Theater

Morgan James, Torya Beard, & Richard Amelius at St. John the Divine Cathedral

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Morgan: Right around Christmas of last year, I had a dream that I did Jesus Christ Superstar with Shoshana Bean as Judas. I didn’t know Shoshana very well at the time ­– I didn’t even have her number. [Richard and Torya] were coming over for Christmas dinner, and when they came over, I said, oh, I had this dream, and they both immediately said, when are you doing that? That needs to happen. So I asked a friend for Shoshana’s number and I texted her: It’s Morgan James. I had this dream. She said something to the effect of WHEN ARE WE DOING THAT? and I thought, ok, there’s three people that I like a lot who don’t think I’m insane.

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Ayodele Casel in her studio

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AC: …That is one of the wonderful things that tap dance has given me: it teaches you to recognize your individuality from the get-go. In improvisation, you cannot be anybody else. If you aren’t being yourself, you aren’t being authentic, you aren’t being interesting, you aren’t honoring the dance that you’re doing, you aren’t honoring the art form and most importantly, you aren’t honoring yourself because we all have our own unique and wonderful point of view. If you’re paying attention, you learn very quickly to start honing some authenticity.

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Diane Paulus for the Interval

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“I think my interest in the American musical theatre is in shows that can do all of those things: they move you and they entertain you. And to be entertained, that’s a human need, the idea of diverting oneself to see something, that’s part of what we need as human beings. We also have a need to learn. We also have a human need for spectacle, which to me is defined by seeing something larger than yourself. Why do we go to a mountaintop and look at the horizon or go to an ocean? Because it’s spectacle, and you feel awe in the presence of something larger than yourself. The human need for ritual, that’s also why I love theatre. We move through something as a group. I love to do theatre that tries to drive on a lot of those cylinders. It would be great if it could be entertainment, be spectacle, be ritual, and also make us feel and think and teach us something.”
~Diane Paulus
(Full Interview)

Montego Glover at Lincoln Center

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“The good news, I feel, is that I have yet to meet a character that I didn’t have something in common with, even if on the surface we appear to have nothing in common. So I look for women—I’ve yet to play a man, but I’m sure it’s on its way—who have a story to tell, who I find interesting and compelling, since that’s the hook into wanting to tell the story. So interesting, compelling, heartfelt stories is really what I’m after.”

Montego Glover
Full Interview