years ago she said to me when we work on a project together with the director Robert Wilson in Paris she said to me there comes a time in your life when you discover an emptiness you have no thought of yourself as being empty and in fact you've been operating as if you are not but there it is this emptiness and when you discover it nothing hurts as much as that emptiness except your yearning to be full and that's when for the first time in your life and the first time with your life you search for tongue a language a means of articulation and that's what happened to me through the HIV AIDS pandemic that's what's happened to me in this Black Lives Matter moment that's what's happened to me with this coronavirus pandemic constantly becoming aware of one's emptiness the emptiness that you had been ignoring or not treating and in discovering it you then have to deal with how to heal it or cure it or fill that space and in finding ways to fill the space of your own emptiness that you discover and that can only come with personal self-examination you finally start to develop or yearn for a you know an articulation of of ideology and of feelings and of you know an articulation of being that you had never ever considered before and so this becomes incredibly important you know I think that every moment that challenges us another moment another statement I should say what she said was is that life's challenges are not meant to paralyze you they're supposed to show you who you are and so I don't I do not feel paralyzed I don't feel paralyzed in this moment I feel like I am finding out who I am and I hope that for the rest of my life I will constantly be discovering who I am and not only me but I hope that we will always be forced against a wall to discover who we are and how we are communicating with each other and what we are saying to each other and whether or not we are paying attention to each other's socio-economic you know realities and race realities and gender realities you know how are we interacting who are we voting into governance who are we supporting who are we not supporting that should be supported what do we understand about capitalism what we understand about socialism what do we understand about some kind of an ism that we've never heard of before but could possibly be invented that could actually be a new way for society to manage itself so this is a really important moment and I think this moment cannot be taken lightly for any of us not for any of us we cannot take this moment lightly we're being forced to think about injustice we're being forced to think about family we're being forced to think about health we're being forced to think about racism we're being forced to think about police brutality we're being forced to think about you know the prison system we're being forced to think about our own economy. We're being forced to think about how we spend our time. We're being forced to think about who we spent our time with prior to this moment. We're being forced to think about whether or not there was any value in that at all. We're being forced to think about who we need to spend time with should we survive this moment. We're being forced to think about survival. We're being forced to think about the mediate of our existence. And if we really pay attention to that, if we really commit ourselves to that, if we really challenge ourselves with all of those things and more, we, personally, could actually come out of this moment, finessed and absolutely, absolutely changed in the most magnificent way, I would hate to think that any of us would just hide away, hope maybe we don't, you know, catch the virus and hope that maybe nobody throws a brick throw windows because of the, the Black Lives Matter movement. And then when it's all over or when it seems like it's all over, just go back to our way of living and walking down the street and living in our own shelter and living in our own bubble and ignoring everybody else's needs and ignoring all the people around us. If we do that, then we've missed this gift. This is a gift. This moment is a gift. And that's how I perceive it. I perceive it as a wonderful gift from the universe. Even with, you know, and I don't mean to make light of anybody who's died or has lost anyone or who's been sick. I'm not making light of that. But one must embrace the positive and the negative in order to understand that there is something still to do with all of it. Every wound, every death, every sickness, every challenge, every upheaval comes with something to teach you something, to understand something about yourself and the future. So, yeah, that's, that's a significant realization. It makes me think there's this little Brecht poem of Mr. K. He wrote lots of little stories and Mr. K meets a friend. The friend looks at him and says, oh, you haven't changed at all. And Mr. K. Teon's pale turns around and walks away, you know. So maybe this is a moment in corona. Yeah, how sad that would be. How sad that would be. Oh, you haven't changed at all. Someone that, you know, that's so great you said that to me. Someone asked me that I was walking down the street yesterday with my mask on. And I saw a friend and she from across the street. And of course, we kept our distance. And, you know, she said, hello. And I was like, hi, how are you? And she said, I said, how are you? You know, and so she said, oh, I'm, we're talking through our masks, you know, and then she said, she was telling me that her birthday was coming up. And I was like, oh, congratulations. And then she said, oh, you know, do I look any older? Do I look any different? You know, and I said, no, you know, you'll find it, but I was just trying to compliment you. I didn't want to make, you know, I mean, and she didn't, she looked absolutely fine. But I thought about that. And I was like, well, actually, I know what she was asking me that she that she looked like had she