Jacob G. Padrón’s Whatifesto

Theatre Communications Group
National Conference – Los Angeles, June 2011

New Years Day is typically a bittersweet a holiday for me, but not this year because of an unlikely friend: Facebook! Soon after midnight, I logged onto my account to see how my friends and family had rung in 2011. I quickly came across the status update of playwright Luis Alfaro – his update said this: “2011: The year of transformation.” Stirred and moved by these simple words, I suddenly felt inspired to reflect deeply on my own new year and to wonder “What if we, we who make up the theater field sought transformation?”

I love the word transformation. It makes me believe that no obstacle is too big and that dreams of the future sustain the passionate sparkle in the eyes of artists everywhere. The fundamental transformation in my own life – going from a young Latino too afraid to embrace who I was, to a producer feeling touched by the heavens to have a life in the theatre – has left me really grateful. It feels incredibly special to be sharing this moment with all of you in the breathtaking Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, just across the way from the Mark Taper Forum where in August of 1978 the LA theater community experienced the world premiere of Luis Valdez’ ZOOT SUIT. For Chicano artists everywhere, new pathways emerged – his El Teatro Campesino was born out of a kind of transformation that started on the picket lines in Delano, California. Completely self-guided, this was transformation in spirit and art.

The fearless leader David Hawkanson, of Steppenwolf, once said – “we can be institutions without being institutionalized” and I think he’s really onto something. Perhaps before we can tackle some of the scariest challenges facing our field, we have to first look inward and go back to the basics – we must change how we communicate, how make room for ALL voices, and how we honor each other as true collaborators in service of the stories we want to tell. The technological revolution has arrived, so now more than ever we need deeper and more meaningful connection! We can and we must transform the culture of our organizations and we are the architects of that change.

First, we need to change how we communicate in our theaters. We need to have conversations with and for each other. Email has taken over work spaces but now is the time to look our co-workers in the eye and say: WHAT YOU DO MATTERS. We’re in the communication business and yet we fail all the time; let’s break down all of the walls, both the real ones and metaphorical ones and find a new language for how we make work together. We can’t rest on our laurels on this. COMMUNICATION IS THE THING!

The topic of transformation also leads me to reflect on the lasting gifts of generosity. For me, embracing generosity is about how we treat each other, how we find connection, and how we summon the bravery to ask: How can the field survive if our artists cannot?  Let us spend more energy celebrating ALL of our people, every day, who, whether an artist and or administrator, contribute deeply to our work on stage. Let us build a culture of affirmation so that everyone feels like they too are heroes in the success of our companies. What if generosity became the core value that guided our collaborations? What if generosity of spirit became the ultimate catalyst for innovation in our field?

Generosity can also transform the artistic process. Instead of asking the artists who come into our theaters to work within our systems – what if we asked: how do YOU like to work? How can our theater be nimble so that together we can create the most exciting work on our stage?

And finally, when I think about transformation, I think about the importance of mentorship in our theaters. Sometimes there are no words to describe how incredibly blessed I feel to be at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. Every day I have the great gift to work alongside Bill Rauch and Christopher Acebo – two of the most brilliant, and generous, men working in the American theatre. They are my teachers, they are my compass, they are my friends. We ALL need good mentors; people who will teach us how to shape, invigorate, and galvanize our theaters and communities.

This transformation I speak of (which I too fail to live up to all the time) is what has me inspired to create something like this at OSF:

Bill Rauch, March 29, 2011:

We go to the theater to be changed. You can be soothed, even unconsciously, by the non-threatening illusion that everyone sitting around you watching this story is the same as you. But how about a theater where you can trust that you will often be on uncertain and unfamiliar terrain and grow through that, that you won’t be numbed by a comfort of sameness but that you will enter a kind of crucible of our true sameness despite our wildly apparent differences? That’s the theater that we are building here together.

I think Bill is right – it’s about a theater of connection – that’s where we’re heading. Tu eres mi otro yo – you are my other self – which for me really translates to – we are ONE community. We’re on the path, dear friends, entering a kind of renaissance, and as we look to the next 50 years in the American Theatre I am filled with hope and wonder. Our journey onstage can only be as strong, our possibilities only as boundless, as the work and transformation we commit to INSIDE our institutions.  So, let us support each other! … Let’s champion each other! … Let us be generous with each other!

