ATW - Downstage Center

Austin Pendleton, director of the recent production of "The Three Sisters" at Classic Stage Company in New York, talks about the many Chekhov productions he's appeared in and directed over the years, including five "Uncle Vanya"s and four "Three Sisters". He talks about falling in love with theatre via his mother's involvement in community theatre in his hometown of Warren, Ohio; writing original musicals while an undergraduate theatre student at Yale; being directed by Jerome Robbins in his first two major shows after college, "Oh, Dad, Poor Dad, Mama's Hung You in the Closet and I'm Feeling So Sad" and "Fiddler on the Roof"; how he began his directing career with "Tartuffe" at the Williamstown Theatre Festival and his long association with that company; and why unlike many directors who begin as actors he has never given up performing. He also considers the evolution of his writing career, starting with the elongated development of "Booth", which began as a college musical and ultimately made it to New York 34 years later as a play; why he wrote "Uncle Bob", his most produced play, for actor George Morfogen out of guilt; his hesitancy about showing "Orson's Shadow" to anyone and how Steppenwolf Theatre, where he is a company member, lured it away from him; and why he agreed to write the book for the musical "A Minister's Wife" for Chicago's Writer's Theatre. Original air date - March 16, 2011.

Barry Grove, Executive Producer of the Manhattan Theatre Club, talks about his three-and-half decades of partnership with Lynne Meadow at the top of one of New York's largest not-for-profit theatres. He recalls about his introduction to theatre while growing up in Madison CT; his college experiences at Dartmouth and his participation in the very first semester of The O'Neill Theatre Center's National Theatre Institute; his earliest experiences working in New York Theatre while still a student; coming to MTC when there was only a staff of six in a theatre complex on the east side that they couldn't afford to fully use; the company's transition from neighborhood venue to midtown mainstay at City Center; the long search for a permanent Broadway home; and explains how he's still energized by work at the same company after so long, and the challenges still ahead. Original air date - March 9, 2011.

Elizabeth Marvel talks about whether being "a bad kid" has influenced her more daring stage performances, and discusses the challenges of remaining alienated from her on stage family in Jon Robin Baitz's "Other Desert Cities" while she grows ever closer to her castmates. She also discusses how she was drawn to theatre after a small town upbringing, including the moment when she knew she had to act; the influence of her Juilliard mentor, the late Michael Langham, both on her craft and her career; how she managed to get jobs at Canada's Stratford Festival, The Guthrie and A.R.T in her first year out of school; what it was like to switch between Mark Ravenhill's "Shopping and Fucking" and Wendy Wasserstein's "An American Daughter" in the same year; why she is so drawn to work with director Ivo van Hove on such classic plays as "A Streetcar Named Desire" and "The Little Foxes", and how that work has expanded her range as an actor; how her pregnancy informed her performance as a lizard in Edward Albee's "Seascape"; what it was like to work with playwright and director Woody Allen; how violence has been a recurring theme in her performances, including Michael Weller's "50 Words"; and how she handled the decidedly mixed response from audiences to Caryl Churchill's "Top Girls". Original air date - March 2, 2011.

Interviewed at the keyboard, composer Stephen Schwartz chronicles his career from college to "Wicked" and beyond. He explains how "Pippin" began as a college musical based on one paragraph in a history book and a deep love of "The Lion in Winter", and how the show that ended up as the Broadway version was completely different; tells the story of being asked to write songs for "Godspell" with only five weeks until the show's first rehearsal; plays and sings his first song ever to be heard on Broadway, from the play "Butterflies are Free"; talks about structuring a musical around a lead actor who didn't sing at all, for "The Magic Show", and whether he's disappointed that the show's technical demands have limited subsequent productions; describes how he developed and directed "Working", and why he made the decision to invite other composers onto the project; shares his feelings about the original productions of "The Baker's Wife", "Rags" and "Children of Eden", and why they met with greater success after their first incarnations; reveals that he has gone back and rewritten some of the lyrics for Leonard Bernstein's "Mass" -- with utter fidelity to every note that Bernstein wrote; gives his opinion on whether writing songs for animated films such as "Pocahontas" and "Prince of Egypt" is just like working on a Broadway show; relates how he began seeking to option "Wicked" even before he'd read the book; recounts his involvement as a producer on the musical "The Blue Flower", written by others, at American Repertory Theater -- and why he won't be producing again; and talks about what he's learned about writing for the musical theatre from his 15 years running the ASCAP Musical Theater Workshop. Original air date - February 23, 2011.

