by Rob Kendt
Is there peace at last at the Actors' Gang? Since January, when
founding artistic director Tim Robbins led a series of "Style"
workshops in the troupe's Hollywood spaceÑhis first work as director in the
venue whose construction he funded in 1995Ñrumors have flown about turmoil
among the Gang's artistic staff, rumors that were fueled only by a long,
stubborn silence on the part of all the members we spoke to. That is, until
last week, when we were told that Robbins had been named president and CEO of the
Gang as of Mar. 28, and he was talking. So we called the prolific film
star/filmmaker in New York, and he filled us in.
"We're in a transitional period right now, and I'm looking to
direct a play this summer," said Robbins. It's been rumored that it's The
Threepenny Opera, but, said Robbins, "We're bringing in three or four plays
to work on, and we'll see what comes out as the strongest candidate." That
process will begin in mid-July, for a September opening. In May, he said, the
Gang will host a one-person festival (anyone want to send us a press release?),
and in June longtime director Tracy Young will helm a Gang-affiliated workshop
of LA Weekly theatre editor Steven Leigh Morris' Moscow, a loose
adaptation of Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita, at Audrey
Skirball-Kenis Theatre's Common Ground festival. As for other season plans, the
previously announced Young piece on Jung, Dreamplay, is now
slated for February 2002. That will be part of what Robbins is planning as a
20th anniversary season for the Gang, "which will include some new work,
as well as revisiting some of the work we've done in the past."
Robbins co-founded the Gang in the early 1980s with fellow UCLA
theatre folk, who found their metier during the 1984 Olympic Arts Festival,
with the visit of Georges Bigot's Theatre du Soleil (not to be confused with a
certain high-flying Montreal circus empire). Bigot's commedia-inspired
"Style" became the Gang's working method and remained so for more
than a decade. In recent years, though, it had fallen into relative disuse at
the Gang.
"That's something I hope doesn't happen again," Robbins
said of the long time between Style workshops. "It's important to do a
regular workshop. And it's important to keep evolving and looking at what that
Style is. The work we did in January was about revisiting the Style,
rediscovering and reinventing how it should be applied to our work."
Indeed, Robbins put to rest any fears that he brings with him a rigid aesthetic
regime. "I think one of the strengths of the Gang is that we do all
different kinds of theatreÑwe've never become enslaved to a particular kind of
theatre," he said. "The core of the Style is something we've never
left, which is the commitment to filled emotion onstage."
Robbins has been involved in producing and funding Gang projects
since his film career took off, though he and longtime associate R.A. White
stepped down from the artistic posts in late 1996. Apart from the approach of
the Gang's 20th birthday, why is Robbins back now?
"I don't think I've ever left the theatre, but because of my
responsibilities to other projects, and mostly because of my lack of proximity
to Los Angeles, I have not tried to do the job of artistic director," he
said, referring to the filmmaking career that has included the annoying Bob
Roberts, the masterful Dead Man Walking, and the
rousing, underrated Cradle Will Rock, and to the New York-based domestic
bliss he's established with Susan Sarandon. He's been raising kids with her,
but now, "with the kids being at a certain age, it's more possible to
bring them with me or to involve them in some way."
As for rumors of turmoil among the artistic staff, Robbins simply
said, "That's internal company politics, not for the press." Fair
enough.
¥ Next up at the Matrix, that oasis on Melrose: Pinter's The
Birthday Party, to be directed by Andrew J. Robinson for a June opening.
Robinson is busy latelyÑnext week he opens Side Man at Pasadena
Playhouse, in the play's long-awaited L.A. premiere. The latter puts to rest
that strange announcement at the 1999 Ovation Awards that Scott Wolf would
appear in an upcoming L.A. production of Side Man; instead the
amazing JD Cullum will play the part Wolf played on Broadway, as the stand-in
for playwright Warren Leight. As for Birthday Party, the cast is
slated to include Cullum, Jay Karnes, Greg Itzin, Larry Pressman, and Angela
Patton, among others. We still can't shake memories of Robinson's searing 1995
production of The Homecoming. That was in December, but we'll bet
that summer is just as good a time for Pinter.