Inside A.C.T.

By Claire L. Wong Audiences stepping into the Geary Theater for  Wakey, Wakey  will also experience the never-before-seen play  The Substitution  preceding it. Pulitzer Prize–nominated playwright Will Eno wrote this short play specifically for A.C.T.’s MFA Program students. When thinking about the content of  The Substitution  with Eno, director Anne Kauffman says, “One thing that we were interested in was the woman who appears for a brief moment of time in  Wakey, Wakey . She appears at an important place in the piece, and so it felt important that we meet her in a different context. From there, we developed this idea into the first part of the show.” MFA Program actors in the class of 2020 were in the room with Eno and Kauffman as they rehearsed  The Substitution  for the first time. “It was incredibly fun and helpful to get together with Anne and Kathryn [Smith-McGlynn] and the MFA students,” says Eno. “It’s a really important part ...

By Joy Meads There is a strange alchemy in Will Eno’s plays that draws us away from the anxious, racing world outside and into a quiet communion with one another and those solid, undeniable realities that connect us. Almost imperceptibly, he makes us more conscious of the world and more connected to those around us. Eno’s play The Realistic Joneses was performed at A.C.T.’s Geary Theater in 2016, and now his work is back at the Geary with  Wakey, Wakey . We are grateful we have the opportunity to share this play with you.  Wakey, Wakey playwright Will Eno. Photo courtesy Will Eno.  What is it about the Geary that makes it the right home for this piece?   The play, I hope, makes spaces for us to have a human connection, to come together as a group of humans and sit with one another in the experience of larger, maybe scary or sad things. I love the potential ramifications of an audience using that entire space. I love the frank connection that Guy has with...

By Hannah Clague “The world is a complicated place,” says Anne Kauffman, “and directing theater is my way of facing that.” In two decades working in the American theater, the New York–based director has been unafraid to tackle weighty subjects. In addition to her work on and off Broadway, the Obie Award–winning Kauffman directed  Hundred Days  at Z Space in 2014, a musical that also tackles universal explorations of humanity. Kauffman returns to A.C.T., where she led an MFA Program production of Steve Gooch’s uncompromising drama  Female Transport  in 2005. What excites you about Wakey, Wakey? Growing up in the theater, we’re all taught the Aristotelian way of looking at plays: there’s a beginning, middle, and end. It’s this beautiful arc and all the moments of the play add up to one thing. Each scene is built to take us one step in the direction of the final conclusion. Real life is not shaped that way, and neither is  Wakey, Wakey . It’s messing wit...

By Simon Hodgson “I hope that Bay Area audiences walk away from Wakey, Wakey feeling encouraged,” says two-time Emmy Award winner Tony Hale. Though Hale is best known for his television work in Veep and Arrested Development and recent big screen outing as the voice of Forky in Toy Story 4 , his theater roots run deep. You’ve been working for 20 years in film and television. How did you get started? I was not a sports kid and my parents didn’t know what to do with me. My dad was in the army and he retired in Tallahassee, Florida, where I moved in the seventh grade. By the grace of God, there was this children’s theater nearby, Young Actors Theater, and my parents signed me up. It’s difficult to put into words how supportive and influential that theater was for me growing up. It was a space to be silly and stupid, to be free to discover, and to find what I love to do. I adore going back and talking with students and raising money for the theater. Whether a kid goes into the arts or no...

By Claire L. Wong Rules are made to be broken—and interrogated, rewritten, and overcome. The 2019–20 season at American Conservatory Theater features stories that examine the established rules of engagement, their violent and tumultuous histories, and the people chafing against these constraints. “Told with decorum, rage, spirit, and a wink,” says A.C.T. Artistic Director Pam MacKinnon, “this season’s offerings continue A.C.T.’s tradition of telling stories that provoke responses and lead to debates, dreams, and even action.” Women are pushing back against the rules of oppression in A.C.T.’s first two productions of the 2019–20 season. Tamilla Woodard ( Men on Boats ) returns to A.C.T. for her Geary Theater debut directing Caryl Churchill’s acclaimed modern classic Top Girls . Audiences may remember returning actors Rosie Hallett, who worked alongside Woodard in Men on Boats (2018), and Michelle Beck, last seen at the Geary in King Charles III (2016). In Margaret Thatcher’s d...

By Mads Leigh-Faire Everyone knows the old adage “rules are meant to be broken” . . . but when? And by whom? Welcome to American Conservatory Theater’s 2019–20 mainstage season, where we’re exploring ideas of “rules of play.” “What dictates how we behave?” “Who makes the rules?” “When are rules meant to be broken?” “Is the playing field ever level?” Curtains up! The season starts off on the Geary stage with a modern classic: Caryl Churchill’s Top Girls . Directed by returning A.C.T. veteran Tamilla Woodard ( Men on Boats ), Top Girls celebrates and challenges powerful women while examining power, gender dynamics, and what we are willing to do for “success.” First at The Strand will be a world premiere (directed by our very own Artistic Director Pam MacKinnon ) of Testmatch by exciting, rising writer Kate Attwell . Fresh as a summer mango, this plays dissects Britain's colonization of India through the lens of a rained-out cricket match, where tensions ar...