aged, had time aged her, had this, you know, this moment of sheltering, has that aged her, you know, has it taken away? And she's a very beautiful woman, but I guess, so I guess there was some vanity to the question I'm going to assume. And, you know, in this, do I look any different when she was asking me that? And I, I, I almost wanted to go back to her and say, shouldn't you look different? You know, shouldn't you look a day older? Shouldn't you not weathered? You know, not beaten down, but shouldn't you look a little wiser, look a little smarter? You know, is it shouldn't there be a little frow line here that you didn't have before, that you now that you now really embrace? And it's wonderful? I mean, let's think about that. I mean, let's think about just, you know, the before this moment, you know, of what we were doing to ourselves into our bodies, even in American and all kinds of cultures, right? The idea of Botox, the idea of paralyzing our faces with venoms that would render us expressionless, you know, all the way to cheat, you know, time, you know, and to help us believe or think that we actually looked younger than we actually were. Why would we or why should we? And I'm not making a judgment necessarily, but I'm, I'm using this really as more of a metaphor than anything. Why should we paralyze ourselves from the events of our lives? You know, we should not, you know, we should wear them proudly on our faces if we can. You mentioned students, I think you teach at Yale, right? So I don't, so I don't teach, you know, right now I was teaching at the New School and I was also teaching with NYU's Stella Adler, Voice for Afters. How did you, how did you get into theater when you said, how did, how did you start out as a kid and all of it? Tell us a little bit. Long, too long of a story, my God. We have time. Okay, all right. I was, my mother's paranoid schizophrenic. I was raised in the New York City foster care system. I was adopted by my grandmother's brother and his wife. They were much older than me. My grandfather, my, my, so it was my grand uncle and his wife who adopted me. My grand uncle was born in 1915. My grand, his wife was born in 1923. They'd been born and raised in Harlem. They were music enthusiasts and they loved jazz music and had lived through all the great eras of jazz and Harlem. So I was living with people who were generations older than me and who were, you know, something like, I like to think of, I like to think of them as, they were sort of like ethnomusicologists every Saturday night. They would pull out their records, their vinyl records and play music and force me to listen to, you know, Miles Davis and Coltrane and things that I didn't understand. And they would listen to it with their ear in such a way that was very strange, spooky almost to me at the time because they would, you know, say things like, oh, did you hear the sound that horn made? Did you, did you, did you, did you, did you understand, you know, how, you know, the, you know, the tonality, you know, of that saxophone? Did you, oh, you know, as if these instruments, you know, this instrumental jazz music was actually speaking language to them and that they were having a conversation with, you know, this music. And I thought it was the strangest, weirdest thing in the world. But it was also fascinating. They were, they were, they were, they were artists and they were thinkers. I began to, I think, listen to music and then listen to the world that way. And also, as, you know, when I was very young, I was, I think in elementary school, I worked with, I was in a young actors program, worked with a woman named Neema Barnett, who is a well-known African-American female director still in Hollywood, the first African-American female director, director of farm time television. But at that time, she was heading a children's theater company and I was working with them, just trying to, you know, come out of my shell and embrace myself and, and, and, and deals my, you know, um, you know, my existence and, and try to interact with other children. I loved it, loved the idea of theater, loved the ideas of plays, loved the idea of, um, reading plays. My mother was an avid reader, so I was, you know, nine and ten years old reading the books that were on her shelf, everything from Baldwin to Jean Genet to Hemingway to Ralph Ellison to Richard Wright. And she would encourage this and this is very important to her that I would, you know, read these things. In fact, even reading theory or, or, or philosophy, you know, so this was, even though I didn't quite understand it, and was probably too young to understand a lot of it. But the more I read, the more I fell in love with language. And then, as I, um, so there's the, so there's two things happening. One is I was being taught to listen to language that was nonverbal by my parents, right? So nonverbal language, which is, which is music. Then at the same time I was being taught to participate in language, which was theater, which is performance, um, and to allow the language that someone else had written to come into my body and into my mouth and out of my mouth and to perform it. Then I was also being taught to read language and comprehend language and perceive language and sit with it silently, um, uh, and to become fascinated and to see what it did to my psyche and to my soul. And this is all before I'm 12 years old. So, um, I knew that I wanted to be a writer and I, um, even though I was very, very attracted to all of the art forms, I mean, I was visual art, dance, I was, I was attracted to all of it, but I knew I wanted to be a writer. Went to the LaGuardia School for Music and the Performing Arts as a visual artist, strangely enough, um, because I felt like I, I, I understood the other mediums and I wanted to know something more about drawing. And there I'm being taught the language of seeing and interpreting and making with my