Of course I believe in free will. I have no choice.
Isaac Bashevis Singer
Imagine that I am essentially cynical and selfish. Imagine that what a friend of mine who works at one of Seattle Big Houses once told me is true: that the only reason I write this blog is because I’m mad that they won’t produce my plays. Imagine that my outrage has always been, and will always be, essentially self-serving. Come on. Imagine. Like the man says, it’s easy if you try.
It would explain a lot actually, like why nearly a year ago I felt safe saying in a post titled “On Institutional Arrogance”:
Allow me to honor the clarity of Intiman’s ultimatum with some clarity of my own: I hope they die. I hope they do it soon and with a minimum of suffering. And most of all I hope they do it without siphoning precious funds from the rest of us who make theatre in the Pacific Northwest.
It didn’t take a psychic to know that , despite then Artistic Director, Kate Whoriskey’s guilt-trippy pandering plea, they were highly unlikely to raise the half a million dollars they were asking for in what I called their “shoot-the-puppy” campaign. So I bet the safe money and called for them to close their doors. Cynical. Self-serving. And ultimately dead accurate.
Similarly but conversely, when the Intiman announced last August that they would keeping Andrew Russell on as “consulting artistic director” and that his goal for 2012 would be “….to establish a loose collective of playwrights, directors, actors, designers and others to devise projects for Intiman to produce, in a short “micro-season” mounted next summer…” I kept my mouth shut. Here was a situation not so easy for a self-serving cynic to prognosticate.
Then in November Russell made his plans plainer. This from The Stranger’s Slog:
At a press conference earlier today, Intiman announced it was going to make a go of it after all, with a four-play summer festival, a repertory company of 12 actors, and artistic direction from Andrew Russell. The four-play season is a “split focus,” as Russell put it, between Intiman regulars and a potential new crowd that wants to see newer, weirder, more local work.
Reading further down I learned that Russell had recruited for his bold new strategy some of Seattle’s most exciting (and mostly young) talents like Marya Sea Kaminski, Michael Place, and Jennifer Zeyl; topping it off by somehow snagging the venerable Dan Savage to provide the original work for Russell’s four play plan. This was no longer a “shoot-the-puppy” campaign. This was a “Honey-look-at–this-adorable-puppy-I-brought–home-for-Christmas!” campaign. And a very sexy puppy at that. When you’ve been as cynical and self-serving as I have, for as long as I have, you learn not to bet against this kind of talent. I kept my mouth shut again and waited to see if the “phoenix Intiman” could raise the million they were now asking for. I suspected they would.
And late last night we found out they did.
I have met Andrew Russell. He was gracious enough to come hear an early reading of my new play Ballard House Duet. Along with a handful of other trusted colleagues, he gave some truly insightful feedback. It’s clear to me that Andrew is extraordinarily talented at motivating people and, more importantly, money. In the world of 21st Century regional theatre, you really cannot ask for more of an artistic director. And Andrew has a few other things going for him. He’s young. He’s ambitious, and unlike his predecessor Kate Whoriskey, he owes his position not to sinecure but his own pluck and determination. In short, he earned it. What’s more, he’s making deep connections with the amazing talent native to Seattle. All this bodes well for the success of his career, if not necessarily for the sustained success of Intiman. But then again, I think I have been clear in the past how much I care whether the institution we formerly knew as the Intiman lives or dies. Instead I say, long live the talent represented in the team Andrew has assembled, and long live his own talent for recognizing and organizing it.
And if, as I cynically suspect, Andrew ultimately winds up on the same path as a few promising rookie Mariners, eventually proving himself worthy of a trade to the Yankees in a few years, well then, I may grumble and bitch, but I will still watch in quiet admiration when he belts one over the bleachers in New York.
