SDCF Podcast Series

Susan H. Schulman: In March of 1994, not long after the close of her hit Broadway production of The Secret Garden ,   Susan H. Schulman   sat down with Director Melvin Bernhardt to discuss her life in the theatre. Ms. Schulman walks a captivated audience of early-career Directors and Choreographers through her career to date, spanning neighborhood shows on her family's Brooklyn stoop as a small gi...

Lynne Taylor-Corbett: In this discussion with Director-Choreographer   Lynne Taylor-Corbett   in February of 2000, listen to a two-time Tony nominee share her research into the complex history and techniques of competitive swing dance. She tells about the improvisation and experimentation involved during her workshop process to adapt this dance form for the Broadway stage in the 1999 production of...

For decades,   Marshall Mason   and   Lanford Wilson   have been seminal figures in the theatre industry. Their artistic partnership spans nearly forty years and is recognized as being among the most enduring in the American Theatre. Their work together - from   Balm in Gilead   to the more recent   Book of Days   - stands as some of the most beloved in the American canon. In 2002, New York's Sign...

In this ninety minute discussion with   Arthur Penn , catch a glimpse of the artistic processes which make this legend of directing such an artistic triple threat. To date, he is still the only individual to be nominated for a Tony, an Emmy and an Oscar for the same property -   The Miracle Worker . In May of 1987, Penn sat down with   Melvin Bernhardt   for this candid discussion on his style of...

Ming Cho Lee: World renowned designer for the stage   Ming Cho Lee   spoke to a crowd of early career directors and choreographers in April of 1999 at SDCF's annual Symposium. The focus of this discussion was working with Shakespeare, and in this ninety minute address Ming explains why he will go anywhere to work on the Bard's cannon. With wit and humor he tailors his remarks to fit his audience,...

Edward Albee: Famed playwright   Edward Albee   sat for an interview with frequent collaborator Larry Sacharow before an audience of professional theatre artists and students at Fordham University in December of 2000. In a room composed predominately of professional and aspiring directors, Albee was quick to distinguish himself as a professional director. He recalled that his first inclination to...

Howard DaSilva and Alfred Drake: Beginning in January 1985, SDCF held a series of interviews with Actors Who Direct in order to explore with live audiences of theatre enthusiasts, professional theatre artists, and SDC Members and guests the processes, experiences and craft of this brand of professional artistic hybrid. In the first installment of this series, moderator Ike Shambelan met with   Alf...

In January of 2000,   Joe Dowling   met with SDC Members and guests at Chicago Shakespeare Theatre to discuss his career in the classics. It is a career that began long before his appointment as Artistic Director at Minneapolis' Guthrie Theatre in 1995, and even before becoming the Artistic Director of Ireland's National Theatre, the Abbey, at the age of 27. As family legend goes, his first artist...

Harold Prince: In 2002, theatre icon Harold Prince gave the opening remarks to a packed house of esteemed theatre artists, professional directors and choreographers, and aspiring early-career post graduates at SDCF's annual Directing Symposium. The focus of Mr. Prince's address, as well as the focus of the weekend's series of panel discussions and lectures, was "Creating the American Musical". Thr...

Gene Saks: In January of 1987, SDCF brought one of Broadway's most beloved directors to New Dramatists for a conversation about comedy. Collaborators are quoted as saying "I would like to be surgically attached to his hip" and "I wouldn't mind if I never worked with another director again". In this 90 minute interview, you'll learn how Tony Award winner Gene Saks has engineered a career as one the...

Austin Pendleton: Renowned stage and film actor and Tony nominated stage director   Austin Pendleton   made time for an interview in April of 1999 with former SDCF Executive Director David Diamond. This 90 minute discussion features the always candid Pendleton discussing his life in the theatre. The conversation begins with an explanation of his origins in directing. From his 1st experience direct...

Days before the close of 1986's Tony Award winner for "Best Reproduction of a Play or Musical"   Hay Fever , Director   Brian Murray   sat down with Ada Brown Mather to discuss Mr. Coward's return to Broadway. Murray brings to the conversation a simple, honest and eminently knowledgeable love of Noël Coward's work; a relationship he began as an eleven year old boy reading plays at the library. He...

Jerry Zaks: Just two months after the opening of his Tony Award winning production of The House of Blue Leaves , Director   Jerry Zaks   spoke to a packed house at Westside Arts Theater in the first installment of SDCF's three part "Directing for Comedy" lecture series, in July of 1986. One of America's greatest Directors of comedy opens up his process for the audience, taking us step by step from...

