25 minute read
The Curve in the Road
A Conversation with JoAnn M. Hunter + Lorin Latarro
MODERATED BY DANI BARLOW
In late January, SDC Foundation Director Dani Barlow moderated a conversation, over Zoom, between choreographers JoAnn M. Hunter and Lorin Latarro. The longtime friends met when they were both dancers; their overlapping credits include the exuberant, much-loved 1999 Broadway revival of KISS ME, KATE, directed by Michael Blakemore and choreographed by Kathleen Marshall. (JoAnn started in the show as an Ensemble member and was then a replacement Lois Lane/ Bianca; Lorin later took over JoAnn’s track in the Ensemble and as understudy for Lois/Bianca.) In a photo shoot for the cover of this magazine, JoAnn and Lorin laughed, danced, and generally lit up the room. In conversation, they were engagingly forthright about their creative processes during COVID-19, the challenges they have faced, and their optimism for the future.
JOANN M. HUNTER has been lucky enough to have a career in the theatre for all of her adult life. She is lucky to have worked and learned from, and continue to learn from, so many talented people. Credits include over 25 shows on Broadway and the West End, as well as Japan, China, South Korea, and Australia.
LORIN LATARRO choreographed Broadway’s Waitress, Mrs. Doubtfire, Les Liaisons Dangereuses with Janet McTeer and Liev Schreiber, and Waiting for Godot with Sir Ian McKellen and Sir Patrick Stuart. Other credits include Merrily We Roll Along (Roundabout), La Traviata (Met Opera), Twelfth Night (The Public), Chess (Kennedy Center), 21 Chump Street (BAM), Queen of the Night (Paramount). She directed Is There Still Sex in the City? (Daryl Roth Theatre, NY Times Critic’s Pick). Juilliard BFA, NYU MA.
DANI BARLOW serves as the SDC Foundation Director. She has held positions at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Yale Repertory Theatre, Studio Theatre, and Round House Theatre. Dani holds an MFA in Theater Management from Yale School of Drama and a BA in Theater and Business Administration from Muhlenberg College.
JoAnn M. Hunter + Lorin Latarro
PHOTO Amanda Crommett
DANI BARLOW | I’d love to start by hearing from both of you about a process that you did pre-pandemic that was particularly exciting for you.
DANI | Yes.
LORIN LATARRO | A pre-pandemic process?
JOANN M. HUNTER | A pre-pandemic rehearsal, what we were doing?
LORIN | I don’t know. I don’t remember. (laughing)
DANI | I know. It feels like so long ago, but I’m curious.
JOANN | The last thing I was doing prepandemic, and the most vivid to me right now, was rehearsing LOVE LIFE for City Center Encores! It was a show that I didn’t know, a challenging show, but the more we worked on it, the more I started falling in love with it. When the pandemic hit, when it was clear that we were not going to even get to tech and get on stage, it was heartbreaking. It was such a phenomenal, fun group of people. I was working with Victoria Clark, who was directing the project, Brian Stokes Mitchell, and Kate Baldwin. We were having a blast. And the company was, oh, full out with feeling! It was so great to be in a room with Vicki; we had only worked together as performers. It was really exciting to play and work with her.
DANI | Thank you, JoAnn. What were you working on, Lorin?
LORIN | Just prior to the pandemic, we were in previews for MRS. DOUBTFIRE [directed by Jerry Zaks, on Broadway] and we were about to go into tech for THE VISITOR [directed by Daniel Sullivan, at The Public Theater], we just had our sitzprobe, and WAITRESS was just closing. MRS. DOUBTFIRE was in its first week of previews then shut down on that infamous Thursday afternoon—I left with sneakers, notes, and a pencil still laid out on the tech table. We walked into rehearsal on Friday for THE VISITOR and it too shut down; we closed off with a drum circle. And then I picked up with the same shows post-pandemic.
Sara Bareilles in the Broadway production of WAITRESS, choreographed by Lorin Latarro
PHOTO Jeremy Daniel
WAITRESS was first back, with a room full of alumni. The process was a joy bomb. COVID-19 seemed to be waning last July, so there was an air of relief and excitement opening Broadway back up. Mask protocols were less stringent. No cases. We changed some work inside the show to combine our favorite script and physical finds from London, the tour, and Broadway. MRS. DOUBTFIRE essentially picked up right where we left off. COVID numbers began creeping back up as we were in rehearsals and the zeitgeist shifted again toward trepidation and stricter protocols, and eventually positive cases in our cast.
