make your life a mission not an intermission meaning

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GARCIA: Considering what you’re saying, that the audience is such a big part of art and theatre, and if, then, both the theatremaker and audiences filter the material that’s presented, then what the heck is “universality”? Or “specificity,” for that matter? What’s wrapped up in those terms? I know it’s something I ask myself all the time. The audience has become the scenic designer, costume designer, lighting designer-it’s all in their mind. When you go to audio, you’re taking that one step further. Because the thing you gain in theatre is the audience is willing to lend you their imagination in a way they aren’t always willing to do in film. If you’re doing a play, suddenly these two chairs are enough.

MAKE YOUR LIFE A MISSION NOT AN INTERMISSION MEANING MOVIE

I’d put two chairs on the stage and say, if you’re making a movie about a car chase, you’d better have a packed street with actual cars slamming through carts full of apples.

MAKE YOUR LIFE A MISSION NOT AN INTERMISSION MEANING HOW TO

I loved the way the format forced you to think differently about how to communicate story. Back when I was teaching, I used to do this lesson about the difference between live theatre and film. I spent about two years working with a company down here directing radio versions of classic films from the ’40s and ’50s. We plan to continue to produce work like this even after we are able to return to in-person performance.Īs for why specifically audio: I love audio plays. We had a choice: Do we commission new plays on Zoom? Or do we look to the past to create something new, something that will, hopefully, continue to be viable after the pandemic ends? We went with the latter, and I’m glad we did. STABILE: Late in the summer of 2020, when we realized this “intermission” was going to go on for a while, we were trying to figure out ways to get folks working again. That’s kind of what happened with this play too, right? Because instead of an immersive experience, which would have been impossible, you reached out to commission me to write an audio play. Or maybe just breaking so that we could put it back together another way. It’s like, “Wow, how in the world will we make this?!” That thought excites us both, I think.Įventually, what ended up happening was, um: 2020. GARCIA: I think that’s why we work so well together. But I am typically drawn to projects that start with: “Well, I don’t know if we can pull that off, but…” At that point, I had no idea how that would work, considering that our space isn’t really a “flex” space. I love trying to subvert what an audience views as their “traditional” role. I was also really excited by the idea of the audience taking on the role of the students. Let’s talk about them, dream about them, and see what we can make. Running a theatre dedicated to new work, I never want to be the person saying why an idea won’t work from the start. MATT STABILE: I mean, the idea of working on something from scratch with you was the real thing that made me say “tell me more.” We’d worked together on a couple of your projects, one of mine, but those typically ended at the workshopping point. I usually have to really show people everything-whole. You replied: Tell me more! That’s so exciting for a playwright, because usually, at least for me, these ideas get ignored when they’re fledglings.

The question was: Why? I wanted to answer that in a play, and I envisioned the audience inside my fifth grade classroom with me, at desks, etc. So how did this whole thing start? As I remember it, over a year and a half ago, maybe more, I wrote you an email about how I was obsessed with the Berlin Wall, ever since I saw it fall from my fifth grade classroom (on TV).

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The play happened to premiere on the playwright’s birthday, April 3, and the group Hola Hi created original music alongside the piece, which resonated with the words: “We are not free until we are all free…Ich Bin Ein Berliner.”

It was also Theatre Lab’s first in-person event in over a year, launching their 2021 season with a socially distanced but fully communal listening experience. The piece was created specifically for streaming (through May 23) as an enhanced audio play with a visual companion, including animated illustrations by John Shamburger and video production by Nick Chimienti. In this conversation between playwright Vanessa Garcia and Matt Stabile, artistic director of Theatre Lab at Florida Atlantic University (FAU), they talk about the making of their new hybrid audio play, Ich Bin Ein Berliner, in which Vanessa retraces and unravels her relationship to pop culture, capitalism, Berlin, and her own family’s history as it relates to our present moment. Think of it a bit like this: What the Constitution Means to Me meets an illustrated cartoon, set in the 1980s and ’90s, and wearing 501 Blues with rivets.

Make your life a mission not an intermission meaning