Yesterday, I was fortunate enough to lead a talkback after a local production of A Streetcar Named Desire for which I am dramaturg, and it went off highly successfully.
After the show (which I have now seen 3 times and have been thoroughly entertained each time, 2 hour 45 minute length notwithstanding) the producer invited me to hop up onstage with the actors. After allowing patrons to leave, about 25 people stayed for the discussion. This theatre is known for having the most informal talkbacks, being entirely audience-focused and basically asking them to comment on the actors. I wasn't so sure about this, but proceeded anyway.
I started off my introducing the fantastic director and the cast and audience gave her a full minute of applause, causing her to grow red as a beet. Then I introduced myself, welcomed everyone, and proceeded to have the cast go around and introduce themselves with their real names. I responded with a "good job guys" and got a somewhat amused reaction from the cast, "gee, 3 months of memorizing lines and we get a whole round of applause for saying our names." I was talking about your performance, guys, but...whatever. Love you all.
Then, came the immortal moment of "anybody got a question? anyone?" that everyone hates, but somebody's gotta break the ice. After the usual moment of complete silence and an actor saying "I guess we can all go home," I got a question from an audience member. Throughout the talkback, I bounced around the stage (in the round) and into the audience Ricki Lake-style, moderating the questions and repeating them for the cast and the hard of hearing, and calling on someone from the cast to answer if nobody volunteered.
So, yes, the first question. It was something along the lines of "how did you guys deal with interpreting these iconic characters in the shadow of the epic movie version?" The actors playing Blanche, Stella, and Stanley answered appropriately and with pride, and the mood in the room became much more lively and conducive to questioning, and soon many hands were popping up from the crowd. One of the ladies in the audience complimented Stanley's muscular build comparing it to that of Marlon Brando, which got some cheers from the audience.
During some calm moments, I tipped my hat to the director and gave her a chance to talk about her staging concept, which contrasted Blanche's feeling of entrapment with the outer staging areas being full of life, with muggers and vendors and all sorts of action going on that Blanche just can't manage to see or comprehend, just beyond her reach. The audience acknowledged this, which led me to ask the question to the supporting cast about how they felt about being central to the dramatic action without being center stage. This was another great moment because it allowed the cast members with smaller parts (the Mexican Woman, Pedro, the Negro Woman) to get their ideas and feelings out there with just as much credence and importance as Blanche, Stella, and Stanley.
We got a couple really good questions to round out the discussion; first, a man asked if any of the cast members had done a Tennessee Williams play before and what their experience was like this time around, and more than half the cast got to answer that one with a sentence or two, and the director even chimed in as well. The final question was a really great one from a younger girl in the audience, who wanted to know how the actresses playing Blanche and Stella dealt with being sisters, because even though there were some tender moments between the two, sometimes in the play it seemed that they were "complete strangers!" The actresses playing Blanche and Stella were more than happy to answer what that relationship was like both on and off the stage and how sometimes they felt like sisters and sometimes, indeed, like complete strangers, and what their characters' lives must have been like both before and after the events of the play.
Overall, it went off successfully and several of the actors as well as the director and producer told me how well I did as a moderator and how well I kept the conversation going. After the show, I went out with two of the actors and chatted more about the talkback and the questions that were asked. This talkback was my very first as moderator, and it ended up being a very thought-provoking half-hour that really gave audience members, actors, and the dramaturg some good insight into the show and the rehearsal process, and above all showed that we had a room full of inquisitive and active minds, able to ask and answer intelligent questions. And I was able to facilitate that. I can't wait to do it again.
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