XL Arts

The year of thinking theatrically with '365 Plays'

By Joey Seiler
Thursday, November 23, 2006

Arriving in dribs and drabs for Zachary Scott Theatre's launch of "365 Days/365 Plays" by Suzan-Lori Parks, the audience — and joggers passing by — might have been surprised at the performance space, and not only because it was the Pfluger Bridge over Town Lake.

Parks is known for gritty, near-absurdist plays that eschew large, ornate sets. But the bridge was decked with 365 white balloons, filled with music from the Hyde Park Strings and packed with outfits from tuxedos to pajamas. To celebrate the kickoff of her yearlong cycle of plays, Dave Steakley, artistic director at Zach Scott, wanted to "throw Suzan the best party Austin had to offer."

If the audience was startled by the setting, it seemed to enjoy the party.

Without any introduction, the actors launched into a series of seven short plays, stretching from a dysfunctional fairy tale to a meeting between Krishna and Arjuna and a presentation of the Window of Opportunity. Oh, and a messenger on a rowboat, paddling down the cold river.

Parks, who in 2002 became the first African American woman to win a Pulitzer Prize for drama, began on Nov. 13, 2002, to write a play a day for a year.

"I was hanging out in the living room with my husband," she said, "and I started jumping around the living room and dancing around. And I said to him, 'I'm gonna write a play a day for a whole year, and I'm going to call it '365 Days/365 Plays.' " Based on a split-moment decision, a 15-city project was born.

In each city, one theater group acts as a hub for the festival, as Zach Scott does here. Fifty-one other groups each claim a week's worth of plays, without reading them, to put on in whatever fashion they choose.

Parks and Steakley are adamant that the groups aren't required to be formal theater organizations. According to Steakley, "The whole point of this is to get this into as many points of the community as possible and make it completely accessible."

"We're all that little kid, going 'Oooh,' " Parks said. "Even if we're not in theater or in the performing arts or just art, we all had that experience as kids where we'd be playing, and we'd be totally engrossed in our games. And that's what this is, it's just play. You'll be totally engrossed and then you turn to something else."

Only 24 of the weeks were claimed before the performance, but five more jumped on the bandwagon before the night was over.

At least part of the excitement stems from Parks' presence at the event. In addition to a post-performance question-and-answer session, she spent two hours signing books, programs and paper fans that asked "What Would Suzan Do?" while talking to each audience member willing to wait in line.

She speaks of a "radical inclusion" that drove the project and led her to turn down offers from major theatres in New York who wanted to present the initial run of the play cycle as a normal, traditional premiere. Parks even shelved the cycle until her producer, Bonnie Metzgar, suggested the nationwide approach.

Now anyone who has an interest can perform her work. That same "radical inclusion" extends all the way from Parks' process of writing the plays to her method of signing books.

"When you're writing a play a day," she said, "you can't turn any ideas away. Everyone that comes up gets attention and respect. And now everyone who comes up deserves everything they can get. You give attention and love to everyone who comes to the table. Everyone is worthy of attention and respect and consideration. And they get stars around their name, and they get love. And that's a force of positive change."

If you haven't yet seen any of the performances, don't worry. You've still got just under a year to go.

For more information, go to www.zachscott.com/365.