MUSES & MUSINGS did something. Whether at ceremony or at court, words could save or destroy a life. I learned words must be used carefully.
PHOTO BRET HARTMAN
WITH MADELINE SAYET
Who or what inspired your pursuit of theatre? My mother’s family were Mohegan culture bearers, teachers, medicine people, and leaders, and my father’s family were attorneys. Words had power and stories
I committed to a life in theatre while performing in a production of Pippin in eighth grade, inspired by the idea that we had “magic to do.” I loved escaping my own reality and treasured the opportunity to take audiences on adventures with me. No one around me understood theatre as a profession, but Mohegan Chief Ralph Sturges encouraged me, saying “it required great latitude of mind.” Only later did I realize he meant that theatre is not just a tool to escape the world but to transform it into something people do not need to escape. Where do you get your inspiration? Ecosystems. Stories and inspiration are everywhere. I could watch an ant for hours and there would be a saga there. Just as there is in a kindergarten classroom, or inside a single painting or line of poetry, or a handful of soil. The world and art are entwined. Making theatre means synthesizing the bigness of it all into questions with which I can grapple.
Evan Rothfeld + Erin Tripp in Whale Song at Perseverance Theatre, directed by Madeline Sayet PHOTO BRIAN WALLANCEA
6 SDC JOURNAL | FALL 2024
You’ve talked about the idea of “Story Medicine,” the belief
that every story we put into this world has the power to do real world harm or healing. What are the stories that have helped heal you? In 2013, I watched Colm Tóibín’s The Testament of Mary, thinking, “Don’t they know we aren’t allowed to talk about this?” Hearing Mary say, as mother of her son, “I can tell you now, when you say that he redeemed the world, I will say that it was not worth it. It was not worth it.” Those words broke down a societal wall for me regarding what we are allowed to talk about. That phrase “It was not worth it” still echoes in my mind. In 2019, I directed Cathy Tagnak Rexford’s beautiful play Whale Song, about an Inupiaq girl who transforms into a bowhead whale and marries the whale leader to maintain the ancient alliance between their nations. There’s this exchange between the young leaders under unsurmountable pressures: “Let me ask you this. An impossible decision is before you. Two choices, both equally life altering. Both equally tragic and magnificent...What do you do?” “You do the best you can.” “Yes, but...” “That’s really all you can do.” These two young leaders navigating the stakes of the world, the truth, and the release of pressure in that answer: this still heals me. Lastly, in summer 2023, I served as a dramaturg on Ellen McDougall’s production of As You Like It at Shakespeare’s Globe. I love this play and have worked on it many times, but in this production, Rosalind didn’t change back