From the pile of theater books that turn up on my desk from time to time, one stands out: The Play That Changed My Life, which was just published by the American Theatre Wing and was edited by Ben Hodges.
Every theater person ought to be able to answer this question, but Hodges took the smart road of asking actual playwrights: What was the play that changed each of their lives?
And nineteen of them answered, with thoughtful essays — Sarah Ruhl, Suzan-Lori Parks, Nilo Cruz, Doug Wright, Regina Taylor, and on and on.
Some of the answers aren’t at all surprising (Ruhl chooses Paula Vogel’s The Baltimore Waltz) and some are utterly so (Diana Son, who wrote Stop Kiss, chooses Hamlet). A.R. Gurney talks about becoming entranced with Stephen Sondheim and David Ives with Edward Albee. Who knew?
So here’s my question, theater people: What was the play that changed your life? What made you fall in love with theater? What made you choose it above all else?
I’ll start. For me it was probably an early production of The Fantasticks, at Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, sometime in the early or mid-1960s, when I was 12 or 14 years old — the perfect age to see The Fantasticks the first time., and the perfect age to fall in love with theater.
What about you? What turned you onto theater — and why?
Do tell.