Sound Theatre Company, nominated in 7 categories for the 2016 Gregory Awards including Theatre of the Year, recently closed a production of The Last Days of Judas Iscariot by Stephen Adly Guirgis.
TPS interviewed some of the cast about their successes, challenges, and what they would like to see change in the Seattle theatre scene.
Ray Tagavilla
Satan (2016 Gregory Awards Best Actor Nominee)
Previously in A Small Fire (2014)
What was the most exciting part about working on Judas?
Working with this luminous cast.
Biggest challenge?
Actually keeping my voice. I blew it out 2 days before the first preview and was never at full power throughout the run.
What would you like to see change in the Seattle theatre scene?
I love the diversity of this cast and it’s something I don’t see too much of. I always find it exciting when a theater decides to do blind casting and relies on an actor’s talent/experience and not whether they look “right” for the part.
Corey Spruill
Bailiff/Simon the Zealot
Previously in Dogg’s Hamlet/Cahoot’s Macbeth (2013) and The School for Lies (2014)
What was the most exciting part about working on Judas?
Working with such juicy writing, and the cast. The cast was fantastic to work with, everyone really brought something new to the table.
What was the biggest challenge of performing your role?
Both roles I portrayed had different challenges. The Bailiff sat on stage the majority of the play but didn’t say much, in a lot of ways he was the eyes and ears of the audience.
What would you like to see change in the Seattle theatre scene?
I don’t get out and see as much theater as I should. I would love to see bolder, and more challenging theater. Theater that’s not only has a diverse group of actors, but also material that really connects us all as a community.
Sujay Chattopadhyay
Sigmund Freud
What was the most exciting part about working on Judas?
An obvious exciting part was the opportunity to portray a character of this mind-blowing script by Stephen Adly Guirgis. However, an even more exciting part for me was to be fortunate to work with a group of extremely talented actors and highly creative crew members under the super-caring guidance of Teresa Thuman.
What was the biggest challenge of performing your role?
I believe I had two major challenges. Firstly, the role I played was the only non-biblical and non-religious (maybe atheist, to be more specific) character in the play. Also, while most of the other characters in the play had the freedom to express their feelings across a wide range of rawness and sophistication, Freud was throughout presented in a highly refined manner. Maintaining this distinction via restricted expressions was one big challenge for me. Another tough task was to make the out-of-the-box Freud-ish thinking and logic understandable to the audiences, as if in some professorial way to the students.
What would you like to see change in the Seattle theatre scene?
I would love to see a lot more representation of world culture in Seattle theatre via staging of stories and plays from all around the world, when one can say that Seattle thinks like the planet, at least through the lens of theatre. I think this can effectively increase the bonding of love and respect among races and ethnicities, and, if properly cultivated, might be a model to the rest of the world during this terrible period of monstrous restlessness.
Kathy Hsieh
Henrietta Iscariot/Sister Glenna
What was the most exciting part about working on Judas?
Even though I’ve worked with or seen or knew of almost everyone in the cast before this production, it was such a joy to work with all of them at the same time in one show! The most exciting part of working on Judas was the multicultural diversity of the production. Not enough shows in Seattle have many people of color unless a role is specifically written for a person of color. And when there are people of color in a show, most shows are still very segregated – August Wilson shows feature primarily black actors, David Henry Hwang shows are primarily cast with Asian and white actors. And while many of the culturally specific companies in town (eSe Teatro, SIS Productions, Hansberry Project, Pratidhwani) do terrific work and honor casting that’s true to their community, casting in Seattle is still very segregated. So how fabulous to be in a show where I got to hang out with actors of all ages and ethnicities in one space!
What was the biggest challenge of performing your role?
The biggest challenge was doing the Irish accent for Sister Glenna! Thomas Merton’s definition of despair does not flow well with an Irish brogue!
For Henrietta it was making sure that when I started the show, I started with a bang because the more that audiences could connect with her emotionally, then when the next two characters come on and provide a comedic release, the audience quickly realizes that this show is going to take you from one extreme to the other so to prepare for the wild ride.
What would you like to see change in the Seattle theatre scene?
It’s getting better, but I would love to see even more shows where there’s a greater diversity in casting and script offerings. Even though we’re considered pretty white by most cities its size, still, 1/3 of Seattle’s population are people of color (and half of those people of color are Asian Americans) but we’re not even close to seeing that kind of diversity in most Seattle theatres yet. Sound Theatre, Intiman, Book-It, Pork Filled Productions, ReAct, Arts West, and Seattle Public Theatre are some examples where we’re seeing more multicultural diversity. I can’t wait for the day when what we see on Seattle stages actually does truly look like a reflection of who we see in the world around us in real life.