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"No Child..." Information

from Dramaturge Tiffany Tang

No Child… Playwright: Nilaja Sun

Biographical
Lower East Side, NYC native
Born 1975 (ish) - 37 this year
African/Puerto Rican American, raised by Italian stepfather
Catholic school educated ("I didn't know I was black until I went to college.")
BA in Theatre from Franklin and Marshall College, Lancaster PA
Theatre training at La MaMa Performing Arts Program, NYC
First solo NY performance La Nubia Latina (1996)
Idolizes Robin Williams
Has a dog
Lost her grandmother in 2004, whose name was "Villodas," a name synonymous with "teacher" in her grandmother's hometown of Guayama, Puerto Rico
In 2006: "I think it's really important to find some part of you that has faith.  I'm at a real high point right now, and I've been in really low points. It's so important to believe in something to stay centered, balanced and sane."

On becoming a teaching artist
Teaching Artist since 1998 - something she was "drawn to" -- "I wanted to serve humanity in some way."  Felt that "something was missing" in her odd jobs waiting tables and clowning at parties.
Started as a Teaching Artist with the National Shakespeare Theatre at suggestion of friends doing one-hour performances of Romeo and Juliet in NYC public schools, then worked with Epic Theatre Ensemble and others.

"I saw how things were around the schools.  It was shocking, the attitude and the discipline problems.  It made me want to wait tables again." One of her colleagues notes that her primary teaching tactic is to "mirror students back to themselves" even when the portrayal is unflattering. Doesn't want to stop teaching, even with success of No Child...

"I want to be [in the classroom] every Tuesday.  I want to remember the kids.  I want to remember their spirit and their energy.  I want to be reminding myself what it is to be a Teaching Artist while I'm showing the world what a Teaching Artist is.  Also, I always associate acting with being honest.  If you walk into a classroom, you have got to be honest.  You can't lie to yourself."

"The people who don't have access to theatre need it the most."  ie, schools, students
Teaching Artist as shaman:  "The kids go on a journey, and the TA helps them follow it through."  6-week conduit between students and teacher.

On No Child…
Seventh solo performance creation, although originally written for multiple actors
Semi-autobiographical
One-hour format, Sun attributes to the fact that she was "raised on television" and values brevity in storytelling
Doesn't recall writing the play - "it emerged"
Director Hal Brooks helped her to clarify characters through physical (finger snapping, hands on hips, crotch grabbing, hyperactive shirt tugging) and verbal (wheezing, lisping, sucking teeth) cues and tics.
"Wanted to have fun - to tell a story that desperately needs telling, but to make the battle cry in a jocular, optimistic voice."
"I wanted to create a funny piece to really show the sense of humor of our kids, but I wanted to also make it very truthful."

Students:  Notes that groups of teenagers are feared, and not seen as individuals.  Hopes that her show will help them to be seen as unique people, as characters from the play.
Teachers:  Wants show to be a point of recognition for teachers as well, for their work.  "You're a teacher and you feel like no one is listening to you or understands what you are going through...A breather for teachers to feel good about the work they are doing."
Janitor:  "The [janitor, crossing guard, lunch ladies] can tell you the history of the school.  They never give up.  When the janitor passes away, his soul is still in the building.  So this is a love letter to those who have never quit on our kids."
"A magnifying glass is pointed towards the teachers and the administrators all of the time, and not at the community.  They need to understand how having schools that fail affects all of us."

Details of original production
Commissioned by Epic Theatre Ensemble in 2006.  Sun was one of the original members of Epic, which had its first "business day" on 9/11 and has an extensive educational outreach program in NYC
Melissa Friedman, Artistic Director: "I think the show empowers voices, which is part of Epic's mission statement."

Another interesting quote from MF:  "I believe a healthy democracy encourages multiple points of view, encourages debate.  Nilaja has all of these constituencies communicating on the central issue of education...Democracy is about voices, and I don't think it was an accident that democracy and drama were born in the same moment in western culture."  (Note from TT:  not sure if the "drama" reference is to something specific?  Not clarified in that article but I thought it was a great soundbite anyway.)
Ran April 29 – June 18, 2006: World Premiere at The Beckett Theatre at Theatre Row, 410 West 42nd Street

Winner of 2007 Drama Desk Award, 2007 Outer Critics Circle Award, 2007 Lucille Lortel Award, 2007 Theatre World Award, 2007 OBIE Award for original production.

"No Child… is an insightful and hilarious look into the New York City Public Education system by acclaimed actor and teaching artist, Nilaja Sun. Ms. Sun transforms into the teachers, students, parents, administrators, janitors, and security guards who inhabit our schools every day and are shaping the future of America. Commissioned in association with the New York State Council on the Arts and presented with additional support from John J. Sharkey"
Sets: Narelle Sissons; Costumes: Jessica Gaffney; Lights: Mark Barton; Sound: Ron Russell; Production Stage Manager: Tom Taylor; Production Manager: Jee S. Han; Publicity: O&M Co.