hands, the language of color, the language of, you know, shape and shadow, uh, the language of drawing and painting, you know, the language of, of, of, of linseed oil and paint and smell and all these things, you know, what is that to make an object to sculpt even, you know? I mean, that is, that is the discourse. So, uh, that was, it was an incredible thing. And then also at that time, there were people around me in that school who were singers and actors. And I'm listening to these incredible young students who are singing the most beautiful songs, um, arias, classical music, uh, Negro spirituals, jazz, Broadway show tunes. Um, that's what was happening just like in the movie fame. I mean, and then there were these dancers, these kids, walking down the hallways in their, in their, in their, in their tights and their ballet slippers. And I couldn't stop watching them, you know, articulate, um, something with their bodies. And I was learning the language of kineticism. I mean, really the language of, you know, what the, how the body can actually speak, you know, uh, nonverbally, but, but speak, you know, by, by just using your limbs and your muscles and stretching your limbs and your muscles. Um, uh, you know, that every position that we make, you know, and is itself a sentence, um, which is, which is true of, of, of all language. Um, language is not just the sound that comes out of our mouths. And this made me passionate about the arts. I then went to, um, the, uh, I went to Columbia College. I went to the American University of Paris and I went to the University of Ghana at Lagone, but I did not become a professional artist until with all of those things that I had been, that the universe had been preparing me for, I didn't become a professional artist until that pandemic, that HIV AIDS pandemic, uh, had affected the life of my older brother. And I, I was working for the city of New York in, uh, uh, child welfare administration and working with a lot of social workers. And I was also working as a social work trainer. So there was a, and that's what I partially studied actually, the NYU actually was, uh, the social work, because I wanted to understand something more about, like, you know, the politics of the world and the politics of, uh, you know, um, of, of, of society and how we get through them and, and how we, how we mandate change. And when my brother became very ill, uh, I became his advocate. I had to become the person who advocated for his healthcare, uh, who advocated for his hospital stay, who advocated for, um, his shelter, who advocate, who advocated for his food, who advocate, you know, he was, he literally was losing his mind. He had dementia. Um, and, and, and I loved him. I adored him. He was, he was 20 years older than me, but, um, he was a beautiful, beautiful, wonderful man who had been stricken by this horrible, horrible, horrible disease and could not help himself and was withering away. So I had to sort of put down all of these, you know, aspirations and goals and actually sort of join the world and figure out how does the world operate? What does the world do? Um, and who am I and, and, and, and how do I find out how to become an advocate for my brother and becoming an advocate for my brother? I think I learned how to become an advocate for myself and how to become an advocate for other people as well. Um, and after I lost him, when he died, and I shouldn't say that, I shouldn't say lost him because I didn't lose him, he physically died. I gained him as I continued to gain him. And I mean that in a psychic way. Um, uh, I entered this realm of becoming a playwright because I wanted to commemorate him. So my very first play, which was done on 44th Street, 9th Avenue in Manhattan, was about him. And it was not just about him, but it was also about, um, all the black young men who, and women and people who were living, you know, it was almost like a, uh, the play was called Song of Sad Young Men. It was directed by Trezzana Beverly, but, and it was sort of like a, um, uh, um, you know, there's a bunch of people in a bar, you know, pontificating and talking. Um, and it was, uh, sort of a lower depths kind of play, uh, and, you know, in where, you know, these people are living in this, this structure that's, uh, very dark, and they're living through very dark and dangerous times and they're, they're, they're, they're facing each other and facing their own mortality and dealing with each other. And that's really how I entered, um, professionally this realm of art making, of becoming a professional artist as a way of commemorating my brother who had just died. Um, because I didn't want to die without having said something about my existence in my life and about him and the lessons that I've learned. And then on and on and on. You're strangely quiet. Yeah. Oh, no. That's, uh, I'll tell a bit more. How you, what do you, why theater? If you really, if I understand you could be drawing, could have been social work, it could have been perhaps movement, uh, or music. Why theater? Because that's, because I knew that theater, because I knew that theater actually would be the one form that, uh, while I knew that I wanted to be a writer first and foremost. And the other reason is that theater was the only form that I could think of that was accessible to me, that actually brought all those things together for me, you know? So in theater, I could have music. In theater, I could have dance. In theater, I could have visual art. In theater, I could have color. In theater, I could have singing. You know, in theater, I could have language, you know? Um, so, you know, it was possible. Um, you know, in, in, in visual art, uh, as I had learned it, uh, I didn't, I, I'd not learned vis, I had not learned to be a visual artist as a performance artist, as a perform, as a performative visual artist. So I didn't know anything about, you know, performative visual art. So