This month has brought an array of collaborations into my life, for which I’m exceedingly grateful. Perhaps the most challenging was the creation of a tech rider for the production of LULU XX which I had the privilege of taking to Dubrovnik in July 2024 right after I “retired.” The production, conceived of and produced by Wax Factory founders Ivan Talijančić and Erika Latte was performed over twenty years ago and has an illustrious history performing at the Connolly Theater in New York in 2019, and last in Dubrovnik, Croatia, as part of Midsummer Scene Festival. I owe the privilege of having been on that show to previous collaborations with Sandy Cleary, with whom we had collaborated with Iranian director Reza Abdoh in August of 1991 at the Los Angeles Theater Center on Bogeyman.

Sandy had contacted me in the spring of 2024 with an enticing invitation to meet with Ivan to discuss my stage managing LULU XX at the Croatian festival. After agreeing to hire me (pretty much purely on Sandy’s recommendation), I began the process of learning the show, which is technically fast-paced and complex. Fortunately, there was a video and Sandy shared her calling script as well. I had little to do with the pre-production communications with the theater in Dubrovnik, and arrived, to meet the wonderful design team and begin the load in and tech and one performance of the show. You can read more about that trip and the collaboration here. From this experience, these are the lynchpins of what makes a Collaboration work. Or life, for that matter.

• Total immersion in your aspect of the process. Do your homework HARD.
• Listen and absorb information at a high rate and adapt to that info
• Assume positive intent in all communications
• Prepare for long hours and be patient as your collaborators do their work
• Release your assumptions about what is possible (for you to do and also what can be achieved together) You may be pleasantly surprised at the result!
• Trust your colleagues
• Have fun and relax

Back to the Tech Rider. Ivan called me about helping to assemble for some future iterations of LULU XX. Over a period of about a month, using a template for another show (thank you, Sandy Cleary, again!) we chipped away at each area of the document to try to convey the complexity of the needs of the show without scaring off potential Presenters. Tricky stuff. And because, believe it or not, I hadn’t had the practice of creating tech riders in my quiver after nineteen years in Academic theater producing, I enlisted the review of one of my friends and an excellent Production Manager, Tony S, to be more experienced eyes to the document. He came back with about 180 notes, all of which I implemented into the document. Thank you, Tony! Over the course of several weeks, with the excellent design team for LULU XX, we came up with the document which has been sent to a few festivals for next summer. Cross your fingers for more fun in the sun. And the dark.

In the course of the final week of massaging the tech rider, I had the privilege of dining with six of my former students from SDA, all of whom have become seasoned practitioners in their chosen fields of what I like to think are theater or theatrically adjacent careers. We gathered to fête Melissa T, visiting from Florida for a work-related workshop in Glendale she was running/attending. News of her presence inspired the other five to join for a spirited dinner at my home last week.

I treasure the opportunities to reconnect with former students. The goofy bread meme was because I mentioned I’d forgotten bread and that circulated in the shared text. Just for the record, I had the bread, but didn’t execute. Anyhoo….

Get Thee To The Beach!

The other big collaboration that culminates this week is the one with my food bank buddy, Art S. Art has invited me to be his co-captain on this Saturday’s Heal The Bay Coastal Clean up Day 2026. Our site is the north side of the Malibu Pier, sponsored by Baywatch and will have an interactive zone for after we clean up the beach, including a raffle! If you think you can come, please register HERE! The event is from 9AM-12PM on Saturday, September 19, 2026 and we will pick up thousands of pounds of trash and have fun doing it. That day there will be over sixty clean up sites, so if ours doesn’t appeal, find another, but we’d love to see you out there.

Ongoing Collaborations

I’m also collaborating with my dear and very talented friend Yehuda Hyman, who has written and will perform a solo performance entitled Dancing Into Roses. That will take place at 20 Putnam Ave., Brooklyn, NY 11238 and will perform eight times beginning October 23rd and ending on November 1, 2026. It is a production of Mystical Feet Company, and you can purchase tickets from their website. For those of you in NY, I hope to see you there!