Thank you all, and TCG, so much.

Jacob G. Padrón is originally from Gilroy, California. In 2007 he was appointed an Associate Producer of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival under Artistic Director, Bill Rauch – a post that Jacob still holds today. As a member of Rauch’s leadership team, Jacob is instrumental in producing the 12 shows performed in repertory each season for the $29 million dollar operation. He also oversees actor contracting, produces production tours, is involved in the casting process, and spearheads the commissioning and development of new musicals for the theatre.

Jacob was formerly the Managing Director of Yale Cabaret in New Haven, Connecticut and produced over 20 new works as a part of the theatre’s 40th anniversary season. In the fall of 2006 he co-produced Suzan-Lori Parks’ 365 DAYS/365 PLAYS for Center Theatre Group. His directing credits include Luis Valdez’ LOS VENDIDOS (The Sellouts), LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS, and SEE WHAT I WANNA SEE (workshop). Jacob has worked with Steppenwolf Theatre Company, Yale Repertory Theatre, Baltimore CENTERSTAGE, and El Teatro Campesino.

A graduate of Loyola Marymount University and Yale School of Drama, Jacob is also the proud co-founder of Tilted Field Productions – an ensemble based company committed to producing story driven projects in theatre, film, TV, and new media. www.tiltedfield.com.

 

A Playwright’s Currency

By Fanny Garcia

I’ve been kind of MIA from the blogging thing since the beginning of June. I’m not quite sure how it happened. I think I was overwhelmed with everything that happened in the first weeks of the month. I am slowly but surely getting back into my writing schedule. So here is my first blog after a much needed break.

June started at hyper speed. I was at the TCG National Conference all day for a week, and Radar L.A. was happening at the same time as well. So I went from exhilarating theatre workshops during the day to jaw dropping performances by local, national and international theatre companies at night. I was exhausted by the time it all ended.

The day after this “theatrepalooza” in Los Angeles, I went back to my play reading group. We were scheduled to read “Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo” by Rajiv Joseph but ended up having a pow wow of sorts. I shared my experiences at the conference and Alejandra Cisneros shared her experiences at the Director’s Lab West which had occurred at the same time. (Alejandra wrote a fantastic piece for pLAywriting in the city called “On Being A Stage Manager.”  You can find it here: http://playwritingworld.wordpress.com/2011/05/02/on-being-a-stage-manager/)

Both of us wanted so much to share what we had seen and heard. We wanted those that had not had the opportunity to attend the conference or the performances or the lab to get some sense of what we had gone through. It was a fascinating thing to share. One that I think rekindled our passion and commitment to our craft. Not just for me and Alejandra but also for the members of the play reading group.

We are all at different levels of our artistic careers. My career is definitely in its infancy. I still walk cautiously under ever-present self-doubt, fear, and the seemingly elusive acceptance as an artist, into a theater community, or by an audience not yet defined. Sometimes it can be paralyzing and it is here where the danger lies. I’m constantly fighting the paralysis.

During the conference Todd London, Artistic Director at New Dramatists, Inc. delivered the plenary session speech. He said, “We all begin as amateurs. The word amateur from the French word love. The love of what we do.” This hit me like a tone of bricks. I am an amateur. But that doesn’t have to be a bad thing.

Why do I do what I do? Because I love it. It is my currency, one that I hold on to tightly because I live in a society that does not value art. And if it does, it is always asked in the context of what school the artist attended, who they studied under and how many times they’ve been produced, instead of asking much more important questions.  What is your story? How do you tell it? Why do you want to tell it? How can we stage it?

It may seem idealistic to think of love for theatre and writing as currency but at the moment it is all I have. My value as an artist is what I produce when I sit down in front of my MacBook Pro in my hot apartment and begin to type out a story.  Each time I do that, I am getting better at what I love.

What do I love about it? I love the tingly feeling I get when an idea starts to percolate. I love the frustration that visits me when my brain does not function properly and deciphering the idea does not come as quickly as I wish. I love the rewrites because it brings me closer to the finish product, even though I complain about them all the time.