With THE VISITOR, many of the actors in the room were telling a story about places they personally came from, left from, in the Middle East. Creatively, we went back to the drawing board devising some of the dances, for the actors to bring new parts of themselves into the choreography. We had some really exciting moments happen in the dance rehearsals, and there was one particular song that was aggressive and rhythmic, about how detainees felt locked in these de facto prisons. We visited with detainees, spoke to people who experienced encounters with ICE, and these actors really took this experience on with vigor and personalized the emotion in the dance in a really visceral way. It was quite cathartic for everybody.
DANI | And JoAnn, your first show back was Andrew Lloyd Webber’s CINDERELLA?
JOANN | Yes. I first went to London for final callbacks, in-person callbacks, in August 2020. We were still in full pandemic mode, but the first in-person live auditions that they had in London were for CINDERELLA. Andrew owns several theatres, which is very convenient, so we held auditions at the Palladium. I mean, come on, how lucky am I?
The protocols that we had were spectacular. I asked for 10- to 12-feet-wide boxes, six- or seven-feet deep. And that allowed me to get seven people on stage. The dancers came in and were assigned their boxes. I gave them 15 minutes to warm up. We did a half hour of movement. Boom. They left. Wiped down the stage. Fifteen minutes later, the next group came in. It took a while because we could only see so many people at a time. I too was on the stage with the dancers in a huge wide box at the lip of the deck. I could go all the way lengthwise, but I couldn’t go over a certain line. Crazy but we did it.
DANI | And did you do any work on Zoom at the same time?
JOANN | I did not teach any CINDERELLA auditions on Zoom, but I watched on Zoom when my associate held the first set of calls. I would watch the little boxes and say, “Who’s that over there?” So challenging. It’s just not the same as being in the room. The energy is different. It’s flat. Humans are energy, so it’s really tricky. I also knew that nobody was working on anything. The classes that they were taking, they were probably taking in their living room or in their garage or their apartment. So I was also very cognizant, careful, of how much I gave them, how long the audition material was. For instance, I didn’t want a lot of jumping. I thought, “Who’s really been able to jump and work those muscles?”
LORIN | I didn’t do much Zoom work, but I did one event via Zoom. I was one of the choreographers for “Broadway for Biden”; 90 percent of that event was over Zoom. We went into a dance studio, filmed ourselves teaching the choreography front and back, full out, and then breaking it down very slowly and then sent that out via email to the dancers—over 80 dancers participated. They all learned the choreography in their living rooms and came in knowing it!
I thought, “How is this going to work?” but they did it; dancers are really extraordinary! But I know, at the moment, dancers are very frustrated auditioning on Zoom, because in the room, they walk in and bring their energy and who they are. You are able to see how they dance in space, and, technically, how they plié. You can’t really get that muscularity on Zoom. So they’re getting frustrated. But it’s better than nothing.
JOANN | I think that’s what we all do. We do what we can do at the moment. When the road curves, we’ve got to curve with it. There was no other choice because of this particular situation.
“The Ball” from CINDERELLA at the Gillian Lynne Theatre in London, choreographed by JoAnn M. Hunter
PHOTO Tristram Kenton
DANI | Were there things that you did to adjust, to accommodate for the fact that there were certain things they hadn’t done in a while? Did you make things slower? Did you give them more time? Did you give them more space?
LORIN | MRS. DOUBTFIRE is a lot of high-energy dancing, a lot of jumping, very cardiovascular. We worked very slowly when we came back, because I didn’t want anyone to get injured jumping back in. We probably worked at half-pace, under tempo, marking it twice as many times as I would mark it in pre-COVID-19 times. I was hesitant to push people in a way that would have felt normal pre-COVID. It just wasn’t worth some getting injured over, so we were all really cognizant of that in the room.
JOANN | I was nervous for the dancers in auditions because I wanted everyone to feel comfortable. I tried to figure out, how could they move? I didn’t want them traveling too far because they couldn’t. The first call I had was a group of men. I remember they walked in and most likely it was the first time they were sharing space together. I’m talking to them about the show and the subtext of what this particular moment is, and it looked to me like they were just staring at me. And I asked, “Does everyone understand what I’m saying?” And they said, “We just have not been in a room [in a long time].” And I think they were thrilled, excited, nervous, all those emotions, and their brains were not working the way they normally work. Picking up material, remembering, using those muscles. So, exactly as Lorin said, I did have to go a little slower, take a little bit more time. I would say, “Mark it, mark, mark, mark, mark,” because I was petrified of their stamina not being up to par, up to what they’re used to.
LORIN | Choreographers are real arbiters of fear. I’m always asking an actor to do something outside their comfort zone, asking a dancer to just try and push one more pirouette, asking an actor to drop to the floor or move in an unfamiliar way. Especially when working with actors who are movers and not dancers, I spend a great deal of time navigating what feels safe for all parties. And part of what I think choreographers really understand inherently is when to say, “You’re going to be fine. I’m going to take you through this lift. We’ll do it first small, and then we’ll do it medium. And then we’ll do it big. I’m going to hold your hand the first three times and when you’re ready, you give the thumbs-up and we’ll do it without my hand.”
