INTERVIEW: School is in session in ‘Skinnamarink’
Photo: Skinnamarink, a production from Little Lord, was created and directed by Michael Levinton. He also stars in the show. Photo courtesy of Maria Baranova / Provided by Everyman Agency with permission.
The play Skinnamarink, part of Next Door at the New York Theatre Workshop, is a new show that’s based on educational materials that have influenced American classrooms all the way back to the 1830s. Some schools apparently still use these books, known as McGuffey’s Eclectic Readers.
The play, the brainchild of Little Lord, is a commentary on the power of authority, how people have been taught to read and how the United States has developed its collective belief systems. It runs March 8-23 on East Fourth Street in the East Village.
The theater company has crafted the production to be a bit unconventional. There’s recess. There are masks. Everyone is dressed in school uniforms. It’s a different kind of theatrical experience, one that is par the course for Little Lord.
Michael Levinton, artistic director of Little Lord, created and directed the show (and plays a part during the evening as well). He recently exchanged emails with Hollywood Soapbox. Questions and answers have been slightly edited for style.
How did McGuffey’s Eclectic Readers influence your company to create Skinnamarink? How did you discover the readers?
I love visiting used bookstores, and especially the children’s section. You can always find gems in there. I came across the McGuffey’s in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, and was attracted to them initially because it was a set of beautiful little blue books with soft aged pages and that fantastic old book smell.
This collection was a 1930s reissue, and each was inscribed to “Sally from her Papa.” So really the first things I was drawn to was the look, feel and smell of them. And then I got to reading. I absolutely loved the brutal simplicity of the language; it felt so familiar but at the same time oddly antiquated. Little poems and scenes and series of words teaching you to read — so innocent, but also so deceptive — with this weird sinister vibe under all of it.
We were in the middle of building a project that had a vast amount of source material, and was very research intensive, and very loaded, and just a huge show (NOW IS THE TIME … at Abrons Arts Center, 2016), so I was immediately seduced by working with something very basic, very simple, very stripped down, and seeing what we could uncover.
What were some of your reactions when reading these educational materials for the first time?
How gendered they are. How powerful shame is. The differences between learning and training. It also got me thinking a lot about one-room schoolhouses, and homeschooling, and groupthink, and Flowers in the Attic, and Sharon, Lois, and Bram, and Babes in Toyland. What can I say — I’m a weird guy.
What do you think the show says about education and how children are taught?
The books (and the show) has a lot to do with unseen or implied authority: Who are these people/institutions we put our trust in? What are their motives? Are they the source of information or just a pass through? It also made us question: How were you taught to read? To think? To behave? How were you punished? What is your relationship to authority? To discipline? To shame?
How is the show ‘part recess; and ;part ritual’?
Don’t forget ‘part recruitment’ — it’s a three ingredient cocktail. For that you’ll just have to come down to the Fourth Street Theatre.
How would you describe your directing technique? Is it very collaborative?
Totally collaborative. Little Lord is an ensemble-based company that aggressively reinterprets classic, found and neglected texts to create new works of experimental performance. Our ‘junk spectaculars; are forged using layers upon layers of sourced text, pop culture detritus, upended performance conventions and curated thrift store treasures.
There is no one set technique or methodology for Little Lord’s process. We are most interested in the overlap of text and meaning, and as such, our scripts are part collage, part adaptation, part new writing and part ensemble devised, and always a result of intensive research into a wide variety of source materials.
I wear many hats here: producer, writer, director, performer — so sometimes I’m very much invested in the big picture, and sometimes I’m stretched a little thin and rely on having amazing, talented, trusting people in the room who understand the work, the aesthetic and our shared goals. This group has been absolutely amazing, working on the show for the past two years.
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Skinnamarink runs March 8-23 at Next Door @ NYTW on East Fourth Street in the East Village. Click here for more information and tickets.