I’ve often fought my identity as a playwright. Erroneously, my reasons have been based on how others define my value. I haven’t attended a fancy school. My playwriting education comes from a few workshops, reading American Theatre Magazine, “The Art & Craft of Playwriting”, “The Dramatist’s Toolkit: The Craft of the Working Playwright”, and a workshop production of a play that took me five years to write. I list the books because they were a great help to me and I highly recommend you pick them up at your local bookstore if you’re planning to write a play.

I haven’t owned my playwriting skills fully. I’ve let comments from people get to me. The most memorable is: “You’ve only written three plays, does that make you a playwright?” I should have replied with a resounding, “Yes, yes it does.” But instead I cowered and decided not to mention that I’d put my blood, sweat and tears into three plays. Literally. Okay, maybe not the blood but you know what I mean.

Not any more.

My name is Fanny Garcia and I am a playwright.

I may be at the beginning stages of my career. But with each new play I write, with each semester I finish at school, with each writing job I take on, and each rewrite I do… I am perfecting my craft.

The TCG Young Leaders of Color Pre-Conference Orientation

By Fanny Garcia

The last year has been a very introspective time for me. I’ve had to redefine my priorities as an artist and I’ve made several choices that I hope will put me on the path that I need to be to accomplish my goal. Since finding out that the TCG National Conference was going to take place in Los Angeles, I knew that I had to do every thing I could to make sure that I was present at every event. And just as I suspected, it’s where I need to be right now.

Today, was the first day of activities for the conference. The recipients of the Young Leaders of Color Scholarship met for a pre-conference orientation facilitated by Emilia Cachapero, the Director of Artistic Programming at TCG.

She guided us on a discussion about our current roles and responsibilities as artists of color and asked questions about the meaning of leadership. Most of the group agreed that leadership is most often perseverance. No matter how much you feel unappreciated, no matter how scarce the funding is, or how hard it is to get your work produced…we must always continue to create.

The orientation also provided a workshop conducted by Paul Robinson of the Shannon Institute. He guided us through a series of exercises to help us identify our individual core values. I jotted down several catch phrases and concepts that really resonated. Here are a few of them:

1.) You must continue to question the status quo. The answers will give way to new models of creating. New forms will arise.

2.) How can I be an agent of change?

3.) You will have to work twice as hard to get half as far.

4.) Your core values must be in a vocabulary that you can process and practice.

5.) Our core values become true when they are challenged and you are able to defend them publicly.

6.) In order to find our core values as artists, we must spend time with ourselves and discover who we truly are. If we don’t, we could end up living someone else’s agenda.

7.) Core values are principles or standards upon which we make decisions.

8.) A value is what you DO, not what you SAY.

9.) It’s important to be artists who are not ashamed about being wealth conscious or identifying wealth building as important and putting monetary worth to our talents. Being an artists and having money should not be in conflict.

10.) We should always be on a path to self-knowledge.

I’ve worked in non-profit for ten years and attending conferences is an intrinsic part of the job. I know what it’s like to attend workshop after workshop and sit in plenary sessions. But I had never been to one that was in the context of creating and sustaining a career in theater. I was so enthralled by the conversation that sometimes it was hard to articulate what I wanted to say. I just wanted to listen and be amazed.

I was blown away by the diversity that existed in all our paths. Most of the young leaders present had done virtually every position in theater! Almost all of us have worn different hats in order to create work but we have rarely stopped to discuss what our individual goals were until we were burnt out on executing someone else’s agenda. We accepted that this can be very frustrating but most agreed that the experience gained while serving in these different capacities was priceless and provided an incubation period of sorts for our individual talents. Once we were able to identify where it was that we wanted to make an impact, we did it quickly and effectively because we had so much knowledge.

I met some fantastic people today, talented and committed individuals who are creating work now and definitely looking to mentor the next generation of artists. We want to be of service to others in the field in any way that we can. However, the conversation is definitely moving into sustainability. We must be equally engaged in supporting and making art AND make sure that we also focus on building wealth. Doing so will allow us more options and provide the resources necessary to mentor and support other artists.

