Wonders and Wedges

So we made it to the Hangar Theatre. Phew. After several very busy "Wonder Days," jam-packed with meetings, shows and running around, it is a great relief to be settled down in the delightfully rural Ithaca area (we're in the town of Dryden). Last night, as we were unpacking, we saw some deer walking by our back window. And we're blogging. For a change.

Wonder Days was (were?--is it plural?) lovely. We met with tons of theater-makers from across the disciplines (casting directors, designers, producers, actors, etc) and got to see five shows in NYC (Passing Strange, The 39 Steps, God's Ear, Xanadu and The Occupant). Oh yeah, and we got to attend the Drama League Awards, which was super-happy-making.

One of my favorite meetings was with the staff of the Alliance for Inclusion in the Arts. If you don't know their work, you should. Formerly the "Non-Traditional Casting Project", the Alliance serves dual missions to advocate for and educate about issues of diversity (both for artists of color and artists with disabilities) in the performing arts. It is incredible how atrocious a job the arts (still) do of representing the wonderful diversity of our world; and it is vitally important that this changes. By virtue of their intrinsically public nature, the performing arts are in an extraordinary position to serve as a model for best-practices in inclusion. Additionally, since the performing arts are constantly painting a picture of our world, lack of inclusion in the arts can skew that image unrealistically, leaving some populations over-represented and others voiceless. The Alliance promotes discussion of these complex topics, and the conversation we had--about ourselves as artists as well as the issues of inclusion in the arts--was honest, vulnerable and wonderful. I found myself continuing the never-ending project of confronting my own assumptions, ignorances and biases, while also getting to know my fellow directing fellows on a much deeper and richer level than we had previously reached. Moral of the story: check out the website of the Alliance--they're doing really important work.

Eventually, we made it to the Hangar Theatre. Word of advice: if you ever decide to visit the Hangar (and we hope you do, preferably this summer), make sure that you navigate with a GPS. Oh, and make sure you've entered the right address into the GPS. As a backup, you'll probably want to send someone before you to lay down a trail of breadcrumbs. I can't imagine how we could have gotten more lost, more times, or in more ways.

Corey and Lauren in The Wedge.

I'll leave you with a picture of my fellow fellows Corey and Lauren, standing in our beautiful, grungy, flexible, extraordinary, energizing, triangular, tiny, huge, dark, mysterious, one-of-a-kind, indescribable and absolutely perfect space--The Wedge. I fell in love at first sight. After having seen it, we've all retreated to our bedrooms (which look suspiciously like my freshman dorm room...) to re-consider all the plays we brought with us. Tomorrow we're going to (try to) pick our season!!! Wish us luck!