Rebeck: You know, just this week, we had a reading
of Spike Heels, which was my first play that was done
in New York. And there are some people thinking
about reviving it. And [the reading this week] was
thrilling. A lot of the things I was writing about at
the time, were very honest about what it was like to
be a woman in her 20’s in America - and honestly -
it was startling to me how people weren’t ready to
hear that. But now [people] can hear it much more
clearly… In my youth, I got tagged - in a kind of
negative way and very quickly - as being a “feminist
playwright”. And I thought, “You know, that implies
an agenda.” And that wasn’t my agenda. My agenda
was always the truth, you know, which I think is any
writer’s agenda. I mean… I’m always fascinated by,
the work of Spike Lee - because he so powerfully
insists on telling his stories from his point of view
- of his race and gender and class. And he includes
the, you know, the community of the world in that
- but stands where he stands and tells it from [his]
point of view. And that’s honestly what I thought I
was doing… I was writing plays about what it’s like
to be a woman and what women’s lives actually look
like. And that didn’t seem like a political gesture. It
seemed like a storytelling gesture. Sometimes there’s
a kind of gut reaction against that truth - that I
stepped right into the middle of - because I was
young… and so, I took a lot of grief for that play.
And it was painful to me…
Sherman: Resilience is so key to success in the
theater (and really, to life in general). How did you
rebound after that experience?
Rebeck: I had already written several other plays.
And so there was a road ahead of me... And so I
didn’t actually have to face the difficulty of that ques-
tion until a couple of later moments in my life. And
a lot of times, people ask me, “Why are you so pro-
lific? Why are you doing so many different things?”
You know, I write for film and TV. I also have started
directing. I’ve started writing fiction. I did finally go
and start writing novels. And I think that - for me-
that was a way of always maintaining an identity as
an artist - and not be someone who had to succumb
to a certain kind of trial … there were other places
to go. My husband [said] to me, “You are not a play-
wright. You’re a storyteller.” And I thought, “Well,
I’m actually both of those things.” I just didn’t want
to be told that I couldn’t be a playwright.
Tim Daly in THE SCENE (2013).
Photo courtesy of Dorset Theatre Festival.
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