While playing both a farmer and his wife in Red Bull Theatre Company's "The Witch of Edmonton", Everett Quinton talks about appearing in Jacobean drama and getting to watch the rest of the company at work when he's not on stage. He also talks about studying theatre at Hunter College after a stint in Thailand during the Vietnam War; meeting Ridiculous Theatrical Company founder Charles Ludlam without really understanding who Ludlam was; becoming Ludlam's life partner and a member of the Ridiculous Company's "outer circle" of artists; becoming an actor under the tutelage of Ludlam; coming into his own as a performer in such pieces as "Galas" and "The Mystery of Irma Vep", confessing he only really came to understand "Vep" 14 years after its debut, when he directed it in revival, even though he'd performed in it 331 times; how Quinton came to be a leading actor and the costume designer for the Ridiculous; the challenge of sustaining the troupe after Ludlam's death from AIDS in 1987, when he assumed the mantle of artistic director; whether he was able to expand his own theatrical horizons after Ludlam's passing; what it meant to become a working actor when the Ridiculous closed in 1997; having the opportunity to do work in regional theatres such as McCarter and The Shakespeare Theatre; and the experience of auditioning to play the Wicked Stepmother in a tour of Rodgers and Hammerstein's "Cinderella" when all of the other finalists were women. Original air date - February 16, 2011.

During her visit to the Brooklyn Academy of Music with the Abbey Theatre's production of Ibsen's "John Gabriel Borkman", Fiona Shaw discusses taking on one point of this lesser-known play's unromantic triangle and links her work with co-stars Alan Rickman and Lindsay Duncan back to their membership in the Royal Shakespeare Company 25 years ago. She also talks about having to get a degree in philosophy before she was allowed to enroll at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art; her quick leap from RADA to the stage of the National Theatre in "The Rivals" -- and why she stayed too long; the unique confluence of talents that came together at the RSC during her time there; her ongoing collaboration with director Deborah Warner and the uproars that accompanied their productions of Beckett's "Footfalls" and Shakespeare's "Richard II"; why she spent a lot of time as "Hedda Gabler" rearranging the furniture; how she finds modern equivalencies in the great tragedies like "Medea" and "Electra"; her first encounter with Chekhov, doing "The Seagull" under the director Peter Stein, and how the rehearsal process at Stein's Italian home influenced the production; how she and Warner were permitted to do Beckett's "Happy Days" after being "banned for life" from Beckett's work 13 years prior; how she approached T.S. Eliot's poem "The Waste Land" as a theatrical text; and the great fun she had throwing off her tragedian's mantle to appear in "London Assurance" with Simon Russell Beale. Original air date - February 9, 2011.

Stockard Channing discusses her work in Jon Robin Baitz's new play "Other Desert Cities", acknowledging the ambiguity of the character for the audience and explaining whether she has defined her character's secret motivations with certainty. She also talks about her years breaking into theatre at Harvard, alongside other students like John Lithgow and Tommy Lee Jones, and her subsequent work around Boston before coming to New York and getting her increasingly bigger break in the Broadway musical "Two Gentlemen of Verona", which also began her association with John Guare; her years in Los Angeles, including a film gig she did simply because she needed money, namely "Grease"; her return to the stage in successive productions of "A Day in the Death of Joe Egg" at Williamstown, Long Wharf, Roundabout and finally Broadway; being given the opportunity to choose between playing Bunny and Bananas in the Lincoln Center Theatre revival of "The House of Blue Leaves"; how it felt, as a native Upper East Side New Yorker, playing an Upper East Side New Yorker in "Six Degrees of Separation", and how her performance had to change when she acted in the film version; whether she knew how divided response would be to Guare's "Four Baboons Adoring the Sun"; why she wasn't daunted about stepping into the shoes of Rosemary Harris or Katharine Hepburn for "The Lion in Winter" in 1999 -- and what about doing the show did give her pause; what it was like to do "Pal Joey", her first musical in over two decades (having previously followed Liza Minnelli into "The Rink"); and how she approached the role of Lady Bracknell in "The Importance of Being Earnest" for a production at the Gaiety Theatre in Dublin, Ireland last year. Original air date - February 2, 2011.