that was not, I was not aware of that. That's, I'll just say that. Um, uh, even, even in learning to train and to sing, um, which I did, sang with the Harlem Voice Choir and, uh, studied voice. I had not, um, I had not, I had learned a lot about singing and, and, and, and reading and, and, and how wonderful that could be. But, um, somehow I wondered whether or not singing was enough. It was, and it was, you know what, it wasn't enough for me. It wasn't, it wasn't quite enough. But in theater, theater offered this possibility of bringing all of these things into the room. And, and that's what I wanted to do. And that's what I was able to do. And that's what I did. And continue to do. You know, I mean, it's why, it's why, it's why working with, you know, people like, you know, I've worked with, when I was telling you about Bernie Johnson Regan and having worked with her, well, the piece I was working with her on was an opera that, um, I was performing in, uh, Temptation of St. Anthony. We were touring all over Europe and it was directed by Robert Wilson. And so people, uh, know Robert Wilson is this great, you know, um, avant-garde, you know, theater director, uh, which he is. But, you know, he, he, he's more than that. You know, I mean, you know, he went to Pratt to study visual art and, and, and, and more than that, he was also studying, um, uh, architecture or, you know, you know, the notion of, you know, building and structures, you know, and, and, and, and, and it shapes, right? Um, and, and then more than that, you know, because of his own personal life, um, he was thinking about how theater communicates in very simple ways, uh, or, or an, or an, um, uncomplicated, I should say uncomplicated ways, complicated but uncomplicated ways, uh, you know, while being very colorful, you know, but, but, but it didn't, it didn't necessarily have to be a heightened language, you know, so that is something that he has spoken of greatly about how he's drawn to, um, even in this blocking or his directing, you know, uh, you know, very almost box-like, you know, um, actors on stage, you know, the movement, um, which is his own dance, you know, like Kabuki or it's his own dance of, um, simplicity in order to mimic or interpret humanity. Uh, and then because of Artie's, you know, he's, he's, he's this brilliant, brilliant, brilliant theater director and lighting designer who then saturates the stage with all of these colors and takes you into a world you've never seen. Also, I had gone, when I was a teenager, I was, um, uh, I was accepted into a program called the Harlem Youth Writers Workshop. Um, uh, and it was led by a man named George Davis, another man named Frank Dexter Brown. Uh, it was a way of teaching children, uh, teenagers, journalism, and it was actually housed at Columbia University and it was funded by the Xerox Corporation. And when I was there, I decided that I would become an arts writer because I was already in arts world. And, uh, so I thought that I would, you know, that that would be appropriate for me because each child, you know, made their own decisions about what they, what kind of a journalist they wanted to be or how they would want to study journalism. And I was like, well, let me, let me try to understand arts journalism or arts criticism. And so I was going to see plays and going to see Broadway plays and, and in seeing these Broadway plays, I was sucked into these worlds that were, I, I, I can remember it like it was yesterday, just the beauty and the magic. And nothing else did that for me, not even film, but the magic of knowing that I was in the same room as, as other human bodies. But the difference was that the other human bodies were on stage and I was in a seat and that the people who were on stage were in, were walking in and out of light and were either singing or speaking or both. Um, and we're telling stories to me in that room at that moment. And so there was an energy, there was something that was literally being passed from me. And it was just a few feet away from me. And if I wanted to, if I could, I could actually reach out and touch these people. You know, it's not on the screen. It wasn't technical, you know, it was technical, but it, you know, all theater, everything has its technology. But I mean, it wasn't, um, it wasn't, uh, there was, there was nothing that distanced me from these people who were performing and telling you a story. And so that became magical to me, that I, that people like August Wilson, it could actually take me into 1930 something Pittsburgh. I'd never imagined being in, you know, I'd never imagined being in the 1930s. And I'd never imagined what that looked like. And I'd never imagined what I had no thought of what Pittsburgh was and, and didn't care or, or that, or that, or that, or that any player that anything could actually bring me in that mother courage could bring me to, you know, some, some, some realm of society that I recognized, but didn't quite recognize that Shakespeare could actually bring me into a world that I had no knowledge of yet realized, Oh, I do have knowledge of Lear. I do have knowledge of Richard. I do know who Hamlet is. You know, I do understand that even though it was written, you know, half a millennia before I even came to this planet. And also even though these writers, the playwrights didn't know me personally, so many of these plays felt like they were personal gifts to me that they had, there were times, you know, it's almost like that song, you know, killing me softly, no greater song in the world, I think, lyrically. No greater song in the world, killing me softly with his song, right? I mean, that idea, you know, you know, I thought I heard a song, you know, this whole idea that, you know, it's almost like he'd read my diaries, you know, had my diaries and read each one out loud. That's what theater was like for me, you know, going to see a play. It was almost as if