Honors
For her creation and performance of No Child... and its subsequent national tour, Nilaja Sun garnered 17 awards including: an Obie Award, a Lucille Lortel Award, two Outer Critics Circle Awards including the John Gassner playwriting award for Outstanding New American Play, a Theatre World Award, the Helen Hayes Award, and an LA Ovation Award and was named the Best One-Person Show at the U.S. Comedy Arts Festival,  2008 Joseph Jefferson Award for Solo Performance at the Lookingglass Theatre Company in Chicago, Illinois.

Princess Grace Award Recipient 2005 (playwrighting) - enabled her to "live life as an artist" sans day jobs.  At a United Federation of Teachers Conference in 2007, president Randi Weingarten said, "Nilaja Sun is doing more for our cause than anyone has in years."

All you ever wanted to know about InnerMission's "No Child..."

InnerMission Productions, in collaboration with the Mesa College Drama Department, is proud to present the San Diego Premiere of No Child… by Nilaja Sun May 12-20, 2012.  No Child... can be seen at the Apolliad Theater at San Diego Mesa College 7250 Mesa College Dr., San Diego, CA, 92111

“What you are about to see is a story about a play within a play within a play”

Nilaja Sun spent six weeks teaching/directing a play during No Child Left Behind.   The play she directed was Our Country’s Good, which is about a group of Australian royal marines and convicts putting on a production of The Recruiting Officer. But that's not what No Child... is about, really.

Sun takes this six-week experience and tells a very compelling story about what it’s like being an outsider in a system that is troubled; with kids who are troubled and a project that never had a chance.  She gets it all pretty much right.  It is a bold and insightful piece of theatre that doesn’t preach, doesn’t name names.  It just shows one powerful experience.

And it leaves no one behind.

The playwright performs No Child… as a one-woman show and licenses it out for theatrical productions.  Mesa College acting students work alongside professional actors for this San Diego premiere.

Performance Dates/Times:

8:00 p.m. Saturday, May 12; 2:00 p.m. Sunday, May 13; 8:00 p.m. Thursday, May 17; 8:00 p.m. Friday, May 18; 2:00 p.m. Saturday, May 19; 8:00 p.m. Saturday, May 19; 2:00 p.m. Sunday, May 20, 2012

Cast:

Janitor Baron- Rhys Green; Ms. Sun- Lynae DePriest; Ms. Tam- Justine Hince; Coca- Rebekah Ensley; Jerome- Brandon Kelly; Brian- Robert Malave; Shondrika- Bianca Ostojich; Xiomara- Dempsey Davis; Jose- Carlos Angel-Barajas; Chris- John Rogers; Mrs. Kennedy- Delia Knight; Security Guard- Kent Gandola; Phillip- Marc Amial Caro; Mrs. Projensky- JennieOlson-Six; Mr. Johnson- Patrick Mayuyu; Doña Guzman- Olivia Ruiz Marrujo

About the Collaboration:

Each spring the Mesa College Theatre Department invites a local production company to take up residency in the Apolliad Theatre.  This affords students the opportunity to work along-side experienced artists while learning their craft, and gain professional credit as well.  It also provides a temporary venue for a “homeless” theatre company including access to scenic shop, costume shop, rehearsal spaces, and other production facilities.  This year we are proud to announce a partnership with respected InnerMission Productions headed up by Carla Nell, and Kym Pappas.  This marks the third time Mesa College Theatre has collaborated with outside groups.  Previous ventures involved the San Diego Asian American Theatre, and Common Ground Theatre.

About InnerMission Productions:

InnerMission Productions is Carla Nell and Kym Pappas. InnerMission Productions strives to provide artists and audiences with a safe place for exploration and transformation. We are on a mission to produce theatre in San Diego that inspires our community.

 Production Company:

Directors: Carla Nell, Kym Pappas

Playwright: Nilaja Sun

Mesa College Administrators: Kris Clark & George Ye

Stage Manager: Ashleigh Bodie

Scenic Design: Kasey Snowder

Lighting Design: Mark Butterfuss

Costume Design:  Jessie Monteiro

Sound Design: Kym Pappas & Carla Nell

Props Master: Wendy Savage

Dramaturg: Tiffany Tang

Marketing and Publicity: Kevin Six, Joe Fejeran, Lisa Davis

Mesa College Dramatic Arts Mission:

It is the mission of the Dramatic Arts Program to provide a comprehensive lower division curriculum that provides training, mentoring, and experience in all aspects of the Dramatic Arts. Students prepare for success either in the transfer process or in seeking employment within the industry, an industry that is prevalent in the San Diego and Southern California areas. The program embraces diversity in all of our course work and co-curricular activities. We also provide a strong connection to the community through outreach and production activities.