From Arena Stage's newly opened Mead Center for American Theater, artistic director Molly Smith discusses the development and construction of the new building, which encompasses the company's original theatres and adds a third stage, and how the plans for the venue began during her interview process by the board back in the late 1990s. She also talks about her connection to theatre in her youth, first in Washington State and then in Juneau, Alaska; her theatre studies and 7-year residency in Washington DC in the 70s, when she had the opportunity to see the early work of Arena Stage; her return to Juneau to found the Perseverance Theatre, which she led for 19 years, and how that company operated within the geography and frontier spirit of Alaska; how she managed to get the Arena job without a more traditional artistic resume; the theatrical scene she found in Washington upon her return, and how that led her to focus Arena Stage on American works, both new and classic; and what her personal focus on classic American musicals over the past decade has meant to her creatively. Original air date - January 26, 2011.

Playwright/director Geroge C. Wolfe discusses the seven year development of John Guare's "A Free Man of Color", from approaching Guare with the idea of merging Restoration comedies and life in New Orleans leading up to the Louisiana Purchase, to receiving a script that would have run some five hours, to the just-finished production at Lincoln Center Theater. He also recalls his earliest directing urges as a child in Frankfort KY; provides the details of the first play he ever wrote, "Up for Grabs", while a student at Pomona College; recounts the "horror" of his first professional productions, his musical "Paradise!" in both Cincinnati and New York; describes the sudden success of "The Colored Museum" and the subsequent development of "Spunk", the latter being the first time he directed his own work; explains who he sees as his collaborators when he's both writing and directing; recounts his combative but ultimately fruitful work with Gregory Hines on "Jelly's Last Jam"; lays out the whirlwind of work that surrounded the Broadway production of "Angels in America" and his concurrent hiring as artistic director of New York's The Public Theater; acknowledges that his role as The Public's producer forced the artist in him to take a back seat; considers his ongoing artistic relationship with actor Jeffrey Wright; reveals the conceptual work that animated the household objects that were so integral to the story of "Caroline, or Change"; and answers the question of whether he will ever write another play. Original air date - January 19, 2011.

"The Addams Family" and "Elf"'s lighting designer Natasha Katz talks about the path of her career, beginning with a high school community service requirement that saw her volunteering at a (now-defunct) Off-Broadway theatre and her semester away from Oberlin College as an intern/observer of designer Roger Morgan on the musical "I Remember Mama" which brought her into immediate contact with such notables as Liv Ullmann and Richard Rodgers. She discusses her on the job training (sans graduate school) with such figures as special effects whiz Bran Ferren and lighting designers Marcia Madeira and Ken Billington; explains why she thinks it takes longer now to mount a musical than it did when she began; how a tumultuous relationship with director Clifford Williams led to her Broadway debut at a very young age; what she learned from her work Off-Broadway and in regional theatre, including some 30 productions at the Dallas Theatre Center; why her task is to focus on two key elements -- people and sets -- and to both separate and unite them; how she comes to love a show that she didn't necessarily enjoy reading simply by virtue of working on it; when she joins the creative process with the director and other designers -- and whether that's always at the right time; how she constantly references and stays familiar with lighting in other shows and even other mediums; what it was like to be part of a triumvirate of designers for "The Coast of Utopia"; and why she thinks lighting design was initially very open to female designers and why she believes it's headed in the wrong direction today. Original air date - January 12, 2011.

From his home base in Scarborough, England, playwright and director Sir Alan Ayckbourn makes a return visit to "Downstage Center" during the run of his 74th play, "Life of Riley". He discusses why he chooses to mention his parents' unhappy marriage in his program biography; why so many of his plays involve infidelity; his feeling about happy endings; the challenge and opportunity of creating characters who never appear on stage, but are often spoken about, as is the title character in "Riley"; whether as a director of his own plays he enjoys the benefit of knowing what every character is thinking; the advice he gives to other directors who are tackling his plays and seek him out; his feeling about star casting and how it influenced his early hit "How The Other Half Loves"; why he imposed a moratorium on his plays being done in the West End for several years and why it remains in place for his new plays; the experience of bringing work to New York to critical acclaim ("Private Fears in Public Places", "Intimate Exchanges" and "My Wonderful Day") and why he's content to have it seen for a limited run in a small venue; why he called off plans for "Private Fears" to be remounted with an American cast; whether he can still create "event theatre" along the lines of "The Revenger's Comedies", "The Norman Conquests" and "House and Garden"; and whether he misses being the artistic director of the Stephen Joseph Theatre, his primary occupation for the better part of four decades. Original air date - January 5, 2011.

