Interview with a Playwright: Steve Yockey

The 2016 Season of Rough Readings continues with a fresh set of new plays still in development. The March Rough Readings features Mercury from playwright Steve Yockey. We were fortunate enough to ask him some questions about this delightfully dark comedy:

Rachel Finkelstein: Thanks for taking the time to speak with us! Much of your work, Mercury included, is so surreal -- what draws you to that? 

Steve Yockey: I love when anyone says “surrealism.” It’s sexy. But as alluring as that label sounds, I honestly can’t own it. Sure, the mythic qualities are definitely there, the unexpected punctures in the natural world, but all of my work adheres to a pretty strict internal logic. There are rules; we’re driving towards something. 

Steve Yockey

I guess for all intents and purposes, it’s really just dark realism with some pretty grand theatrical gestures. I’ve always been fascinated by taking these intimate, very human stories and placing them right at the edge of something epic in size or unknown. Seeing the scale of those two things create friction. That’s where most of my plays live. Mercury takes something simple and familiar like failing relationships and casts them against the literally immense and horrifying mechanics of a vengeful universe. It’s fun. Or at least it should be fun. 

RF: Because underneath all of those more “mythic” details, the play really is about some deeply dysfunctional relationships. How do you want the audience so feel about relationships when they come away from the play? 

SY: Amused by the terrible choices? Although I’m betting some people will leave identifying with the terrible choices, which would also be pretty great. It’s essentially a dark comedy and only one character of the seven in the play is anywhere even close to being a “good” person. So it’s tricky. Maybe I’d like the audience to come away hoping these characters will become better people. I want to say it’s never too late for anyone, but the play doesn’t really make that case. 

RF: Why do you use so much overlapping speech in Mercury? 

SY: Oh, that’s something I use in all of my plays. In real life we don’t wait for other people to finish speaking, especially in heated exchanges. And it’s also a way of tuning rhythms and builds, like in a piece of music. 

RF: You write for several different forms of media, including for comics and TV -- how does that compare to playwriting? 

SY: Playwriting lets you be a little bit more ambitious with storytelling. I think that’s the best way to say it. In theatre we ask audiences to suspend their disbelief and imagine a lot more. That means we can take bigger swings.

RF: That's the beauty of it. Thanks again for your time!

The Rough Reading Series is Pay What You Can. The 2016 series continues with "Mercury" by Steve Yockey, playing Monday, March 14th, 7:30pm at Roble Hall, Stanford University and Tuesday, March 15th, 2pm at Custom Made Theatre, San Francisco.

Read more about "Mercury", Steve Yockey, and the Rough Reading Series at  Playwrightsfoundation.org. 

Save a Seat with an RSVP! Email rsvp@playwrightsfoundation.org or call 415.626.2176.

Interview with a Playwright: Dipika Guha

The Rough Readings Series is wrapping up for the year with Lifted by Dipika Guha! We had the chance to interview Dipika Guha on her process, motivation, and experience as a Resident Playwright at PF.

You can view the entire interview on Vimeo, but here's just a sampling of some of her remarkably insightful thoughts:

Dipika Guha

"As a playwright, we have the opportunity to begin the world again when we write plays, and my plays tend to be set in imagined worlds that draw very real resonances from history, but they're always slightly askew...I think there's an attempt in that to foster a kind of imaginative space."

"I think tragicomedy in particular strikes me ... of life being both things simultaneously, that speaks to me as being true...There something in that multi-genre device that is thorny and poses the question rather than a simple solution."

"I think point of view can be embodied in a very direct way...where you are forced to take another perspective. And I think the more perspectives we can take on the world right now, the better it is. We do live in a globalized world, but it's also a world of such iniquity."

"There's a sort of pressure to devote ourselves from imagination and from play, and I think I'm drawn to everything that preserves that in the writing of my play worlds."

"There is such a diversity of aesthetic and voice in this room it's truly thrilling to be part of the [Resident Playwrights] Initiative."