Mesa College offers an intensive four semester Associate Arts Degree in theatre studies.  Students take classes in acting, movement, voice, scenic design, lighting design, costume construction, make-up, production marketing, and production management.  In addition to course work all students are assigned main stage roles, appointed designer and department heads. What makes this program extremely unique is the immediate hands-on training you receive.  The company emphasizes theatre production as a collaborative art

form where mutual respect for all disciplines enhances process and production standards.

“No Child, the one woman show written and performed by Nilaja Sun, is a tour-de-force exploration of the New York City public school system, in which Sun fearlessly transforms with rapid-fire precision into the teachers, students, parents, janitors, security guards, and administrators who inhabit these schools.”

-Hannah Bronfman, The Huffington Post

How to get to the Apolliad Theatre at Mesa College to see No Child...

Have you ever wondered how to get to the Apolliad Theatre at Mesa College? There's a great play,No Child... there in May and I want to see it. So I went there.

See directions and a map here, or follow me...

 

and you thought you had a bad Monday at work...

 

No Child... San Diego Premiere

Here is a play that I'm working on with InnerMission Productions.  I'm quite proud of this theatre group, their new residence at San Diego Mesa College and the cast they put together for No Child...

 

"No Child" Media Release

Download "No Child..." Media Release

So what did you do at work today?

Cuz this is what I did.

The deplorable state of theatre, and the coverage of same, in San Diego

A message to theatre decision-makers and the audiences they are killing off

By Kevin Six

Yes, kids.  The Old Globe and the La Jolla Playhouse are theatres.  They are not the only theatres in town, unless you happen to sell advertising.  No, there are about one hundred other theatre companies who would not only kill for the coverage these two behemoths receive, they would do better with it.  Yes, I’m burning bridges at the only two theatres in San Diego that pay living wages to actors.

And pissing off all the second-tier theatres who won’t hire me either and are just copying the above mentioned theatres anyway.  No, they are.  So I loose income from acting and writing.  No big whoop.

But in my career, which began in 1977, I’ve worked at exactly one of the top-tier theatres.  For one night.  I got the Equity minimum of $25 so I stand to lose $1.40 per year for the rest of my life.  And that is freeing because the truth costs more than that and I can afford to tell you the truth, theatre decision-makers.

I can now say that the best theatre companies are the ones that actually do bad work.  What?  No, they’re not trying to do bad work; they are simply taking risks.  And taking risks means that some theatre productions turn into steaming mounds of not-very-good theatre.  Trust me, I’m working on production now and I can’t get coverage for it even though it has all the makings of a Class-A train wreck (or a runaway hit, we might never know because no one cares about a local phenomenon making scary new theatre right here under the noses of the media-hogging middle-of-the-roaders).

I will draw your attention to another phenomenon who was making excellent theatre when I was just starting out.  Evel Knievel.  That dude made a living by putting his body through a meat grinder in front of an audience whenever he could. And people came in droves to watch it (and here’s my point) because they knew he was going to fall on his face, slide on his face and ram his face into a truck, bus or statue. 

Did you know that Evel Knievel’s son Robbie Knievel regularly does all the jumps his father never could manage and is successful at it 100% of the time?  Of course you didn’t!  That’s boring!  Doing everything right and making it look easy is boring as hell and, in theatre, it’s killing off audiences.  Large, medium and small theatres all over San Diego are jumping their mopeds over koi ponds every night except Monday in the form of “safe programming.”

What is safe about boring your audiences to death with the play that the other theatre did just last year?  Shakespeare, Ibsen, Shaw, Miller, Williams – all brilliant, wonderful, talented playwrights.  But they are also as dead!  Dead as theatre audiences will be if theatres produce too much of their work.  Next in line for killing off theatre audiences if theatre-producing sheep are allowed to make “edgy” (read safe) choices:  Mamet, Letts, McDonagh, Shanley.  I have nothing against these playwrights.  I think they are all brilliant but if sheepish directors, producers and boards of directors over-rely on them, people will get sick of the “new, edgy” same old thing.

And don’t get me started on musicals!  I love musicals.  I think companies should produce them.  I think audiences should see them and I think they should be (to paraphrase Bill Clinton) safe, legal and rare.  If not, people will just watch movies and TV, which does all of it better and there’s more to choose from.

But to return to the Evel Knievel metaphor, only a precious few theatre companies are strapping themselves to a machine they have no business riding, pointing it at an impossible number of busses, sticking the throttle open, closing their eyes and just throwing their bodies onto a sure massacre.  And audiences have no way of finding them because all the coverage in this town goes to one per cent of the theatre being produced in this conservative little backwater town.

