COLLOQUY AT LATC : DIRECTORS SPEAK OUT ON THEATER

It was one of the most high-powered events of the theatrical season.

They called it “Six Directors in Search of an Audience,” but the colloquy held Saturday at the Los Angeles Theatre Center (under the auspices of the AT&T; Performing Arts Festival) featured six American artistic directors who, among them, would have the least amount of trouble finding one: Bill Bushnell (LATC), Robert Falls (Chicago’s Goodman Theatre), Des McAnuff (La Jolla Playhouse), Peter Sellars (lately of Washington’s American National Theatre), Gary Sinise (Chicago’s Steppenwolf) and Stan Wojewodski Jr. (Baltimore’s Center Stage).

Certainly, LATC’s Theatre 2, where the event took place, was packed to the proverbial rafters, chiefly with members of America’s extended theatrical community--coming from as far north as Oregon and as far east as New York. The thread linking these directors was simple: Each had been the recipient of AT&T; largess. That also explained the identity of the colloquy’s moderator, actress/singer Georgia Brown. Brown is the star of the new musical “Roza,” developed with AT&T; support at Baltimore’s Center Stage (and opening April 30 at the Mark Taper Forum).

The questions, ranging from ordinary to odd, began with the all-encompassing: “How do you feel about the state of the American theater?” The groans did not have to be heard. They were written on the directors’ faces.

“We’ve all grown up at a time,” said McAnuff, firing the first gun, “when we’re perched on this precipice of involuntary mass suicide. The best thing theater’s got going for it is that it’s saved by the threat of nuclear war.”

“Of course, theater is in a catastrophic state,” Sellars said. “The tradition we’ve inherited from Europe is hopefully dying. Theater will be saved in America by minorities. That’s as it should be.”

For Bushnell, whose theater is currently hosting the Chicano “La Victima,” a damning chronology of Mexican-American history, minority theater is a chance to confront the predominantly white ticket-buying public. “I’m not interested,” he added, “in what’s going on in New York.”

“Validation in New York is like rats swimming towards the sinking ship,” said the Goodman’s Falls. “A lot of people are stuck on the lifeboat not realizing there is nothing there!”

Sinise, who acts as well as directs, gamely defended the actor’s needs. “Unfortunately, to make a living, (actors) have to be validated. For us (Steppenwolf), it became necessary to go knock over the Big Apple.”

While acknowledging the need for some national validation, “The (nonprofit resident theater) movement you’re talking about,” Bushnell said, “is the only art form that suffers from having a commercial arm. That tends to confuse corporate sponsors. There’s no such thing as a ‘commercial’ symphony orchestra.”

“There’s no recipe for popular art,” McAnuff added, asserting that “Broadway is some strange mutation, a game wealthy people play.”

The question that brought the most intense reaction cut close to a nerve: “How do each of you justify,” Brown asked, “taking private and/or public subsidy when there are thousands of starving and homeless?”

It was McAnuff who had the most cogent response. “Theater is about the spiritual and moral health of a nation,” he said. “(As) the mightiest nation the world has ever known . . . (we) have a huge impact on the rest of the earth. We would be very ill-advised not to provide the best art that we know how. We don’t want to snatch bread from babies’ mouths, but there are a lot of places to get support. We don’t need much.”

To the age-old question, “How do you put a season together?,” McAnuff answered, “I only do plays I don’t like,” attributing this to his days as a free-lancer, when choices were usually limited to what was offered, not what he wanted.

Said Sellars: “I have a pretty strict rule. I hire my friends.”

As for the matter of hiring minorities, “At Steppenwolf,” Sinise said, “we’re a closed group of actors from southern Illinois who happen to be white and happen to be Gentile . . . We’ve been trying to open our doors.”

“In (heavily black) Chicago,” said Falls, “only 6% of the contracts went to blacks (last year). One has a major responsibility to set examples.”

“Last season,” McAnuff said, “it turned out the majority of our actors were black. I wish I could say it happened by design. I work with Nat Adderley not because he’s black but because he’s talented.”

“Is there a style or form,” asked Brown, “to reach for and why is there so little political involvement in American theater?”

“Ideology gets confused with (politics),” replied McAnuff. “Shakespeare’s plays are incredibly political, but it’s very difficult to figure out his ideology. They reflect all these conflicting points of view. That’s a pretty good role model for me. Theater can’t just preach. My interest is content. Style and form are a response for how to handle content.”

“The quality of our national theater will have to be judged by the quality of the issues it tries to raise,” said Falls. “Always take the more dangerous road if given a choice.”