Dipika Guha's Interview

The Rough Reading Series is Pay What You Can, and is closing out the year with "Lifted" by Dipika Guha, playing Tuesday, November 17th at 2:30pm at Custom Made Theatre in San Francisco and Wednesday, November 18th at 7:30pm at Roble Hall in Stanford University. 

Read more about "Lifted", Dipika Guha, and the Rough Reading Series at  Playwrightsfoundation.org.

Save a Seat with an RSVP! Email rsvp@playwrightsfoundation.org or call 415.626.2176.

* Member of Actors' Equity Association

Interview with a Playwright: Lauren Yee

The 2015 Season of Rough Readings is now in full swing, granting audiences the rare chance to see up-close and personal readings of new plays in early draft form. We're continuing with King of the Yees, a brilliant new work by playwright Lauren Yee. We were able to speak with her about her work and process, and she's shared some wonderful insight below:

Rachel Finkelstein: Thanks for your time! King of the Yees touches upon some of the issues you face as a woman of Chinese ancestry, and I know you're a Fellow at the Women’s Project Playwrights Lab and a member of the Ma-Yi Theatre Writers Lab. As a playwright, what do you most hope to communicate about the intersection of culture and gender as it appears in your work?

Lauren Yee: I love it when cultures smash up against one another and I can make connections between seemingly disparate communities. King of the Yees reflects that in spades for me. To me, this play is a parent-child story and all those questions and stories you sometimes forget to ask about. It's also about those contradictory feelings on where we come from--what we love, what we don't, all the strange and wonderful things that reflect who you are.

RF: How did you go about partnering with the Contemporary Drama Working Group at UC Berkeley on this work, and what does that partnership entail?

Lauren Yee

LY: Because King of the Yees  is set in San Francisco Chinatown and is very much a local story, I really wanted to find different ways of introducing King of the Yees  to the Bay Area, and I'd heard great things from other playwrights about working with Berkeley's Contemporary Drama Working Group.

So now I have the really great opportunity to hear the play out loud in the Bay Area two times in April. After the UC Berkeley reading, I'm looking forward to making some changes, and I'm also really looking forward to working with Dennis Yen, one of my lead actors in both readings. We previously worked together on the play at a workshop in North Carolina at UNC Chapel Hill.

RF: This play deals with a lot of surrealism and completely obliterates the fourth wall in the process -- what got you going in this direction?

LY: For me, King of the Yees starts from a very real, grounded place and explodes outwards as we and our protagonist go through the journey of the play. I love asking the question of "how is this theatrical?" It also reflects a general trajectory in my writing thus far--when I first began writing, I started from a place of heightened realism, big farce, and have gradually continued my exploration of what it means to be big and theatrical and formally inventive. I want to write plays that surprise me as I'm writing them, and hopefully that translates to a satisfying experience for an audience, too.

RF: From what I've seen, I'm sure it will! Now, your father plays a huge role in this work - what level of involvement did your father have in the creation of the play?

LY: Absolutely none! Though he definitely did have a lot of ideas about what the play should be about, which was particularly interesting when he suggested things that had actually made their way into the play already. And I think I'm a writer who's deeply invested in strong character voices, so hearing a strong voice for this play really helped me to jumpstart it more quickly than usual.

RF: It really shows in the work. Thank you so much for sharing, Lauren!

The Rough Reading Series is Pay What You Can, and continues with "King of the Yees" by Lauren Yee, playing April 20th at 7:30pm at 424 Santa Teresa, Stanford University, and April 21st at 7pm at the Tides Theatre, San Francisco. 

Read more about "King of the Yees", Lauren Yee, and the Rough Reading Series at  Playwrightsfoundation.org. Save a Seat with an RSVP! Email rsvp@playwrightsfoundation.org or call 415.626.2176.

*Member of Actor's Equity Association

Ozma of Oz: A Tale of Dorothy’s Return to Oz, Unlikely Heroes, and Fluid Gender Identities

written by Gillian Heitman, Artistic Director Fellow and Production Assistant for Ozma of Oz

Rough Reading: Ozma of Oz, written and directed by Rob Melrose

zma of Oz is a trip hop rock musical that centers on Dorothy and her quest to save the royal family of Ev from the evil Nome King, based on the third book from L. Frank Baum’s Oz series. She is aided by her old friends: Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly Lion, as well as new friends such as Sawhorse, TikTok, Tiger, a feisty chicken named Billina, and, most mysterious and wonderful of all, Princess Ozma.

