Américana Passover
nytheatre.com q&a preview by Guy Yedwab
October 11, 2012
What is your job on this show?
Creator.
What type of theater do you like most to work on?
Over the last couple of years, more and more I'm working on immersive, participatory events -- as an audience member, I find that I'm increasingly drawn towards opportunities to interact with other people in a performance setting. So that's the type of performance I want to work on -- chances for people to enter into a performative world, interact with each other and with a strong offer from artists. I feel like that's where live performance has a chance to compete with recorded arts (film, television, music) is the sense that people are participating.
Complete this sentence: My show is the only one opening in NYC this fall that...?
Our performance is the only one opening in NYC this fall where an audience sits with the performers, and with the food and shares the event as equal. It's the only performance where the audience reads from a ritual text together and takes it home with them.
Do you think the audience will talk about your show for 5 minutes, an hour, or way into the wee hours of the night?
I think that this performance is going to follow the participants the next day, the next week, and to the next year -- because this is a ritual that can be performed by anyone, and because we are leaving them with the ritual text, we invite them to perform the ritual themselves, every year or whenever they need it.
Which famous New Jerseyite would like your show the best: Snooki, Bruce Springsteen, Thomas Edison?
Bruce Springsteen. I think he would enjoy the chance to dine and remake America. Also, he would enjoy eating the food of work with us. We might ask him to play us a few songs before the night is over.
Can theater bring about societal change? Why or why not?
Our performance was created to test that idea. Our hope is that society can change among people, when people come together, listen to each other, speak to each other, meditate together, and speak aloud their hopes and desires for the world. The role of theater and performance is to be a point where people come together and explore tangible examples of the ideas that change are based on.