The industrial theatrical complexes wield their power in many forms.  Formidable budgets with enough advertising dollars to not only lock up all the prime advertising space but all the editorial space too.  Their board members are also advertisers at the large papers so there’s another fear factor.  Oh and everyone is scared.  Least of all audiences who have to shell out large amounts of cash for mediocre plays.  I believe that the less an audience member pays, the better the production.  Because the real edgy work is being done by people who neither afford nor fathom a $50+ ticket price.

I could sell tickets to middle-of-the-road crap all day long if I could buy a five-figure advertising contract and guarantee a preview, and a review, of every play I advertise.  But that’s not going to make it good.  That’s not going grow audiences either.  That’s going to make boards of directors happy while everyone waits for (and hopes against) that one kid in the audience to point out that good advertising and promotion doesn’t make a play great.  What makes anything great is constant and renewed effort by the lunatic fringe out on the cutting edge.  You know, stuff you can’t get grants for because granting organizations say they want “new innovative” programming, but really they don’t want to offend their own boards of directors and funding sources either.

A word on boards of directors.  They are the least qualified (as individuals and entities) to run arts organizations.  They are nice, generous people to be sure but, in most cases, they don’t write, act, direct, paint, build or, in any other way, create.  If they did, they couldn’t afford the giving requirements attached with board membership.  They are fundamentally inept at understanding what audiences want.  Do you know who knows beyond a shadow of a doubt what audiences want?  Box office clerks.

Yes, box office clerks.  Most theatres pay no attention to their box office clerks, who deal with the general public night and day and, on their days off, are busy producing theatre that people actually want to see and can understand!  Theatre decision-makers, you ignore your box office at the peril of: a) losing your audience; and b) losing your audience to the scrappy young theatrical entrepreneurs you don’t pay enough and who are actually doing the stuff you dreamed of doing when you were a wide-eyed theatrical newbie.  Face it, theatre decision-makers, you’re killing the genre and the people you respect least will build the next generation of theatre goers over the steaming corpses you made of your theatre and its audience.

Is new work the answer?  Actually, no it’s not.  New work is only part of the solution.  No, the real answer is engaging the audience by remembering that in most cases the audience does not have an advanced degree in theatre.  If they did, they wouldn’t be able to afford the exorbitant prices most theatres charge.  That’s the next part of the solution.  Lower prices!  No, don’t raise prices and then raise discounts.  Again, go to your box office, theatre decision-makers, and you’ll see what the general public wants to pay to see theatre.

Movies cost about $12. Twelve dollars for a billion dollar production that is better than theatre because if a person doesn’t like a movie, so what!  That person won’t quit going to movies because the risk was $12.  If a person risks $60 or $110, he or she might start to take that personally if they keep paying to see boring crap.  Lower prices, theatres, and do away with all discounts.  Make it easy for your audiences.  All tickets on all nights and in all areas of the theatre are $20.  You know I’m right.  Look at the average ticket price.  Take every seat sold: subscriber discounts, senior discounts, preview discounts and the thousands of comps (yes, people, theatres give away thousands of tickets so you will think thousands of people want to see the show) and you will come up with the average ticket price. 

That figure is 45% less than you’re charging. 

Lower your ticket prices, don’t throw compost on the weeds to make them ranker, quit giving it away and eventually you will build a real audience. Oh, and hire a local playwright once in a while.  I happen to know 20 in this town.  Do you?

Better miracle than the last

So I had a horrible Tuesday, or so I thought.

Some pople didn't do some things I assumed they did; I assumed and you know what that makes me; and the person who ended up on the wrong side of it chose to be the victim instead of aprt of the solution.

Like being in the dishwasher with all the dirty dishes.

But trying to solve the problem allowed me to look in on a friend and it turns out that this friend needed help.  And we were in a position to provide it.  And that was good.

Another wat miracles can happen. 

Pretty damned cool!

It Works! It Really, Really Works!

Last time I posted here, I asked for a miracle and got one.  The same day!

The dog owner from upstairs came over to talk and became a neighbor.  It must not have been easy because of all the trouble I've caused.  I commend the neighbor and look forward to a nice living arrangement.

The landlord, however, still needs to learn how to read a calendar, join the human race and gain about 50 I.Q. points.  This will take a miracle but I'm used to them by now.

People I rely upon to to their jobs need to do their jobs.

Drivers need to look beyond their hood ornaments.

More love in politics (hey, miracles can happen, right?)

Broadway producers need to choose my play.  It made the stack (bonafide miracle!) now it needs to get the "Smash" treatment.

And I need to give everyone a break.  I am going to try this just for today.

I'll let you know how that miracle shapes up.

Here's a ton of gratitude for the miracle that happened (that I didn't expect), for the miracles that brought me to this point and for future miracles.  In gratitude, I promise to take care of the last miracle on my own.  Thanks!