(L-R, Aimée Guillot, , Michael Shipley, Jamie Jones)

(L-R, Aimée Guillot, Jamie Jones)

Aimée Guillot

Director Anne Kauffman and Playwright Adam Bock

Encore interviews resident playwright Adam Bock, author of The Typographer's Dream:

How did you first become involved with Encore?

AB: We were doing a reading of Five Flights at the Magic and Kent asked Lisa to be in it; and then we did a workshop of The Typographer's Dream with the Shotgun Players and Lisa played the Typographer - so we started getting to know each other.

What was it like seeing Five Flights become the success that it did?

AB: It was odd and exciting. I remember thinking the show was gorgeous - I loved James' set, and the actors sparkled. And previews were fun. At the opening night party there was a happy buzz; we'd survived a fire alarm that went off right before the show - all of the critics were there and the audience had to get up and leave their seats and the firemen came, and then the show went on, and the audience was great - really behind the actors. I remember Lisa calling me in the early morning telling me that we'd gotten a big review in the Chronicle and that tickets were selling and suddenly shows were selling out and selling out farther and farther in advance and more good reviews came in and we started extending and then extending again and again. I didn't know what to make of it - I loved the show, and I loved all the people working on it, Kent and James and Kathryn and the designers - the actors were incredible and such a strong team - but I knew it was their show so all the noise around it felt more like noise about them! I just kept opening my eyes wide and smiling. People were so generous about it all - I was just psyched that we'd made something that people could clearly relate to, and that touched people.

Would you say there are any particular themes that your work follows?

AB: I write about lots of different things - about waking up, about choosing how to live in the world, about love, about gay men growing up, about how we use the resources available to us. I like hearing stories that aren't usually placed in the center, I like to listen to women speak, I like surprises, I like jokes.

So tell us about The Typographer's Dream.

AB: I started The Typographer's Dream by wanting to write about a typographer. My job at the time was as an assistant to the principals of a design firm called MetaDesign - they did the most amazing graphic and web design, and while I worked there I fell in love with typography - which is the designing of text, the letters themselves and how they are placed on the page. Then I thought "well, if I write about a typographer, I should write about a geographer too. And maybe about a stenographer." That made me laugh. Then I started thinking about our work, and the question of "am I my work?" and how what we do every day creates the world we live in. I thought it would be interesting to use people's work to create their characters - for example, a geographer is concerned with boundaries - could a geographer have trouble with the boundaries in her own life?

You presently reside in New York - do you feel there's a different "artistic climate", as it were, having worked on both coasts?

AB: New York is very different from San Francisco - it's very big and very businesslike. It has been work for me to remember to write to a community here rather than to the business - it is easy in New York to get swept up in the notion of making it - and in thinking that there might be a way to do that. When I was in San Francisco I was writing to understand myself and my communities - and because of San Francisco's size I always felt the different communities I was a part of around me - the theater community which is strong and tight, and the gay community which is gorgeous, and all my pals who I'd
bump into on the street all the time. I believe that is the way for me to write. I miss San Francisco for that reason - the deep honoring of community.New York is smashed full of theater - I go to three or four plays or readings a week here. There are so many playwrights and actors and directors and do much art, I feel like I am back in school - learning fast and furiously. New York has encouraged me to think bigger, to explore event and spectacle, to dance on a pin, to meet people and to work harder. It's fun.
I'm fortunate to work on both coasts. It's a good combo - and I can feel the two influences blending in my work. I like it.

(Interview conducted by Reynaldi Lolong. All Photos by Shawn Ferreyra)