these playwrights had unearthed my diaries and we're, and we're reading each one of them out loud in many different ways. And that the world was playing some strange, wonderful, magical trick on me that I was willing to take part in, you know, I was like, yeah, let's play. I'll join this, you know, this is what a wonderful game. I mean, if this can happen and can continue to happen, I must be a part of this world. And so that's how theater came into my life. I remember you spoke about Racine that you were as a kid, you would, you know, read it, but you could imagine family structures because you didn't fully know, you know, your parents, right? And that's an incredible. Yeah, I think that I think that I think there are a lot to do with it. I think the fact that I was a foster child, who had been adopted, who had no relationship with his biological mother, whose history was really unavailable to me, had no knowledge of my biological father, was born, actually born, I found this out recently, that I was actually, you know, when my mother had me, I was, it was while she was institutionalized, I didn't know that, by the way, when I last talked to you, I thought that, that, that her, that her mental illness happened after sometime after I was born, but actually I found that recently, that it happened before I was born. She was already institutionalized. It was like a family secret. It was a thing that people were keeping for me for whatever reason, I have no idea, but they were keeping that with me. So I was, so she became pregnant while she was actually in the, in this, in this, you know, mental institution with me. And there was no way of finding out who my father was. And no one pursued that. So I still don't know and won't know. So there, so I was a child with questions and question marks. And again, that's, like I said earlier, you know, that even, even the darkest, saddest things in our lives, we must learn to embrace. I mean, it's what Buddhism teaches us, isn't it? You know, I mean, that, that we must, we must understand the balance of, of the universe, right? That, that everything has a purpose and a meaning. And so I was a child who came into this world with question marks and didn't know how to articulate my questions, but certainly found a way to articulate my questions to find my own answers, maybe not specifically to who is your father or why your mother was, you know, paranoid, schizophrenic or why I was born in a mental institution or, you know, maybe none of those answers could absolutely be answered. But what could be answered were larger questions. And it's just, and it's the greatest thing too about being an artist is that one question opens the box to the next question to the next question to the next question, you know, until you find a million or one answers that you had never even perceived on finding in the first place. So I, yeah, they had a lot to do with these question marks that was stamped on my soul and stamped on my psyche had a lot to do with becoming an artist. Who we are, you were forced and thrown into it to really ask it extensively. And from many of us, somehow we seem these questions are answered, but perhaps they are not, you know, just take superficial explanations. Where do we come from? And where are we, where are we going? What is the father, the idea of the mother and father and family and what is it? And so many of us have that. I mean, so many of us have those questions about, you know, it's almost a, it's almost a, you know, every, I think almost everybody questions, you know, Oh, was my mother and father a good mother or father or, you know, or did I have a happy childhood or was everything okay? Or could things have been done differently or could things have been done better? Or, or why did they divorce or, you know, whatever, everybody, everybody has a story about their family, everybody has a family story, you know, and, but, you know, it's something to have it with you for your entire life and to allow it to, you know, to push you further to investigate the world. You know, I think that's, to use it, to use it, to use those questions and to use those experiences, you know, whether you're adopted or not, whether you were a foster child like me or not, you know, I mean, but just to use your own experiences and your questions is very relevant and insurgent for all of us. And, but to use them, not just have them, because if we just have them, then we can die with them and they can actually increase our disease before we, and, and we die with them and, and, and not help us. But if we use them, then we can actually sharpen our instrument and do something while we are here, because we're only here for a certain time. And so that's what learning and that's what investigating and learning about my own personal history did for me. It made me and continues to make me sharpen my instrument or instruments, my weapons, my armor, my language, my polyglot, my linguistic, my mind, my interactions, my perceptions. Yeah. And as you pointed out, this time of corona is something where it forces us and it might be something that will save. Well, if it doesn't, if it doesn't, then we've, then this is, if it doesn't, then we've got nothing from it, right? I mean, if we don't, if we don't, if we don't do anything, if we don't do something with this moment, then it's lost. A bunch of people have died for what? Nothing. And I don't think anybody wants that. I mean, maybe there are people who have a very hard time believing the existential, you know, or the spiritual and, you know, the idea of, you know, sort of questioning things, the larger world or trying to see the greater picture. But I can't help but do that. And I can't think that every single moment that we are on the planet, we are here to learn something to actually increase and better the planet and the place and the moment and the people that inhabit the earth. And so if we don't