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The Theatre Communication Group National Conference comes to L.A!

By Fanny Garcia

For years, I’ve heard great things about this conference from colleagues and fellow artists. They rave about the workshops and the speakers and the people they meet and the amounts of wine they drink over thought provoking conversations about art and playwriting and creating and producing and I have listened each and every time with a jealous grin on my face.

But this year, it’s a whole different story.  I will not have a jealous grin on my face as I listen to the stories the attendees tell because I will be present for every bit of it. And I won’t just be any normal attendee, I’m one of the recipients of the Young Leaders of Color Scholarship! I was nominated by the multi-talented Diane Rodriguez who is currently Associate Producer and Director of New Play Production at Center Theatre Group.

The scholarship allows the recipients to attend the conference for free and partners each with a mentor. It also provides separate events geared only towards Young Leaders of Color. I’ll be attending a lunch where I’ll meet alums of the program and a mixer at Yxta Cocina Mexicana (I’ve been to this place and it’s awesome) where we can network.

The conference will take place June 16 through June 18th with workshops at the Millenium Biltmore Hotel, Dorothy Chandler Pavillion, and Central Los Angeles High School #9 School of Visual and Performing Arts.

Speakers include Susan V. Booth, Roger Copeland, Gordon Davidson (Founding Artistic Director of Center Theatre Group in Los Angeles), Mona Eltahawy (award-winning columnist and international public speaker on Arab and Muslim issues), Marcus Gardley (poet and playwright), Janie Geiser, David Houle, Nancy Keystone (Artistic Director of Critical Mass Performance Group. Fantastic!), Sage Lewis (composer), Mimi Lien (set designer), Todd London, Cricket Myers, Marsha Norman, Sonja Parks, Tanya Selvaratnam, Mark Shugoll, Julie Taymor (Yes, THE Julie Taymor), and Angel Ysaguire (director of global community investing at The Boeing Compay).

The theme of this year’s conference?

What if we imagined the theatre field of the next 50 years, and began making visible progress today?

• What if theatre weren’t seen as a luxury but as central to the fabric of our country?
• What if artists and other theatre leaders talked regularly and openly about art and aesthetics?
• What if theatre institutions and their boards committed to hiring more people of color in leadership positions?
• What if a group of billionaires created a “Giving Pledge” initiative for theatre?
• What if the US became more embedded in wars around the globe – what would become the role of theatre and artists?
• What if there were a new audience engagement model as powerful as the subscription model?
• What if theatres and artists could commit to each other for multiple years?
• What if we could solidify new business models that would truly lead to the sustainability of our theatres?

Here are some of mine:

• What if artists weren’t always struggling to make ends meet?
• What if there more theatre companies that focused on development of new work by artists of color?
• What if audiences in low-income communities didn’t see theatre as something the “elites” do?
• What if plays were promoted as an important part of theatre?

Although my primary interest is in playwriting and meeting other playwrights, the real opportunity the conference provides is creating a space where artists from all over the country can discuss the future of theatre in the United States and begin to create a blueprint for it. The conference will engage us in discussions that will force participants to think outside the artistic realms of theatre and spend time on the business innovations that will ensure its sustainability for years to come.

I am honored to have been chosen as a Young Leader of Color and will make good use of the information I collect at the conference. I’ll be keeping the readers of pLAywriting in the city informed by posting an update at the end of each day.

If you are not able to attend the TCG National Conference next week you can still make your voice heard by doing one or two or all of the following:

1.)   Check out the Theatre Communications Group Facebook page, click “Like” and post your very own “What if…?” statement. http://www.facebook.com/tcg.org

2.)   Attend one of the shows in the Radar L.A. Festival. It’s an international theatre festival coming to Los Angeles for the first time. Artists from Japan, Mexico, Australia, Ireland and Los Angeles will be performing at REDCAT. http://www.redcat.org/event/radar-la-festival.

3.)   Get yourself a prescription to American Theatre Magazine and start educating yourself about theatre across the country and the world!

4.)   Make sure theater stays alive by supporting local theater performances!