Interviews

Frankie Mulinix and Porter Grubbs introduce the three-part Atlanta series with a conversation about the city’s performance scene, building audiences, the importance of affordable spaces, and more.

Matthew McMahan talks to playwright Herbert Siguenza about branching out as a solo writer after years as a member of Culture Clash, writing bilingual comedy, and more.

Carlos Murillo and Kira Obolensky talk about their National Playwright Residency Program residencies, creating work for a specific theatre’s audience, playwrights not being part of the sea change of artistic director turnover, and more.

Early career arts manager Al Heartley speaks with Jennifer Bielstein, executive director of American Conservatory Theater, about active listening, how to balance focusing on the details with looking at the bigger pictures, management values, and more.

Rehana Lew Mirza and Melinda Lopez talk being playwrights as well as actors and teachers, critiquing their own work, their individual work processes, and more.

Caridad Svich shares a correspondence she had with playwright and theatremaker Will Arbery, touching on topics of writing about bleakness and despair, a play’s relationship to breath, faith and faithlessness, and more.

ArtsEmerson Artistic Director David Dower speaks with Chilean playwright Guillermo Calderón about the ongoing protests in Chile.

Amelia Parenteau speaks with Lauren E. Turner about racialized trauma in American theatre, Lauren’s experience with it, and healing.

Beatrice Perez-Arche and Livian Yeh have a conversation about their experience in the Young Critics Program, “cancel culture” and criticism, gaining confidence, and more.

Cultural organizer and producer Joon Lynn Goh speaks with Janna Graham, a research-based practitioner, curator, and lecturer, about connecting cultural work with political organizing.

Producer Tobi Kyeremateng and poet/writer Roger Robinson talk about Black writers in the UK, creative citizenship, activism in the arts, and more.

Katy Rubin, founder and former exeuctive director of Theatre of the Oppressed NYC, talks with new executive director Meggan Gomez about how long leaders should hold their roles in an organization, mission drift, founder’s syndrome, and more.

Linda Parris-Bailey and Diane Rodriguez talk about their own leadership transitions and what’s next, gender, race, and economic barriers; documenting work; and more.

Choreographer Malik Nashad Sharpe and film & TV director Liza Johnson talk gravity, abstraction and risk, ethics, and more.

Black British writers Matilda Ibini and Oladipo (Dipo) Agboluaje talk about choosing to study theatre at school, crowdfunding, Afrofuturism, and more.

Demi Nandhra and Rajni Shah talk about their performance practices, social media, mental health, ego, and more.

Part II of the conversation between Michael J. Bobbitt, the recently appointed artistic director of Boston’s New Repertory Theatre, and Raymond Caldwell, the new leader of Washington’s Theater Alliance, who talk about post-show conversations and self-care.

Michael J. Bobbitt, the recently appointed artistic director of Boston’s New Repertory Theatre, and Raymond Caldwell, the new leader of Washington’s Theater Alliance, sit down to talk about race equity work, the guilt they felt leaving their previous posts, and more.

Playwrights Kirsten Greenidge and Peter Nachtrieb talk about what it means to be an artist in residence, how theatres constantly work on their mission, connecting with the community, and more.   

Playwrights Will Power and Jonathan Norton talk about what being an artist in residence looks like, championing local playwrights, rejection letters, and more.

Michaela Goldhaber, current artistic director of Wry Crips, talks to the founding and early members of the disabled women’s theatre group about their history.

Playwright Peter Nachtrieb and artistic director of San Francisco’s Z Space, Lisa Steindler, talk about the National Playwright Residency Program, getting out of your comfort zone, making a living as a writer, and more.

Kitty Drexel and Regina Victor, both artists and critics, talk about working through biases, accountability, transparency, and more.

Part II of the conversation between Bill Rauch and Nataki Garrett—the outgoing and incoming artistic directors of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival—touches on inspiring leadership choices, pacing yourself, and cultivating diverse audiences.