do that, if we don't use this moment for its purpose, then we've, we've, we've really failed the class. Yeah. And then we are really lost. But today I got a mail from Tom Walker, who's a long-standing member of the Living Theater, and he wrote a poem about the evil that surrounds us. And he said theater is not a mirror. He said, again, this old image of, you know, good to you, said it's kind of forges. We have to, theater has to engage now and has to promote people to act. What do you, how do you see theater? How do you see your theater? What does it do? Well, I mean, I think, I think it was always, after having seen a lot of theater and lots of different kinds of theater, I was very, I think I became clear that I was not into, well, I shouldn't say that, that the kind of theater I wanted to make was not going to be naturalism necessarily, you know, that it wasn't, you know, that it wasn't going to be a, you know, kitchen table kind of, you know, naturalism or realism, you know, that I was interested in theater that, you know, is abstract to some degree or, or experimental to lack of a better word, you know, that joined, you know, different mediums and came up with something that I had not seen or not been witness to, almost in that way that Toni Morrison says, you know, write the book that you, that you, that you have not read or that you want to read, you know, so, so I wanted to write the play that I had not seen and that I wanted to see and hope that maybe there'd be another me out there in the audience who, you know, that the kid that was me long ago that leaned forward and said, you know, maybe everybody in this room isn't getting this, but I'm getting it. I feel this. So I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm passionate about history. I'm passionate about the moment. I'm passionate about the existential, as you can tell. I'm passionate about the abstract. I'm passionate about language. And I'm passionate about ideas, you know, and I've always been passionate about ideas. I think that the theater is a place for discourse. And actually, what I've learned, sorry to make my computer move, what I've learned is that that's what it always was. You know, that it always was meant to say that it was not simply for entertainment purposes. You know, there was a, there was a level to it in ancient Greek theater where it may have been propagandistic to the degree of, you know, forcing us to believe one thing or another regarding, you know, who we, you know, what gods we followed or, you know, what armies we followed. But on another level, it was forcing us toward our values and forcing us toward ourselves and forcing us toward something spiritual. So it's, it began this idea of theater as far back as we know it, because I believe it, I believe it existed even before then, as far as we know it, even with the ancient Greeks, was always political and social and spiritual and abstract and dealt with the many realms of existence. And that's the kind of fear that I'm attracted to in a contemporary way. I always want Dionysus to be in the room, you know, always, you know. I need, I need a Dionysian moment constantly, you know, has, I need, I need a God to play some dirty trick on me or on a character in order for me to understand something. I need, you know, I need, I need a city, I need thieves, you know, I need, I need to try to get to it or at least I need to try to save it. I need to be pentheus. I need to be pentheus in that way that I am a son, you know, and a warrior son, and that I am a warrior son who has serious conflict with his father. I need my father to be some great mythic king possibly unavailable to me or in conflict with me or endangering me to some degree, only to or even trying to impede me, only to compel me. I need love to be something that I have to kill the minotaur for. You know, I need that, I need that, I need that. I need to step into someone else's garments and perform the role of the other. That, that's what theater is to me. That, that is theater, that is absolutely theater to me. That's the kind of theater that I absolutely love. You know, stepping into the garment of something I've never worn, being influenced by a god that I've never known, challenging another part of my father, and when I say father, just creation, right, challenging a part of my, of the creation of the universe that I had not yet challenged, salvaging myself at a city that I had not yet inhabited, or at least trying to get to a city that I've not yet inhabited, you know, those are, those are really important things to me. And, and, and just architecture. I mean, strangely enough, for whatever reason, I'm, I'm passionate about buildings. I'm passionate about how buildings are structured. I'm passionate about the idea that rooms and doors are used for their emptiness, thus were helped by what is not. So I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm passionate about entryways that let in air, let out air, or trap air in. I'm passionate about derelict buildings and old buildings that trap history, and spirits and ghosts. I'm passionate about the stories that even plaster and molding can tell us. And stone and marble, rocks. I'm passionate, I'm passionate about the texture of rocks and wood and stone, because they all represent something so much older than I am. And they have a story to tell me. And so that, that, that's why theater, it feels less manufactured in a way than for me, than I guess film or television. And I don't mean that I don't love film or television, but I do mean that theater is the oldest form. It precedes these forms. You know, it birthed those forms, right? It birthed film, it birthed television. But so what, you know, why not go to the source, going back to the source? For me, there's nothing like the source, the source of the thing. You know, the artistic beginning, you know, that form that teaches us more than we could ever possibly