As a playwright, Sarah Ruhl has observed how audiences in different cities respond uniquely to her plays, even when the productions have the same cast and crew and the play is acted in exactly the same way in each place.
“It’s a strange alchemy,” said Ruhl, who was one of nine theater-makers on a panel discussing their experiences at the Yale Repertory Theatre on Oct. 7 in celebration of that institution’s 50th year. “The observer changes what is observed.” She added that for her, this phenomenon is what makes her career writing plays both “so exciting and so nerve-wracking.”
Theater critic, producer, playwright, and educator Robert Brustein DRA ’51, who founded the Yale Repertory Theatre and was its first artistic director, agreed with Ruhl’s assessment, noting, “The audience is the final character in a play and the character is different every night.”
Ruhl and Brustein were joined in the discussion in the University Theatre by James Bundy DRA ’95, current dean of the Yale School of Drama and artistic director of the Yale Rep; dancer, actor and choreographer Carmen De Lavallade, who previously taught movement at the drama school and was a member of the Yale Rep company; actress Jane Kaczmarek DRA ’82, best known for playing the character of Lois on the television series “Malcolm in the Middle”; actress Kimberly Scott DRA ’87, whose stage credits include performing in August Wilson’s “Joe Turner’s Come and Gone” at the Yale Rep and on Broadway, for which she received Tony and Drama Desk nominations; Stan Wojewodski Jr., who was artistic director of the Rep and dean of Yale School of Drama 1991-2002; Michael Yeargan DRA ’75, co-chair of the design department at Yale School of Drama and resident set designer at the Rep; and Catherine Sheehy DRA ’92, D.F.A. ’99, chair of dramaturgy and dramatic criticism at Yale School of Drama and resident dramaturg at the Rep. The discussion was moderated by fiction writer, playwright, and translator James Magruder ’88, ’84 M.A., ’92 D.F.A., who is currently writing a book about the 50-year history of the Yale Rep.
During the discussion, Brustein recounted some of his earliest days at the Rep, just after Kingman Brewster “reluctantly” agreed to turn the former church on Chapel Street where the theater now resides into a training ground for actors, designers, playwrights, and directors.
Asked if there was a moment in his career when “things came together” for him, Brustein responded: “I can tell you about when it was all falling apart. That was the first few years of my tenure at Yale Rep.” He went on to describe that period of the 1960s as a time of revolt against American involvement in Vietnam, saying that he shared students’ “passion against the war” and that with everyone’s energies focused on anti-war protest, it was nearly impossible to hold a class.
Scott spoke about the one artistic director of the Yale Rep no longer alive — Lloyd Richards — and the playwright whose work he championed, August Wilson. “I understood just being in the room with them what a big deal that was,” recalled Scott. She recounted Richards’ “openness,” saying that rehearsals with him were always “a process of discovery,” and described Wilson’s joy. “[H]e sat back and just kind of enjoyed what you were discovering in the moment,” she said, adding that he also was interested in hearing the actors’ point of view. Describing the craft of acting, she said she realized, while watching a rehearsal of “Fences” by Wilson at Yale Rep, that part of an actor’s job is to be a “truth-teller.”
Wojewodski described his tenure at Yale Rep and earlier at Center Stage in Baltimore as a time when productions at the theater engaged in “significant cultural questions.” He nurtured the careers of playwright Suzan-Lori Parks and choreographer Ralph Lemon, and said that following “the artistic impulse” sometimes meant taking huge risks on stage. Quoting Vaclav Havel, whose work he also produced, Wojewodski commented, “Some things are worth doing no matter the outcome.” He described theater as “poetry that cannot live outside the body.”
Bundy, who has just been reappointed to his fourth term as dean of the School of Drama and artistic director of the Yale Rep, said that he had considered leaving the theater world before he was offered the “dream job” of holding both of those posts 15 years ago. During his tenure, the Yale Rep has commissioned more than 50 artists to write new work, and he also made it a practice to provide low-cost theater tickets to thousands of middle and high school students from Greater New Haven through the educational program Will Power!
Yeargan, who came to Yale in 1969, and Sheehy, who has also served through three Yale Rep/School of Drama administrations, spoke of always having something new to see or learn despite their long careers here. De Lavallade described how she is “still growing” from her time at Yale, where, she recalled, she felt a great “freedom” as she moved from working principally as a dancer — “where you don’t question a choreographer but just do” — to teaching about acting and movement. Whether at the Yale Rep or the Yale Cabaret, she said, everyone felt that work mattered “whether it worked or not.”
“The freedom to fail was very important,” agreed Brustein.
Kaczmarek described her first audition to become a student at Yale School of Drama, during which she spoke in an English accent while reciting from Shakespeare, adding as well a little dance she “made up” to go with her performance. Brustein told her not to speak in an English accent the next time she did Shakespeare, causing her to think: “Oh, this guy doesn’t know anything,” she said. “Why would I drop the English accent? This is Shakespeare!” She laughed while saying that she did not win admission on that try, but tried out again successfully the next year. She described the growing confidence she felt as an actor during her time on campus, noting that she performed in some 30 plays during her three years here. “Little by little while here, you see things and think, ‘I can do that,’” recalled Kaczmarek.
In response to the question “What would you do over if you could?” Ruhl, whose play “Scenes from Court Life, or the whipping boy and his prince” is currently having its world premiere at Yale Rep, responded: “I don’t believe in do-overs. … I think the best do-over is to write the next play.” She continued by saying that one of the gifts of having “refuge” at Yale is to have the time and support to write the next play. Comparing Yale to Chekhov’s treatment of his women characters — “taking care of them from the cradle to the grave” — Ruhl added, “I think great institutions do that too for our artists.”
The discussion ended with each of the panelists sharing their thoughts about “the first rule” of collaboration. Most described the importance of listening, whether to other viewpoints or other visions, and treating the ideas of others as equally as important as one’s own. Mixed in were some other words of advice:
“Assume good will,” said Scott, noting that to do so is harder than it sounds.
“Don’t take yourself too seriously,” added Kaczmarek.
“Don’t work with a**holes,” advised Ruhl, to great laughter from the audience.
Recalling visits to Wojewodski’s office when he was a drama student, Bundy said he took note of a quote on a plaque with the Zulu proverb: “A person is a person because of other persons,” saying that is at the heart of what it means to be collaborative.
During the same afternoon, alumni and friends of the Yale Rep celebrated the theater’s five decades by gathering for food and conversation on Library Walk before the discussion.
