This year's Lab was more concentrated and less production-oriented than previous Labs. Approximately 50 directors participated, a small enough group to allow people to get to know each other and scrupulously study an array of plays. The Lab was interested in creating an atmosphere that would engender meaningful discussions. There is a danger in theater to not understand what great writers like Aristophanes and Brecht were trying to do, so we slowed down and we looked at fewer plays with fewer people. All of this year's applicants proposed "political" plays they wanted to explore. We selected 15 projects and then our company of actors read one play each morning to the directors. Each afternoon the Lab directors assembled, occasionally with a guest speaker, to discuss the work they had heard read in the morning.
The range of plays was vast, encompassing works from Aristotle to Shakespeare to new plays written within the past few years. Consequently, as the Lab progressed the plays' diverse topics and themes began to resonate off of each other. Adding another dimension, some ensemble members remained with the directors each day to take part in the discussions and provide actors' points of view.
The directors also engaged in symposia with a variety of prominent theater artists to explore the political theater. This list includes Liev Schreiber and Mark Wing-Davey (discussing the politics of Shakespeare's HENRY V), William Ivey Long (participating in a discussion of the work of writer Paul Green), cartoonist-playwright Jules Feiffer (whose new play A BAD FRIEND opens at Lincoln Center Theater on June 9), and discussions on a variety of political topics ranging from The Living Newspaper to Huey Newton.
Lab Directors
Bamonte , Christopher
Bogad, Larry
Brown, Blair
Bugaj, Katrina
Buggeln, Samuel
Chiang, Fu-Chin
Christman, Meggan
del Rosario, Antonio
Dick, Edward
Ebersold, Scott
Fishman, Ben
Fratti, Valentina
Golden, Pat
Gonzalez, Anita
Higby, Devon
Hughes, Gene
Hurwitz, Isaac
Kasper, Philip
Kruszelnicki, Zenon
Lee, SG
Lemieux, Louise
Linsley, Johanna
Lippard, Alex
Little, Eric
Lopez, Leticia
Marotta, T. Anthony
Mazer, Jonathan
McDonald, Bethany Ann
Mead, William
Mendoza, Oscar
Mosher, Honor
Najjar, Michael
Newbury , Kevin Lee
Ornitz, Alexandra
Parees, Marc
Perez, Richard
Rasmussen, Sarah
Rehrmann, Alexis
Rest, Jonathan
Serotsky, Shirley
Shapiro, Mike
Sloan, Leni
Steindler, Catherine
Stewart, Kris
Sulatycky, Warren
Timbers, Alex
Travis, Michele
Tucker, Shona
Vining, David
Lab Master Artists
Jules Feiffer
William Ivey Long
Emily Mann
Liev Schreiber
Mark Wing-Davey
Jerry Zaks
Lab Actors
Boothe, Cherise
Brawley, Lucia
Brown, Blaire
Buckley, Candy
Gamble, Julian
Greer, Matthew
Guilarte, Andrew
Jones, Ty
Kahn, Ian
Lin, Angela
Mulheren, Michael
Nakahara, Ron
Reddy, Brian
Soelistyo, Julyana
Stephens, Mara
Valdez-Aran, Ching
Wilcox, Wayne
Wright, Mary Catherine
Wu, Robert
Lab Playwrights
Aristophanes
Bertolt Brecht
Caryl Churchill
Larry Gelbart
Langston Hughes
Brian Mullin
Honor Mosher
Janet Neipris
Emily Jane O?Dell
Eugene O?Neill
William Shakespeare
Jason Sherman
Dalton Trumbo
Lab Staff
Lab Director: Anne Cattaneo
Lab Coordinator: Mike Brunner
Lab Assistant: Amy Conant
William Ivey Long, Dr. Laurence Avery, Jonathan Mazer, and Johanna Linsley: Paul Green
Julyana Soelistyo, Chris Bamonte and Robert Castro: Discussion of THE CHILDREN OF HERAKLES Directed by Peter Sellars
Liev Schreiber and Mark Wing-Davey: Politics of HENRY V
Mladen Kiselov, Jonathan Rest, Zenon Kurszelnicki, Alex Diaz de Villegas, and Naum Panovski: Directing Political Theater In Open and Closed Societies
Alexis Rehrmann, Honor Mosher, and Meggan Christman: The Community-Based Theater Movement
Larry Bogad: The Living Newspaper
Marcy Arlin and Victor Maog: Immigrants' Theatre Project: Journey Theatre
Screening of A Huey P. Newton Story, Written and Performed by Roger Guenveur Smith
Irene Krarup and Sarah Rasmussen: How Does the Way Our Arts Are Funded Affect The Arts Itself?
Emily Mann and Blair Brown: The Tempest
Discussion with Jules Feiffer, author of A Bad Friend
Discussion with Jerry Zaks, director of A Bad Friend
Discussion: RAT Theatre
Discussion: Brecht's Testimony Before HUAC
THE AFTER-DINNER JOKE by Caryl Churchill; directed by Shona Tucker
THE FRENCH REVOLUTION, PART DEUX (a New Jersey play) by Emily Jane O'Dell; directed by Isaac Hurwitz
IT?S ALL TRUE by Jason Sherman; directed by Gene Hughes
READING HEBRON by Jason Sherman; directed by SG Lee
A SMALL DELEGATION by Janet Neipris; directed by Marc Parees
RETROSPECT by Brian Mullin; directed by Alex Timbers
TROILUS AND CRESSIDA by William Shakespeare; directed by Ben Fishman
THE TEMPEST by William Shakespeare; directed by Blair Brown
ANTIGONE by Bertolt Brecht; directed by Katrina Bugaj
LYSISTRATA (SEX AND THE CITY-STATE) A COMEDY WITH SONGS by Larry Gelbart, Alan Menken, and David Zippel; directed by Zenon Kruszelnicki & Michael Najjar
IN THE ZONE by Eugene O?Neill; directed by Catherine Steindler
DON?T YOU WANT TO BE FREE by Langston Hughes; directed by Anita Gonzalez
JOHNNY GOT HIS GUN, THE MUSICAL BY Dalton Trumbo; directed by Will Mead
RIP CORD by Honor Mosher; directed by Honor Mosher
