Lark Play Development Center

	Check out Community Perspectives with John Clinton Eisner
	"We’re focusing in depth on what Lark community members have to say about where we’re headed as a society and the tools we’ll need to get there. Every month, we are inviting a guest essayist—theater artists as well as people from fields outside theater—to share a unique perspective on some important strategic questions we’ve been asking ourselves lately about the purpose of live theater in the twenty-first century, what the field has to offer society as a whole, and what we can learn about how to shape the theater of the future. Most of all, we hope that you will read these essays and take part in our online blog conversation with us so that we can begin to get a sense of what ideas are in the ether." - John Clinton Eisner
	The Archives
2009-10	(featuring: Theresa Rebeck, May Adrales, John Clinton Eisner, Henry Godinez, Maria Alexandria Beech )
2008-09	(featuring: Chisa Hutchinson, Rajiv Joseph, Margarett Perry, Andrea Thome, plus essays from John Clinton Eisner)
2007-08	(featuring essays by John Clinton Eisner)
2006-07	(the 1st essay by John Clinton Eisner)

	2009-10
	DECEMBER - Let's Not Use The Word Mexico by Maria Alexandria Beech "Ignoring the work of certain regions seemed dangerous to me because it seemed to tell artists (and their cultures) that their art wasn’t important or relevant, and that blocked the dialogue and exchange that was elemental if we were going to progress as a civilization."
	NOVEMBER - How Voices From Across The Border Can Speak To Us by Henry Godinez "The future demands more than simply our projection of what the rest of the world is thinking and feeling. It seems to me that the more direct communication we have with the world in which we live the less potential for misconceptions, prejudice, and fear. At these times it's most important to not withdraw to safe and recognizible corners of our existence. Audiences are changing and if we are to keep the theatre vital and immediate, the stories we tell must be inclusive."
	OCTOBER - The Island Swim by John Clinton Eisner "Having embraced a commitment to “change” in the last election, are we afraid of a vacuum? We asked for change, but, having cleared the old furniture from the room, we seem uncomfortable with the empty space we have to fill, and ambivalent about setting new directions and dividing power fairly."
	SEPTEMBER - The Audience Is The Artists' Responsibility by May Adrales "Imagine a world in which the most profound words you have heard in the theater were repeated back to you in a conversation months later. That somehow that string of words had found its way from the writer’s imagination, to the lips of the actor, to the ears of one, to the memory of another and spit out into the world in another new context on a new day, perhaps long after the play had run."...
	AUGUST - Can Craft & Creativity Live on the Same Stage? by Theresa Rebeck "It has always seemed to me that the instigating impulse is something messy and internal, and that a playwright's job is to take that messy internal moment and build it into a stronger and more complex and dynamic version of itself so that it can sustain itself, on a stage, with actors, in the light of day...That's not reconciling a conflict, that's art."
	JULY - 15 Years Old and Still Growing by John Clinton Eisner "As we move forward, I anticipate that the Lark will deepen certain aspects of its programming while looking beyond existing programs to what comes next...Our job is to exist where the newest thinking is happening, where we can help make real risk seem approachable, where artists look out across open and uncharted territories of the imagination and lead us into our future by creating new vocabularies to describe it."

