Leigh Silverman: One Season, Four Off-Broadway Plays
In a season in which seven Broadway shows have been directed by women, maybe it shouldn't seem surprising that a talented director like Leigh Silverman has juggled four off-Broadway productions in the past few months. Silverman's expert handling of Lisa Kron's Well put her on the directorial map two years ago, and her smart production of Tanya Barfield's Blue Door at Playwrights Horizons made the play one of last season's highlights. Silverman's recent workload has included David Henry Hwang's tricky autobiographical drama Yellow Face, Brooke Berman's quirky romantic comedy Hunting and Gathering, Liz Flahive's forthcoming intergenerational comedy From Up Here and Kate Moira Ryan and Linda S. Chapman's Beebo Brinker Chronicles. A hit last fall for the off-off-Broadway troupe Hourglass Group, this stage adaptation of Ann Bannon's pulpy lesbian novels of the 1950s has transferred to 37 Arts with Jenn Colella now playing the title role. As her resume attests, Silverman doesn't shy away from the hard work of nurturing new plays and guiding them to the stage for the first time. In the midst of her busiest year ever, she mused about the challenges of being a freelance theater director who happens to be a woman for Broadway.com.
I was always a theater nerd. When I was a sophomore in high school, I did a theater program in England. On the first day of class the teacher made me stay after and told me, in no uncertain terms, that I was a terrible actress. Literally, she told me I was terrible. But then she told me that I was really smart and asked if I wanted to be her assistant and help direct the other students. And that was it. She handed me Chekhov and Ibsen and changed my life.
I directed my first play in high school and then went to Carnegie Mellon University and completed a dual degree in directing and playwriting. I always knew that I wanted to work on new plays, that my passion was for the collaborative process and working with live writers, so I studied playwriting as well as directing. Then I moved to New York, where I did a series of internships with Circle Repertory Theater, Women's Project and New York Theatre Workshop. Then came many years of juggling being an assistant director I had the good fortune to assist Doug Hughes and Michael Greif multiple times, among others, temping and producing my own work in tiny rooms.
And now, this season, I've somehow ended up directing four off-Broadway shows in a row: Beebo Brinker Chronicles, which began downtown at the Fourth Street Theater before transferring to 37 Arts, Yellow Face at the Public Theater, Hunting and Gathering at Primary Stages, and From Up Here at Manhattan Theatre Club. I've really been so lucky.
It's especially exciting that Beebo Brinker Chronicles is one of the first commercial theater productions in which the writers, director, lead producers and all four major designers set, costumes, sound and lights are women. I initially got involved with the show through Linda Chapman and Kate Moira Ryan. After I was plied with wine, they told me they had this great idea to adapt Ann Bannon's famous lesbian pulp books. Once I read the series, I realized they were onto something sensational, very sexy and very, very funny.
The biggest challenge in staging Beebo was in finding the right tone. Ann wrote the books with total sincerity, and we wanted to honor her style. The books have a cult following and we didn't want to make a joke out of characters beloved by so many. Also there are so many locations, so many different bedrooms, so many period props. And the sex scenes! Imagine the tedium of rehearsal! Do you know how many times I have to say, “Please kiss for longer and then pull her bra strap down further”? Really, it's so hard.
I could never have planned my current streak of off-Broadway shows. In the fall, I was in rehearsal for Beebo and pre-production for Yellow Face and Hunting and Gathering. At that time I couldn't have dreamed Beebo would have a commercial transfer and I would also be directing a show at MTC starring Julie White! So much of working freelance is like that. It's so terrifying really, never being able to plan, never knowing what could happen. And by terrifying I mean wonderful—if you don't want a social life, or need sleep, and you don't mind chronic acid reflux.
Luckily for me, I find it easier to work on multiple projects. I find that work informs work. Like when you do the crossword puzzle and you can't think of something so you go wash the dishes and when you come back the answer is right there. Well, that's how it works show to show. Multi-tasking is one of the most important skills for being a director. So is being able to compartmentalize and to seamlessly switch from obsessing over details on a micro level to working more macro. For example, you must always strive for perfection of any single little beat, but then also step back and look at the big picture.
Everybody knows it's really hard to make money working in the theater. From my limited vantage point, it seems Broadway provides the opportunity to make a living. It is also the opportunity to be very publicly celebrated or humiliated. If you do a play on Broadway you must make something that will appeal to a thousand people a night, mostly tourists. If you don't succeed, you close very quickly, and then you are very sad. Despite being one of the best reviewed plays of the 2006 season, my production of Well closed after only 57 performances.
If you direct a play off-Broadway you're generally working in a not-for-profit, which loses money on every show anyway, so the goals are different. Off-off-Broadway, you are too busy shopping for your own props to have goals. I actually missed the opening night of Beebo in the fall because I was directing a corporate event to help pay my rent for the month I was working on that show. So I'm particularly excited for opening night this time around.