off-stage right

Today’s New York Times takes a look at shows directed by women in New York in Who’s in Charge of This Show? She Is by Patricia Cohen. Links at the end of the post for more of the discussion on Women in Theater.  But interesting points to be made from the New York Times article:

This has been something of a banner year for female directors in New York, a development that wouldn’t be worth noting if it weren’t so rare. In July alone three new Off Broadway shows directed by women (including Ms.[Judith] Ivey [Vanities]) are beginning previews. On Broadway eight shows last season — a record — had a woman in charge, with most of them garnering outsize praise for their work. “Hair,” directed by Diane Paulus, won the Tony for best musical revival this month, for example, while Phyllida Lloyd is one of the few directors — male or female — to have two shows running simultaneously (“Mamma Mia!,” which has raked in a fortune over the last eight years, and the new entrant, “Mary Stuart,” which earned Ms. Lloyd a Tony nomination).

“It’s getting better and better,” said Ms. Ivey, 57, during a break between rehearsals. The fourth-floor studio is air-conditioned to ice-cream store temperatures, so she wears a lime-green scarf wrapped around her neck. On her feet are colorful tapestry slippers. How often, she asked, do middle-aged women without an Olympic-type record get a crack at directing a show? “I feel that’s what Second Stage is doing for me,” Ms. Ivey said. She has directed a few plays in recent years but no musicals before this new version of Jack Heifner’s 1976 show. “They are giving me a chance.”

That chance, however, is something that does not come as easily or as frequently for female directors as it does for their male counterparts, many people in the theater contend.

Leigh Silverman, 35, who directed “Well” on Broadway in 2006 and the musical version of Neil Gaiman’s children’s tale “Coraline,” which is running Off Broadway, is optimistic about the uptick in directing jobs for women. “I think it is really exciting,” she said. “There were multiple women nominated for Tonys this year. In the short range it’s incredibly encouraging.” Still, she maintains: “It’s not a level playing field. There is no parity.”

Pretty much everyone in the business is quick to acknowledge that with so much money at stake, it’s understandable that producers want to work with people they know, and with people who have already had box-office success. Such established directors are generally men.

One certainly can’t deny there is no parity.  We should all be applauding the face that more women have been on Broadway in the last year which hopefully won’t be an anomaly but the new norm.   I have often said to friends that I think female directors have it more difficult than ANY other group in theater – and let’s not even discuss female directors of color!

But I have to take a moment and note that although I applaud the New York Times for writing an article on this disparity, would the reporter have described what say Michael Grief or Joe Mantello was wearing in the rehearsal studio?  Seems a bit stereotypical to me.

The last paragraph is also a bit disturbing, and perhaps a good explanation why in so many seasons we feel like we are seeing the same old thing again.  This past year included a season of more highly acclaimed shows than most seasons of the last decade.   (I have gone so far as to hypothesize that we are entering a new arts renaissance).  I have to imagine that some of the success of the last season is some new folks (or “second-timers”) mixing it up on Broadway with some amazing veterans.

What really gives women in Britain a leg up over those in New York, Ms. Lloyd said, is the nationally subsidized theater. Because of the government money, theaters — including the eminent National Theater and Royal Shakespeare Company — have been more likely to hire female directors, giving them the crucial experience of running a large production, she said.

Maria Aitken, nominated for a Tony in 2008 for her direction of another British import, “Alfred Hitchcock’s The 39 Steps,” has a similar view. “You don’t have a structure where young female directors can come and get training,” she said.

The sheer size of the United States also makes a difference. In Britain it’s not hard to lure producers and artistic directors to spend a couple of hours on a train to see a production, she said, while attending a show far from New York most likely requires a flight and an overnight stay.

Ms. Aitken, 63, who is directing Simon Gray’s play “Quartermaine’s Terms” at the Williamstown Theater Festival in Massachusetts this summer, said she wonders whether New York’s “money men” will make the journey to see it. For directors not as well known or experienced as Ms. Aitken, the web of personal relationships is even more important. Just as producers prefer to work with people they know, so do playwrights. “Everybody wants to work with their friends,” said Pam MacKinnon, 41, who is directing the premiere of Cusi Cram’s “Lifetime Burning,” for Primary Stages this summer.

Luck — a frequent character in these stories — helped Ms. MacKinnon get established. Her agent also represented Edward Albee, and he suggested that the two meet. They got together for lunch and hit it off. She has subsequently directed eight productions of Mr. Albee’s work, including the official premieres of “Peter and Jerry” and “Occupant.” She mentioned that the director Anna D. Shapiro, who won a Tony in 2008 for “August: Osage County,” has also had a longtime relationship with the playwright Tracy Letts from their collaboration at the Steppenwolf Theater Company in Chicago. (“August” is closing on Sunday, but it earned back its investment and took home an armful of Tonys last year.)

During her acceptance speech Ms. Shapiro referred to Steppenwolf and Mr. Letts, saying, “I’m pretty sure that the only way that you get to have a life in the theater is if somewhere in your life you come upon a group of people who, although they don’t need to, make room for you.”

Look we all know this business is more “about who you know” in many cases than “who is best for the job.”  A lot of these women are well-known names in the theatre industry, with good reputations about working with others, and I have to believe the producers are at a point where they can’t deny knowing about them – thanks to many of the great nonprofit theaters that have been much better at creating opportunities for female directors.  So, the network is expanding.  Perhaps a good question is how to make it expand quicker – especially at a time when there seem to be more and more female producers running shows.

But I don’t want to dismiss some important points made about the British system.  I think overall the road for young directors, male or female, is a difficult one.  The informal system in place now usually requires being an assistant for little or no pay.  Anyone who can’t support themselves from some source (other than working another job because more or less the assistant is needed endless hours a day) is excluded by time requirements.  There are a few great programs out there that could be models (ever major market in the U.S. could benefit from say a Drama League directing program), but there need to be more.  The current season will hopefully inspire some younger females to stick it out, but I couldn’t fault them if they chose a different path.  After all of the top of my head I can think of at least a dozen wonderful female directors who have never been on Broadway but have great credits for wonderful productions in New York, Chicago, Seattle, etc. but sadly it seems like most seasons only have one slot for such a director to leap to the Broadway arena.

As for Ms. Aitken, she is sick and tired of the whole subject. When she first started directing after acting for many years, she said, “I sometimes felt like a performing bear who could walk and chew gum at the same time.”

It is much better today, but, “it annoys me and upsets me even now that we have to be considered a special case,” she said. “I want to stop being an oddity.”

I couldn’t agree more!

More on the discussion of Women in Theater:

Continuing the discussion on Gender Disparity in theater:  Emily Sands – notes and impressions from June 22 Presentation

Women in Theater: Are all things equal?

Emily Sand’s OPENING THE CURTAIN ON PLAYWRIGHT GENDER full thesis

Emily Sand’s OPENING THE CURTAIN ON PLAYWRIGHT GENDER presentation from June 22