	2008-09
	JUNE - Spies Like Us by Rajiv Joseph "...After nearly five years of development, I had foolishly thought that the script was locked and set, before rehearsals had even started. As it turns out, when you have a bunch of brilliant people...pouring over every last beat of a play, questions are going to rise up...and every time I rewrote one moment of the play, other things would unravel."
	MAY - Practice Makes Process by Margarett Perry "...seeing how a play works—or doesn’t work—in front of an audience is at the core of how we learn about it. Commercial Broadway producers understand this and have traditionally developed shows through out of town performances during which the director and writer continue to work on the production before moving to New York City for several weeks of previews where their work continues through opening night."
	APRIL - To Make A Contribution, You Must First Exist by Chisa Hutchinson "Here's my theory: people with access to art-both as audience and as subject-tend to have a sense of entitlement that makes them better equipped to succeed in the world.... Totally underrepresented people, on the other hand, lack the sense of entitlement and confidence they need to fulfill their potential....They are simply too invisible to feel eseential, and society totally misses out on what they might have to contribute."
	MARCH - ®Evolution: Topdogs, Underdogs, Slumdogs – unite! by Saviana Stanescu "Obama gave us the green light and a nudge to finally debate race, class and gender issues in the open—a vital act for any society that attempts to be truly progressive."
	FEBRUARY - Hail to the Mutt! by Andrea Thome "Obama gave us the green light and a nudge to finally debate race, class and gender issues in the open—a vital act for any society that attempts to be truly progressive."
	JANUARY - The 'Why' of Theatre in the 21st Century by John Clinton Eisner "I’ve noticed that when a group of experts in any field get together, they tend to talk about the 'how' and not the 'why.' From what I know, the participants in the Manhattan Project didn’t spend much time pondering the ethics or implications of the bomb they were assigned to make. They focused on the 'how' and they made it."
	DECEMBER - On Solid Footing and Looking Ahead by John Clinton Eisner "During times like these, when the value of everything from mortgages to barrels of oil is in question, it is natural for a person like me, who works in the arts, to question the worth of my efforts and the impact of my field as a whole."
	NOVEMBER - Collaborating, Not Compromising, and Transforming Our World by John Clinton Eisner "The reenactment of social oppression within the creative process exists as strongly in former communist countries, in "emerging democracies," and in the United States, where we have long suppressed the value of individual freedoms in favor of commercialism and entitlement."
	OCTOBER - Rooting Ourselves in Theater by John Clinton Eisner "It is healthy and natural for societies to look to their minds, memories and imaginations to explain the unexplainable, and this tendency in people and communities to want to root themselves in a better idea of their identity, to provide a context for good and evil, to offer space for hope and comfort in despair, is one of the origins of the theater."
	SEPTEMBER - Letter From Guadalara by John Clinton Eisner "...the day we arrived a coup took place at the university: the chancellor was forcibly removed and replaced by a new chancellor by a phalanx of faculty and students and there are demonstrations in the streets. Clearly academic politics exists everywhere."
	AUGUST - Finding Time and Space Where You Least Expect It by John Clinton Eisner "Lark artists were packing their suitcases for our annual playwright's retreat on the campus of Vassar College with New York Stage and Film...then the phone call came: there was a stomach bug on the loose in the dorms..."
	JULY - Courtroom Drama: What I Learned While Performing My Civic Duty by John Clinton Eisner "It involved a melee with a machete in an uptown neighborhood and the contradictory testimony of a passel of marginally reliable witnesses who bore something of a latter-day resemblance to characters from the Damon Runyan stories that inspired the musical Guys and Dolls. "
	2007-08
	JUNE - Following the Path to Future Theater Audiences by John Clinton Eisner "I fear that we are becoming too insular in our profession, too isolated as Americans in the world, and too unambitious about where our work reaches and whom it touches...."
	MAY - Growing Pains: Reaching Further, Diving Deeper by John Clinton Eisner "It is clear that the direction the American Theatre has taken during the past century, broadening its national presence while supporting democracy by providing a platform for free expression, has constantly encountered resistance. "
	APRIL - Translating the Meaning, As well as the Words by John Clinton Eisner "Even though I think I understand where the writer is coming from, it is not necessarily true...I’ve come to the conclusion that translation is part of every discussion between two people. Even when you ostensibly share the same language, meanings can be elusive." "Simply put, theater requires that one group of living people (the actors) perform for another group of living people (the audience)....we consider the actors who work with us at the Lark essential players in the process of making plays and supporting playwrights."
	MARCH - The Play's the Thing - But Not Without the Player by John Clinton Eisner "Simply put, theater requires that one group of living people (the actors) perform for another group of living people (the audience)....we consider the actors who work with us at the Lark essential players in the process of making plays and supporting playwrights."
	FEBRUARY - The "Playlab" Phenomenon by John Clinton Eisner "With all due respect to the artists and entrepreneurs who pioneered the regional theater movement in the high hope of democratizing and decentralizing the theater in America, the net result has been often, though not always, a kind of “Walmartization” of the art form..."
	JANUARY - Three! Two! One! Happy New Year...Right...Now! by John Clinton Eisner "Confronted with so much exhausting competition, we may allow our most fiercely idiosyncratic and wonderful dreams to fade along with our confidence. Like the visions of political candidates corroded by too much market research, honest and personal New Year’s resolutions are difficult to formulate, much less carry out, in the cross-breeze of conformism. "
	DECEMBER - A Case for Philanthropy by John Clinton Eisner Philanthropy has become the lifeblood of freedom in America. In a society where so many experiences are valued in economic terms almost exclusively, philanthropy has the mission of supporting activities that have other kinds of worth."
	NOVEMBER - Theater as a Platform for Free Expression by John Clinton Eisner "History is full of instances where political leaders - in the name of preventing social order - have curtailed free speech as a tactic to weaken opposition and manipulate public opinion."
	OCTOBER - It Takes a Village to Build a New Repertoire by John Clinton Eisner "Perhaps because we live in a “disposable society,” where we drive SUV’s and eat out of throw-away containers, we have become content to invest in works of art without thinking about the future. The creative process has become disjointed, isolated, fragmented. Writers travel between institutions without a coherent plan, subject to different agendas at different theaters, subsuming their own goals just to be giving a little attention and the possibility of a production.”
	SEPTEMBER - The Courage to Try Something New by John Clinton Eisner "...the very idea of “risk” conjures images of two-fold failure. First, I worry that adding something new will rock the boat and jeopardize what is running smoothly. Second, I don’t like to look stupid in front of other people and the clear inevitability of failing publicly in my first attempts at something new always holds me back. A favorite teacher of mine used to describe this condition as “a paralysis of integrity.”
	AUGUST - A Platform for Free Expression by John Clinton Eisner "The human network is the flipside of the information revolution; what cannot be improved through computer, techonology and specialized systems is human contact and the trust that it engenders - and theatre is at the intersection of contact and trust. Theatre, therefore, helps us to focus on each individual's life and the power of local community, and enhances a conversation about democracy that can only happen in person."
	JULY - Making the Theater Safe for Democracy by John Clinton Eisner "...I believe that the theater plays a significant role in the future of American democracy. Grassroots theater, in particular, has the capacity to preserve the strengths inherent in a multicultural society, to teach trust and collaboration, and to develop new thinking that addresses the issues of the day..."
	2006-07
	JUNE - The Shakespeare Rule and the Nelson Principle by John Clinton Eisner "...we expect Shakespeare to know what he is doing. He is a four hundred year old authority and a font of wisdom and truth. Done right, his plays are amazingly entertaining, emotionally engaging, and stunningly complex. We are reverential, perhaps overly so at times. But that isn't how we think about the living, breathing playwrights who write contemporary plays..."

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