Ron Cephas Jones - St Luke’s, 30th April 2008

“You have an orange, we have an apple: let’s mix it!”

In one of the most fruitful of visits to the Factory, Ron Cephas Jones of Labyrinth Theater New York, spoke to us and led a discussion lasting, though it seemed to go very fast, for over an hour and a half. Before sketching out the history of Labyrinth, Ron immediately stressed the importance of his visit:

“This is about relationships between companies, to nourish, to encourage each other”. Citing the parallels between the development of his company and ours, he set out not so much as a comparison but gave us a view of the future which was part manifesto, part challenge. Whilst he acknowledged that the success that Labyrinth now has is from fifteen years of work, he addressed us, like to a younger brother, insisting over and over that we have the potential to do something no less exciting.

Labyrinth, he explained, started in the early 90s (1992) simply as a group of five Latin actors, meeting once a week to read plays, an early member being Paul Calderon (Pulp Fiction). Soon other actors, directors and writers became involved, including two, Stephen Adley Guirgis and Philip Seymour Hoffman, who, both with the company and outside, would become leading figures in American theatre.

From being a reading group, it branched out to include public performance of work, initially in the form of a party to which friends and others would be invited with a 2 or 3 dollar entrance fee to cover rental of a space. Quickly, those members with skills in directing and writing were identified and the company started to dedicate itself to new work from within. At the same time, the company had taken the use of Center Stage, a small, “black box” space, which was the home of the company, both for performance and a meeting place.

Ron himself joined in 1999, in the year that Guirgis wrote ‘Jesus Hopped the ‘A’ Train’, the story of two convicts on Rikers Island. One of these, the serial killer “Lucius” was a role written for Ron. The director was Guirgis’ usual collaborator, Philip Seymour Hoffman.

By then, the company had established a way of approaching the work, beginning with several weeks of private workshops before working in front of an audience for a five week period. Center Stage, a 70 seater, was becoming too small, though Ron noted that queues of people trying to get in looked good and created a buzz. And reviewers from the New York Times sought out productions - rare in an off-off Broadway venue.

Good reviews and public interest led to the enlargement of the company and an office had to be organised, accounts submitted and so on. Until this point, members had been paid only a small stipend, to cover travel and subsistence costs, but this was to change with the appointment of a Board of Directors and the moving of the company’s base, in 1993, to the Public Theater NY , who gave them a free space and some funding.

More funding from a surprising and generous source came in the form of $500,000 from Madonna, which secured the run of ‘Jesus’ in the West End (Donmar) after showing at the Edinburgh Festival, where it had won the Festival Fringe First Award.

From his experience with Labyrinth, Ron explained passionately to us how we should be working and the principles that should guide us in future. Having seen and been hugely impressed with Hamlet, he thought that new work, as well as classics, should be a central part of our existence. He suggested that there should be a Literature Committee, formed of those members perceived as being good at reading and assessing plays. Plays should be submitted to the committee by an agreed date, after which perhaps five scripts should be chosen for what he called “The Intensive”, that is, working on and then reading in front of an audience. Out of these, two might emerge as possibilities for company performance.

Ron clearly possesses a broad artistic mind and he stressed several times the need to reach out for influences be they from music, animation and other arts, but above all, to have the courage to mix the forms. By way of example, his role in ‘The Last Days of Judas Iscariot’ was a mix of biblical and hip-hop. In the same way, he mentioned that not all of the company had been actors. One, David Zayas, had been a policeman but was now enjoying a good career on stage and television. Ron’s next work is to be a show about jazz, and will include, amongst other eclectic elements, musicians.

“In the end, it comes back to the work”

Apart from the word “work” which came up again and again, Ron also talked to us about intensity, which, as a self-governing group and not a publicly funded company, we could pursue with greater freedom. Labyrinth itself takes two weeks a year on a sort of retreat, where work can be all-engrossing, going from, say, 9am to 3am, even working over lunch on a scene. In this way, three plays could be worked on simultaneously, and the members would be in a position to bond as a group, to build confidence form within and begin the dangerous task of “putting our personalities on the stage”. It takes time, he said, to build trust between actors, but only having done so can they be open with each other. He proposed that we might go away for four days for an ‘Intensive’. From this exercise would come the commitment and loyalty to a group, such as would be strong enough to withstand the inevitable tensions and difficulties in any project of this kind.

“Re-affirmation, re-affirmation, re-affirmation”

J'ox