10 Questions
Take Ten - AARON POSNER
Playwright, director, teacher, and former artistic director AARON POSNER returns to Theater J to direct Edward Albee's 2001 play Occupant, focusing on sculptor Louise Nevelson's feminist and Jewish identity within the art world. Posner, a six-time Helen Hayes Award-winner, has directed plays in theaters across the country, and here in the D.C.-area he's been at the helm of scores of productions including his adaptation of Anton Chekov's The Seagull, Stupid Fucking Bird (Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, 2013), and Lanford Wilson's Talley's Folly, the last play he directed at Theater J, in 2018. Now that he's back at Theater J, Posner says he's enjoying working with Adam Immerwahr's talented team and that the play's actors "have attacked it with tremendous passion, diligence and intelligence." In this week's Take Ten from theatreWashington, Posner tells us about how he got involved with theater at an early age, a case of stage fright, dinner with The Bard, and why he'd advise everyone to study the theater. Occupant runs through December 8. And next at Folger Theatre, his production of The Merry Wives of Windsor starting January 14.
1) What was the first show you ever saw, and what impact did it have?
The first one I remember was The Pied Piper at Carnival Theatre at the University of Oregon when I was maybe five or six. I was enthralled. I still have very vivid images of it. I remember being quite moved and upset by the story. I think I was always highly susceptible to the power of theatre. And I still am.
2) What was your first involvement in a theatrical production?
The Musicians of Bremen Town in 2nd grade. I think I was Robber number 2. In third grade Charlie VanRysselberghe and Mitch Olsen and I won the all-school talent show with a skit we created called How to Make a Monster. I was in a 45-minute version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream in 4th grade. I wore the ripped-up lining of my mom’s old green raincoat and tights. And it just keeps going…
3) What’s your favorite play or musical, and why do you like it so much?
There are a lot. I love stories that are smart, moving and highly theatrical in one way or another. Sarah Ruhl’s Eurydice. Stoppard’s Arcadia. Sondheim’s Sunday in The Park with George and Merrily We Roll Along. Shaw’s Man & Superman. Mary Zimmerman’s version of The Arabian Nights. Beckett’s Godot and Endgame. A Christmas Carol. Stories that are worthwhile… and never boring.
4) What’s the worst day job you ever took?
Cleaning the grill, floors and ovens and all at Jeb’s Good-Dogs in Eugene, Oregon when I was 15. It was a greasiest place you could possibly imagine. Just gross. Though the food was great!
5) What is your most embarrassing moment in the theatre?
About fifteen years ago I moved into the role of the narrator in my own adaptation of The Chosen at a major regional theatre during their extension week. The original, excellent actor couldn’t do the extension week, and I actually volunteered. I became terrified. Petrified. About two thirds of the way though the first performance I paused a moment to notice how well it was going… and immediately went up and stood on stage, facing the audience, saying nothing for maybe… oh, 30 seconds or so. It felt like an hour. I had never wanted a trap door in the stage so badly. Deeply, deeply embarrassing.
6) What are you enjoying most about working on Edward Albee's Occupant at Theater J?
Honestly, the people I am working with. Great cast. Great staff. Artistic Director Adam Immerwahr leads a terrific team at Theater J. Our design team of Nephalie Andonyadis and Jesse Belsky have created something quite smart and very beautiful. Occupant is a complicated play, and our wonderful actors Susan Rome and Jonathan David Martin have attacked it with tremendous passion, diligence and intelligence every single day for the past month. I have followed their lead. And it has been an honor to do so.
7) Other than your significant other, who’s your dream date (living or dead) and why?
It would have to be dinner with Shakespeare. Just too curious about who this remarkable, insightful poet could have been and how he could have seen and understood all that he saw and understood.
8) What is your dream role/job?
I live in daily gratitude that I’ve had the opportunity to spend my life doing things I most love to do: Writing plays, directing plays, and teaching theatre. I feel privileged beyond all reason and I love pretty much every project and every day I am in a theatre, rehearsal room or classroom. That said… I would love to direct some more big musicals. I haven’t gotten to do as many of those as I would like.
9) If you could travel back in time, what famous production or performance would you choose to see?
Peter Brook’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream in 1970 or so. It was a game-changer for modern re-imaging of Shakespeare and all classics, and I would have loved to have seen it live.
10) What advice would you give to an 8-year-old smitten by theatre / for a graduating MFA student?
Well, I am the father of an 8-year-old smitten by theatre, so I am trying to figure that out all the time! I never know if I would advise anyone to make a career in the live theatre—it is very complicated world, and not an easy one. But I would give EVERYONE the advice to study theatre. It is an amazing training ground for empathy, compassion and humanity. It can teach you who you are, who you want to be, and help you see yourself, others and the world around you more fully and more wonderfully.
AARON POSNER is a playwright, director, teacher, and former artistic director. He’s very pleased to return to Theater J where he previously directed his own plays The Chosen and Life Sucks, as well as Broken Glass, Everything Is Illuminated, and Talley’s Folly. His other adaptations, plays and musicals include The Heal, JQA, Me…Jane: The Dreams & Adventures of Young Jane Goodall, The Gift of Nothing, Stupid Fucking Bird, No Sisters, District Merchants, Who Am I This Time? & Other Conundrums of, Cyrano, My Name Is Asher Lev, Sometimes a Great Notion, and more. He has directed more than 150 productions at major regional theaters across the country, is a Distinguished Guest Artist-In-Residence at American University, and has won multiple awards for his work across the country, including six Helen Hayes Awards. He lives outside of Washington D.C. with his remarkable wife, actress Erin Weaver, and his amazing daughter, Maisie.
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