Richard Foreman and Wilford Leach: SDCF's James Furlong sat down with two preeminent stage directors who also design,   Richard Foreman   and   Wilford Leach , for a 90 minute discussion about navigating the often contentious relationship of collaboration. Sharing similar origins, both Foreman and Leach discuss how their affinity for designing sets came from a "do it yourself" mentality which deve...

At St. Mary's Church in Manhattan on September 19, 1986 SDCF hosted the second installation in a series of interviews with "Actors Who Direct". This interview moderated by   Ike Schambelan , features a discussion with the magnificent directors/ performers/educators   Geraldine Fitzgerald   and John Houseman . The focus of the talk is a simple one - good directors. Fitzgerald and Houseman lead the...

Ellen Stewart: Off-Off Broadway pioneer   Ellen Stewart   gave a candid interview to SDCF Executive Director   David Diamond   for a packed audience of theatre artists at ArtsConnection on June 13, 1994. The central focus of the interview is her founding and continued artistic leadership of La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club. She begins at the beginning, explaining the origins of the institution an...

Gillian Lynne: On February 4, 1996 the Drama League Directors Project co-hosted with SDCF a moderated discussion between Director/Choreographer   Gillian Lynne   and musical Director/Arranger   Marvin Laird . In this candid discussion of Gillian's life in the theatre - the prolific dancer, choreographer, director of musicals and straight plays speaks of the mentors who helped her develop her compr...

Ron Lagomarsino: Fresh off of the successful opening of   Driving Miss Daisy   starring Dana Ivey and Morgan Freeman, Director   Ron Lagomarsino   sat down with SDCF's Steve Kaplan   in January of 1988 to discuss directing comedy for the stage. In this, the third installation in a series of three interviews devoted to the topic, the listener will notice similarities in the directorial philosophies...

Robert Whitehead and Brian Clark: In April of 1986, the day after their play   The Petition , staring Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy, began its short lived run on Broadway, writer/producer Brian Clark   and producer/director   Robert Whitehead   sat down with colleague   Robert Pesola   to discuss bringing serious work to Broadway. The two frame the discussion somewhat ominously; beginning by ackno...

Fritz Ertl sat down with   George Ferencz   to discuss Sam Shepard at New Dramatists in January of 1985. The conversation begins dominated by questions concerning the musicality of Shepard's earlier work and Ferencz's collaboration with Jazz legend Max Roach to stage them for the   ShepardSets in the mid-eighties. The questions drift from the musical toward the more practical as Ferencz covers the...

Richard Foreman: Professor/Playwright Steven Drukman sat down with theatre artist Richard Foreman in April of 1997 at Artsconnection to discuss theatrical innovation in an interview co-sponsored by SDCF and the Drama League Directors Project. Foreman illuminates an early career of set design as a teenager in Westchester, NY; as an actor at Brown University; as a playwright at Yale. He confides tha...

Mitchell, Ashley, and Mayer on Directing: In 2001,   Charles Repole   and   Joe Miloscia   of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation had the opportunity to bring together a trio of Broadway's hottest hit-makers for a special conversation.   Michael Mayer , Christopher Ashley , and   Jerry Mitchell   spent an evening catching up, reminiscing and discussing the intricacies of creating com...

On April 27, 1986 frequent SDCF interviewer and legendary acting coach Ada Brown Mather   sat down with director   Sir Jonathan Miller   to discuss Eugene O'Neill's work one day before his revival of   Long Day's Journey Into Night   opened on Broadway. In this conversation Sir Miller covers his career as a performer, his recommitment to working in the theatre despite a career as a doctor, his aff...

In November of 1986, legendary acting coach   Ada Brown Mather   sat down with   Roderick Cook   at Westside Arts Theatre to discuss his affinity for acting, directing and presenting the words and work of   Noël Coward . During this interview Cook covers his relationship with Coward the man, the unlikely circumstance under which Cook's hit   Oh Coward!   was developed and then revived, and the exp...

In December of 2001, renowned director   Jack O'Brien   was interviewed by his former protégé, John Rando, as part of SDCF's One-on-One conversation series. In this 30-minute session Rando and O'Brien span the gamut of Jack's considerable artistic abilities. Jack O'Brien candidly and eloquently covers everything from his sense of competition and his love of discovery, to his artistic process, love...