know from its offshoot. You know, and so that's why theater for me. And then actually, and also, sorry, oh, I was going to say, and then also, you know, I can hate it or love it. You know, I mean, how great is that? You know, and then I could, and then I can, I can, I can, you know, or that I can walk out in an in a mission and not understand it. My favorite moment, you know, I think that I always get wrong. And I think I need to learn how to quote this. But I know I've read this is improved, you know, you know, where, where there's a character who sees a play and decides that he hates the play, you know, and, you know, he just can't stand it. He's sitting there, he's watching the play and he's like, oh, this is awful. Oh, this is, oh, this is intolerable. I can't take this. And then he, but he waits, you know, he waits until the play is over and he leaves. And as he's walking through the street, you know, he suddenly remembers something that someone said in the first act, you know, and thinks, oh, what a clever statement that was. And he remembers something about the garment or the dress, you know, that the actress wore, you know, in the second act and how beautiful that garment was and how it flowed and how the light hit it, you know, and he remembers something about the relationship between the one character and another character. And suddenly in the middle of the street, as he's on his way home, leaving the theater that presented the play that he thought he hated, he learns he loves. You know, he suddenly discovers that he actually loves the play because he's gotten to live with it and learn it and question it and hate it and learn to love it and to allow it to, you know, have some real, some real relationship to his thinking. Theater theaters, you know, it's, it's, it's this passionate, strange, crazy, mystical world in the same way that, you know, I'm almost like, you know, church or, you know, I love the theater of things. I mean, I love the theater of, I was talking to someone else about how much I love the theater of Catholicism. You know, I don't, I'm not Catholic. I don't know that, you know, but I don't, I don't know what these incense things are, but I think they're beautiful. I mean, my God, you know, when you see these things that are, you know, and the priests have got this, you know, this, you know, even in a movie and you see it and it's got, I don't even know what to call it. That's how dumb I am. But I mean, you know, this, this lovely brass, you know, thing, whatever with the, with the smoke coming from it and whatever in there, and it's on a chain. Who invented that and why? You know, and, and what does that represent? Is that supposed to represent the spirit? You know, who invented the garments, you know, of the, of the, these priestly garments, these robes, these, these colors, you know, these songs, you know, it's spiritual. What are they singing? Who are they singing to? What are the songs of the angels? Where are the angels? What are the angels? I don't, are they here? What are those, who are those people made in glass that are windows really nothing more than glass in, in, in window frames, but colored glass reflecting light into a space so that, but forcing me to look up at them and see them and ponder who they are and what stories they're telling. I mean, I love the theater of rituals. I love the theater of, like I said, of church, of rituals, of dance, you know, and that's all of these things are theater for me. Conversation is its own theater and I love the theater of conversation, even though I tend to dominate it sometimes like I'm doing right now, but I, I love, I love, I love the theater of, you know, conversation. Yeah, I look at people and I'm fascinated with them and I can't stop. I, I was the kid who, you know, my, my, my mother would have to, you know, slap my hand a little bit because I would stare at people, you know, and just stare at them for whatever reason because I wanted to know who they were behind everything, you know, would look at you and, you know, like, wow, you can look at you right now, you know, I mean, I could easily just sit and stand and stare at you all day and wonder about your story and wonder about the country you come from and wonder about why you part your hair in the middle and wonder about why you chose those glasses and wonder about, you know, why you're wearing that specific shirt and wonder about the white wall that you're sitting in front of, but knowing that possibly outside of the frame of this computer, the walls have to be, must be something else other than what I see, that they at least turn or that they, or that they make another shape, that it's not just a flatness, right, that, you know, that, that, that it's not just a flat plane that's behind you, and that maybe there's a picture to your right, you know, and maybe there's a desk to your left, and I wonder, I can't help, I'm nosy, you know, it's like, it's like, and it's like Zora Neale Hurston, Zora Neale Hurston, you know, it's why, it's why I believe in research, you know, the great anthropologist and novelist Zora Neale Hurston said that all research is, it's poking and prying with a purpose, and that's what I do, I poke and I pry with a purpose, and the purpose is really that, to understand something more about me, so I'm looking at you, wondering who you are, because I'm still trying to figure out something about who I am, and who we are, and our relationship to each other. Yeah, yeah, no, this is a, this is a, you know, important, this is a time where we can and should do this and what we can learn and see the world how this, how it really is, besides the fact how we process it, you know, become aware of the fact that was our own VR headsets, we are actually processing the world and everybody is in a way isolated and we have to be able to get an idea for the different ways of understanding, it's really, really good to