A theme that stands out is being more than what you’re born as. The show’s use of gender bending enhances this theme and allows for an open discourse on sexuality. Many actors played characters with the opposite gender and there was a lot of discussion of what best served the story and how changing the gender of the actor altered the meaning of the scene. Another way gender is so fluidly dealt with is with the character of Ozma, who describes her childhood as a boy and asks Dorothy if it confuses her. “No, not at all,” Dorothy replies, “I think because I’ve spent time in Oz, things that may seem strange to some people don’t seem strange to me.” Dorothy’s journey is a discovery of self as much as it is a discovery of her own sexuality. Her acceptance and attraction for Ozma shows how we can find ourselves in untraditional places.

Tristan Cunningham as Ozma

Inspiration for Ozma of Oz began when Rob Melrose, artistic director and co-founder of The Cutting Ball Theater, read the Ozma of Oz novel to his daughter around the same time as listening to the music of Z.O.N.K., a trip hop rock band which creates distinctly urban and San Franciscan sounding music. Something about all of those Z’s struck a chord with him and he soon began working on an Ozma of Oz musical, commissioning Z.O.N.K. to work at The Cutting Ball Theater for the project.

Last week, Ozma of Oz received its third staged reading at the Rough Reading series here at PF. It was a complicated rehearsal schedule due to the Thanksgiving holiday, but the cast and creative team pulled through to get a rewarding and insightful experience.

When working with such a large and rich story, one important consideration was how the future production value would determine the development of the show. Would it be better to write for a big Broadway budget or for more of a club atmosphere? Ultimately, Rob decided to write the best San Francisco Cutting Ball version and see where it goes from there.

While the first reading helped develop the songs and music of the show, at the Rough Readings this past week Rob chose to play only three recordings (which were excellently played) and have the cast sing the rest of the show a cappella. This decision was made so that the audience and actors could focus on the lyrics and meaning behind the songs rather than on the musical notes. The result is the audience got a taste of Z.O.N.K.’s musical styling while also being given the time to fully grasp the emotional content, depth, and humor of the songs and characters.

Missed Ozma this time around? Well, it’ll be back in July as part of Playwrights Foundation’s 37^th Annual Bay Area Playwrights Festival. So take a ride on a green magic carpet and join us for the next reincarnation of this exciting, new, and uniquely San Franciscan musical!

A Day in the Life of...

Gillian Heitman, Artistic Fellow at Playwrights Foundation

Gillian Heitman

Tuesdays are my Mondays…and my Saturdays. 

Such is life when you work 7 days a week at two places. I’m very tired since I was up since 5:30 A.M. yesterday and didn’t get home until a quarter to midnight. The good news is I was at Playwrights Foundation’s Fall 2013 Rough Readings at Stanford, hearing playwright Dipika Guha’s new work, Herculine and Lola, being brought to life by an ensemble of eight talented actors. It’s a known truth that plays are meant to be performed, not simply read, and that’s exactly what happened at the Rough Readings. The actors brought genuine emotion, made real connections with each other, and some even came in costume, which was a nice visual for the color heavy symbolism in the play. Though it’s not the same as seeing a fully produced show, there’s something thrilling about seeing new work being presented and hearing the writer receive feedback on where to go from here. 

After such an exciting night, I’m glad to be coming into the PF office today.  We’re getting ready for a benefit next month and there’s still casting to do for the remaining two Rough Readings of the season. Stuffing envelopes may not seem fun to most, but I’ll gladly take it over working on data entry on Vendini for four hours straight. And the materials we are putting together are so fun and cute! I definitely would want to go if I got an invite like that.

In the afternoon, we decide Laura is the “rebel” fellow. Really, she’s more like our wacky leader. We went on a “fellow party” to the post office and then to Peets, thanks to her. It was awesome.  I got a s’more that was amazing! Just another great day at PF…