Post-Performance Chats Bring Down the Barrier Between Audience, Artists

Those of us in the media who cover entertainment get the opportunity frequently to sit down with artists and talk about what they are doing, what they are about to be doing, what they want to be doing, what they wish they had done and what they are sorry they’ve done.

Besides functioning as intermediary between the subject and the reader (thus justifying our paychecks and our membership in the esteemed fourth estate), the interview process itself is just plain fun most of the time. But while a well-written article can communicate a sense of that process, for the most part the public is stuck with delving into the artist’s heart and soul vicariously.

For those interested in something more intimate than the second-hand approach, South Coast Repertory in Costa Mesa is once again offering a series of post-performance discussion sessions. The series gives theatergoers the rare chance to go face-to-face with the actors, directors, dramaturges and, in some cases, the playwrights who are behind the company’s productions.

Subscribers can indicate that they want tickets to performances that are followed by the discussions, which are held for Mainstage offerings on the second Tuesday of each regular run. The Second Stage discussions take place on the first Tuesday after preview performances have ended.

The next go-rounds will be this Tuesday for Hugh Whitemore’s “Breaking the Code” on the Mainstage and Nov. 14 for the Second Stage production of Sharman MacDonald’s drama, “When I Was a Girl, I Used to Scream and Shout.”

At the last session, after a performance of “Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune,” Terrence McNally’s pithy and funny two-character ode to neurotic romance, more than half of the audience stuck around to take part. Actors Karen Hensel and Richard Doyle were joined on the set by SCR dramaturge John Glore (who presides over the discussion series with fellow dramaturge Jerry Patch) in a talk that, figuratively and literally, had a bedside informality.

It lasted a relatively short 15 minutes because Hensel wanted to leave for her drive back home to Pasadena, but generally Glore said they don’t last much more than half an hour. “To be honest, I like to keep them short and to the point,” Glore said in an interview later. “I’d rather people left wishing they had a little more time, than to carry on so long they get bored with it.”

As one of the observers that night, I found it as enlightening to hear what piqued the audience’s curiosity as it was to hear the actors respond to their questions.

Because “Frankie and Johnny” was a bit racy by local standards (some brief nudity, rather salty dialogue and much pillow talk), the first question from the house was predictable: “Did you feel uncomfortable doing the nude scenes?” a woman asked Hensel. (“No,” Hensel said, “my character is my costume.”)

Another woman said she found Hensel’s character funny, but essentially unlovable, and the question came up about what either actor found in Frankie’s persona that made their love attraction plausible.

For his part, Doyle looked to the insecurities and desperation that hovered just below the surface bravado of Johnny’s overture of love to Frankie: “He’s tired of looking around--he knows she might be his last chance.”

It was, however, another member of the audience who zeroed in on an even better answer.

“Johnny had observed her being kind to an old man in the restaurant (where they both worked) and he found that very appealing,” a woman said.

There were lighter moments, such as when one man asked Doyle whether he had taken a method-actor’s approach in detailing his role as a fry cook at a small New York diner by spending time with short-order chefs and studying their style and mannerisms.

“No,” Doyle deadpanned. “I used to be a fry cook.”

A woman who said she was from Boston used the forum to praise SCR on the quality of its repertory company, a compliment that was seconded by a British man.

That air of genteel support for the play and the company that typified this session was not unusual, Glore said.

“More often than not, people enjoy what they’ve seen, and that is reflected in the discussion,” Glore said. “But if a majority of people in the audience are disgruntled, they are not afraid to voice that feeling, and if one person speaks up about something they didn’t like, it will have a snowballing effect.”

He said questions run the gamut from technical aspects of a production to queries about what personally motivates the actor. “Thankfully, we’ve encountered very few of the really trivial sort of questions: ‘What hair dye do you use to get your hair that color?’ We have an intelligent audience that asks good questions.

“By and large, the discussions tend to be on a positive note. People are more comfortable talking about what they liked rather than what they didn’t. I think it’s because our society is bred on politeness.”

In this respect, the post-play discussion series differs markedly from SCR’s series of staged readings, in which audiences are encouraged to be as critical as possible about a still-evolving script so that the playwright and the dramaturges will have a better insight in to what works and what doesn’t.

In those, Glore said, “we deliberately try to find what wasn’t working, where the audience was bored or confused. I wouldn’t say we seek that kind of discussion (following the staged plays). By this time, it is a finished production, it’s gone as far as we can take it. . . . Although I say ‘finished production,’ no production is ever really finished--it is always affected by the way the audience responds.”

Nevertheless, Glore said he couldn’t think of a single instance where a performance was altered because of something that came out of the public discussions. Primarily they are for fun and enlightenment of the theatergoer.

“Everything we do in one way or another is geared to expanding the audience’s horizons. This is particularly true in a situation like this (discussion series). It’s our obligation to let the audience know as much as we can regarding what it takes to put together a show.”