hear from you and your reflections and what we're saying, and we are over time and out of time, but before we go, what inspires you, what are you reading at the moment or listening to what, or in Corona, what did you, what did, did something show up on the horizon you were surprised about? Oh, there was a, those are many questions, which one do you want me to answer? What comes to your mind? Yeah, well, so the reading at the moment, which answers also the surprise question is that I was walking down the street the other day and you know, people in my neighborhood sometimes put down on their stoop things that they're getting rid of, you know, cups or glasses or books. And I came across this Patty Smith book that she was writing about her time living in this neighborhood, right, right with Robert Mabel Thorpe. And, and I had actually just seen the film, but I'm fascinated about that period in time and all the many people were going to Pratt and whatever. So I picked that up and so I'm reading that just because I picked it up and it called out to me and I, and I'm that way about books, you know, I mean, they, they, they have to call me, you know, I mean, very rarely are they even suggesting, they literally call me, you know, I'm also reading these essays by Toni Morrison. And other than that, so those are some surprises. And then other than that, I'm researching, I'm researching some things about people, about, well, you know, it's, this is a continued research. I was researching last night for hours and hours and hours about Greenwich Village and about the Manetas, you know, Maneta Lane and Maneta Place, and, and about the 19th century citizens who lived in that area and the people into the early 20th century, and about the, you know, the little Africa that is no more that once existed in that area. And then the, you know, the incoming of, you know, the Italians to America and dominating what we know as Greenwich Village, you know, the South part of Greenwich Village and that culture and all the many characters who were prominent and a part of the Bohemian lifestyle of the 20s and the 30s and the 40s and the 50s in the Greenwich Village, in Greenwich Village, you know, and what they were studying, you know, from Gurgit to, you know, you know, just to, you know, this notion of the journals and I mean that, and I'm researching that for a reason. I'm working on a project, actually. So, but that's, yeah, that became, and I'm finding out things that I still had not found out. And I've been, I've been studying that and researching that for 20 odd years and thought that I knew everything that was to know. And I found things last night, I never knew or maybe forgotten. So it was amazing. That is great. So this time maybe is a time to find out what we never knew about or what we forgot. And it was a really, really important and significant to hear from you what lessons you draw, how you use it, what it means to you and how you create meaning. And I think we need that. It is a time where we are lost. And as we are anyway in our existence, but we have to know we are called to create meaning. There's no imposing structure, or better or worse, I think it's better or so. We don't need it, but we are the ones now who have to do it. And you made a great contribution to that just for me. And I think I'm also sure for people who listen to it and artists and everyone. So really, thank you for joining us. Why the hell haven't you talked to Kalyat? I love it. I try to be, somehow we didn't fully connect. So it's great that you were here. Tomorrow we continue our journey listening to theater artists. It is Philip Ken, who is from Paris. He is involved in many things, significant things. And his practice of theater and what he calls the small thing, just a little thing, we will find out what he will say to us. Petit Chamier, a playwright, she's moops now between New York and San Francisco and the Arab American theater community. And Friday we have Adelaide Rosen from the Netherlands in Holland, where she is in Amsterdam, really creating a stunning amount of work and engaging with the communities and creating work that resonates with them. Actually, Melanie will be there and talk with her. They will use it also as a way of connection, that they have a relation with each other. So hopefully this will also bring them closer together. Carl, really, thank you. It was so significant and important to hear from you. Thank you for taking the time. And I can't wait to see your next play or one about or your work or opera or where you act in. And so stay tuned, stay connected to us, to our listeners. Really thank you for taking the time. What Carl had to say to you is significant and it has an impact if you choose to do so. And it might be something in there that changes you. Or maybe things have already changed just listening to him and observing him. It almost looks like it somehow also like a little Orson Welles shot. It could almost look like a ceiling and you are standing and looking down to us where he had these, you know, ceilings close to the actors. So it was really, really an important contribution. Thank you for doing this and to listeners for taking time out so much we have to do so much is on our minds. It means a lot that you are here with us for how long to hosting us and to the Segal team and the Segal Center and the Graduate Center. So really, thank you. I hope you all stay safe. Wear a mask. It's not a political thing. It makes common sense. We heard the story of a barber shop or two hair cutters got a clean bill, a negative test, but there was wrong. They were positive, but they had kept their mask on for two weeks. They kept cutting hair and nobody got it. So it really protected the people who came in with masks and it does work. And so let's keep safe. So stay tuned. Love to hear from you soon and see you all again and all my best. And again, really, thank you. Thank you so much.