Composer John Kander talks about his decades-long collaboration with Fred Ebb, with particular focus on the four projects that were not fully completed before Ebb's death in 2004: "The Scottsboro Boys", "The Visit", "All About Us" (aka "Over and Over") and "Curtains", speaking directly to the issues of utilizing the minstrel show construct for "Scottsboro". He recalls his first meeting Ebb and their earliest, never produced collaboration, "Golden Gate"; beginning work on "Cabaret", at the behest of Hal Prince, the morning after "Flora the Red Menace" opened; what factors resulted in "Chicago" being only a moderate success in the 70s but a smash in the 90s; why he thinks musicals are best written at a certain "remove" from their subjects; whether he believes there is a "signature" Kander and Ebb writing style; how he, Ebb and and their collaborators spent a great deal of time talking, asking "what if," long before any writing began; whether any of the more than 60 songs written for "Cabaret", most unused, will ever escape his "trunk"; what it was like to write for the particular voices of Liza Minnelli and Chita Rivera; whether he thinks writing teams benefit from working in the same room, as he and Ebb did throughout their career together; and what he's working on now. Kander also demonstrates how the same melody can be used to change tone over the course of a show, using examples from "Cabaret" and "The Visit". Original air date - December 29, 2010.

Having recently steered "Driving Miss Daisy" to Broadway, director David Esbjornson discusses what it's like to direct a "brand," why he thinks older actors can play younger much more easily than the other way around, and what it was like to work with powerhouse actors like Vanessa Redgrave and James Earl Jones. He also talks about growing up as the child of a high school drama teacher in Minnesota and how The Guthrie Theatre developed theatrical influence and inspiration among audiences in a five-state area during his formative years; reflects on working with his grad schoolmate Tony Kushner on the very first production of "Angels in America" at Eureka Theatre; explains how he came to collaborate with Arthur Miller on "The Ride Down Mt. Morgan" and "Resurrection Blues", and with Edward Albee on "The Goat, or Who is Sylvia?"; considers the different experiences of being artistic director at Classic Stage Company in New York and Seattle Repertory Theatre, and how they compare to being a freelance director; and ponders what challenges he'd most like to tackle in the coming years. Original air date - December 22, 2010.

Founding artistic director of both the Yale Repertory Theatre in New Haven and the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, Robert Brustein discusses how each of those organizations came into being, including the circumstances surrounding his departure from Yale which led him to take the company to Harvard. He also discusses his early years as an actor, in academia and as a critic; how he managed the dual rules of being the head of an artistic institution as well as a working critic commenting on the work of others - including why he took a hiatus during most of the Yale years but returned to the critical role while at A.R.T.; whether he has any regrets about his debate with August Wilson over the role of African-American plays and theatres; his many books on theatre thus far as well as several coming up; and his recent turn to play writing, with a focus on stories about William Shakespeare. Original air date - December 15, 2010.

Stephen Ouimette, who plays Bejart in the current Broadway revival of "La Bête", talks about what it takes to hold the stage, with little dialogue, throughout the show's fabled 30 minute opening monologue -- especially after having played the voluble role of Valere himself almost 20 years ago in his native Canada. He also discusses his acting training at the University of Windsor; joining The Young Company at the Grand Theatre in London, Ontario immediately after graduation; his 17 (soon to be 18) seasons with Canada's famed Stratford Festival, where his roles have included Mozart in "Amadeus", Hamlet and Richard III; how he has kept himself fresh by alternating work at Stratford with work at many of Canada's major companies; his prior forays to the U.S., including plays at Chicago Shakespeare and a run at City Center in New York in 1998; how he feels about Stratford's "The Importance of Being Earnest", in which he played Rev. Chasuble, coming to New York without him; his rare forays into musicals, notably "Oliver!" in Edmonton and "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum" in Stratford; what it has been like to make his Broadway and West End debuts in a single year; his anticipation of appearing with Brian Dennehy in both "Twelfth Night" and "The Homecoming" in summer 2011 at Stratford; and the singular experience of playing Oliver Welles in the television series "Slings and Arrows", which afforded him the opportunity to work one last time with his early mentor, legendary Canadian actor William Hutt. Original air date - December 8, 2010.