To listen, click KQED Perspectives 2/11/09.

“Devilishly fine entertainment… It wouldn’t be fair to reveal how that game turns out except to note that as comically meaningful and offbeat fare for the holidays, McPherson’s “Seafarer” succeeds in filling an inside straight.”

KGO Radio review:

“FROM A DOWNRIGHT TYPICAL IRISH COMEDY THAT’S ABSOLUTELY LOADED WITH LAUGHS, IT DEVELOPS INTO A SURPRISING, THRILLING SITUATION. AN ENSEMBLE CAST OF FIVE BRILLIANT ACTORS HAS BEEN ASSEMBLED TO PROVIDE A WONDERFUL EVENING OF EXCELLENT THEATRE. AND IT’S MASTERFULLY DIRECTED BY THE COMPANY’S ARTISTIC DIRECTOR, JASSON MINADAKIS. “THE SEAFARER” IS NOW PLAYING AT MARIN THEATRE COMPANY IN MILL VALLEY THRU DECEMBER 7TH. THIS IS DEFINITELY NOT-TO-MISS THEATRE.”

SF Examiner review:

“It’s a fantastic production of a play that ranks among McPherson’s best… beautifully directed by MTC artistic director Jasson Minadakis… It’s a veritable full house of great actors, and they’re a joy to watch in this disarming tale of deep, dark nights, hopeful daybreaks and, yes, maybe even a little genuine (and genuinely sozzled) Christmas cheer.”

Get your tickets now!

Here’s a link to MTC’s YouTube page, with video from all the productions this season.

He joins MTC after six years as Producing Artistic Director at Southern Rep Theatre, the premiere professional theater of New Orleans. During his tenure, Southern Rep underwent the largest period of sustained growth in its history, and was honored with more awards than any theater in the region, including “Theater of the Year” in 1995 and the Governor’s Arts Award for “Outstanding Arts Organization” in 2007.

For the past two years, Rilette has served as Secretary of the Executive Board of the National New Play Network. He is also the co-founder and former Executive Artistic Director of Rude Mechanicals Theatre Company in New York, and a former professor at Tulane and Loyola Universities. He recently directed Virginia Woolf’s Orlando, adapted by Sarah Ruhl, at the Zeum Theatre with the third year MFA students at ACT, his alma mater.

We are all very excited to have Ryan aboard!

I find visual research to be tremendously important in creating a design. I tell my students at UC Berkeley that it’s the fuel that gets you through a process. I like to get started as early as possible on research. For me, images and research are a way to come up with a ‘visual language’ that a director and I can agree upon. One director’s idea of what ‘romantic’ looks like might be different from my own. For that reason, I usually have a lot of preliminary research that spans everything from paintings to photography. Later in the process, research is the well that I go to frequently when the rest of the creative team and crew need answers from me as to a specific look, texture, color, etc. A design can be thought of as a series of many, many decisions and, as the ‘snowball’ of people involved gets larger and larger, the questions get more and more specific…”what type of bedding do you want on the bed?, what type of trunk does Blanche bring in?, etc.”
The research has, for me, the answers within it – you just have to look closely.

…So much of the feeling of ‘Streetcar’ comes from the surroundings…the sound of the French Quarter, the Jazz, the heat, the mysteries of the night. It’s a city unlike any other. My hope is to create a design that captures the feeling and essence of New Orleans – without (in our case) necessarily re-creating New Orleans onstage.

…For this particular production, Jasson set us on a path that I find enormously interesting. He mentioned going for very sexy, very dangerous, and very wet. He wrote the following:
”I have rarely seen a Streetcar where the heat between Blanche and Stanley made everything believable. That’s a top priority for me.” So often this play is done in its traditional form, but I’ve been lucky in recent years to be involved on some interesting updates of the play that make William’s words even more poignant. That’s the beauty of theatre – we can create a ‘world’ onstage that approaches the same work in a somewhat different way. Bold choices make for exciting and interesting theatre.

One of the fascinating and challenging experiences for me in this production is developing distinct characters ~ one of which is quite drunk and in need of sexual attention, one of whom is a neighborhood member who is “a fixture”, and one who is severe and tough. And, with just a short time on stage, making each character real and, hopefully, memorable.

So how does one approach these distinct roles? For me…………..with respect and a LOT of thinking. The best (maybe worst?) place for me to think is in my car. Because my commute to MTC takes roughly an hour, and I know Hwy 101 “like the back of my hand”, I get a lot of good think-time. I also use my (almost) daily walk to space-out on my characters and the play and the scenes.

Building in a backstory on each character helps – from where did each come? What has been her life up to this point? What is her motivation right now? And, as Jasson has pointed out to us all, what are your character’s vulnerabilities? What does she say and how does she say it? What is she feeling at that moment in time? How does she move through space alone and/or with others? What are her gestures? What are her ways of handling the things in her life?

What is my director’s vision for the character, the scene? Who are the others in the scene? What are they bringing “to the table”? This is where the fun, the chemistry, the magic can happen for me. And, if one is lucky enough to find this in rehearsals, in little ways and big ones – well, that’s what keeps me coming back for more.

It’s day four and we’re up on our feet just ripping it. It’s awesome – and I mean that in the traditional sense of the word. What a ride this is going to be!

Days 1 through 3 were SO overwhelming. Someone asked me this morning how the show was going and I turned on them with a drawn and haggard look and said, “Intense, it’s intense – I feel like I’ve already been in the thick of it for a month!” And it really does. And that speaks volumes to just how much enthusiasm has leapt out of this cast, crew and director from Day One. It is very exciting territory.

The journey of this show will not be easy. It is intense. It’s physically, mentally and emotionally exhausting. It’s challenging. It’s overwhelming. I mean, come on, it’s Streetcar! But, oh my, it’s also going to be one exhilarating ride. for us and for the audience. Believe me when I tell you that this is going to be one of the most passionate, sexy and emotionally raw Streetcars ever staged.

Right now, I just feel like a very lucky girl. I have an amazing Stanley and Blanche to play with. I look forward to rehearsal with a giddy anticipation to see what new and surprising nugget we’ll find and explore in the text and see what new and exciting choices this insanely talented cast are going to bring to the table for the day…. Whew. What a first week!