We have a sixth sense about when to push and when to stop. And, look, it’s scary for actors to lift people in the air who aren’t used to being lifted, like when [composer and lyricist] Sara Bareilles played Jenna in WAITRESS. She’s not used to being thrown from one boy to the next. She’s not JoAnn Hunter with 12 Broadway shows getting thrown around Broadway stages her whole career. So we have developed an understanding and language with performers to help make work safe eight shows a week and build confidence and communication.
Now we are all also the arbiters of figuring out…a new kind of fear. There’s science of COVID-19, but there’s fear of COVID, and everybody’s fear level is different. And we know that their experience of fear is real. For instance, partner dancing is fine; we’ve learned that if you wash your hands prior to partnering and after partnering, you have no higher risk of getting COVID. But even if that’s the science, the fear might still be present in the room and you have to navigate it. And that meant, for me, in one instance, cutting the partnering. If somebody is just so uncomfortable touching someone else in this pandemic, it’s a split-second decision: “I’m just going to put these actors first. We’re going to cut the partnering.” There are a million ways to make this moment. It’s gone. Let’s do something else. Navigating those moments became a whole other level of understanding the safety of dancer and actor.
DANI | I’m curious: when you all were back in the room, and as things continued to change—how serious COVID-19 is, the rates, the levels, all that kind of thing—you found yourselves in situations where you couldn’t engage the artists anymore through touch. Is that difficult?
LORIN | I’m used to being very tactile. These days, I use language before I touch anybody. “Are you comfortable with me touching you? I’m going to touch you on your thigh. Is that okay?” And everybody appreciates it. It’s simple. It’s an easy shift. And it works for everybody.
JOANN | I agree. And that’s because of the times we’re in and the shift, and this damned COVID. I am a touchy person. It was hard for me because I had to ask our COVID safety supervisor, what’s the protocol here? Every theatre, every company, every production has a different protocol.
For CINDERELLA, we rehearsed on the stage; they built a deck out over the audience, so that we were on the same level. We tried to make it like you were not in a theatre rehearsing, but the reality was we were in a theatre rehearsing. Not my ideal space. At first I did think it was fantastic, but for me—it was tricky. I was in a theatre, and somewhere in the back of my head I was thinking… finished product…NO, not a finished product. It was tough on the creative process.
But we did what we had to do. And we had a huge safe space to rehearse in, which was brilliant. So I asked, “What’s the protocol?” We don’t have to wear masks when we’re rehearsing. But we had to wear a mask if the actors went out to the house or anywhere else out of the workspace. Anyone who wasn’t part of the production, they all had to wear masks. All designers had to stay in masks. We did not, but Laurence Connor, the director, did say to me, “JoAnn, you can’t go over that line.” I said, “I can’t go on stage?” Next to impossible for me. I need to be near the dancers and actors. Oh, it was kooky.
Linzi Hateley + ensemble in JOSEPH AND THE AMAZING TECHNICOLOR DREAMCOAT at the London Palladium, choreographed by JoAnn M. Hunter
PHOTO Tristram Kenton
Now, the COVID-19 protocol for ALW theatres is that you have to be masked when you do go on stage. At least I can go up there and communicate. Sometimes I want to have an intimate conversation with a few people or one dancer or an actor and I don’t want to do it over the God mic.
DANI | It sounds like there’s a required flexibility and adaptability, depending on COVID-19, the moment, how people are feeling. Do you feel like you’ve gotten better at rolling with the punches than maybe you were in the past?
LORIN | Absolutely. Beyond COVID protocols that keep shifting weekly, there is flexibility in content. There was a moment in Waitress where we do this one big swing around and one of the actresses just said, “I know I used to do this swing, but it always scared me. And now, for some reason, I’m doubly scared.” And Diane [director Diane Paulus] and I looked at each other, and I said, “Let’s change the moment.” And we just came up with something in the room, and you know what? It’s better. It ended up being better than what was originally there. And now we’ve changed all the companies to this new idea. COVID made us all move at a tiny bit of a slower pace, and that slower pace worked out to be really conducive to creating art.
JOANN | Lorin said this earlier, but dancers and choreographers and those of us who work physically—we are used to solving problems. “I’ll make it work. I’ll make it work. We’ll make it work.” I can’t even tell you how many times it comes out of the mouth of probably every choreographer that we know: “I’ll make it work.” It’s just what we do. And I’m not saying just us. I think that’s part of our community, in that everyone has to do it together for it to get to a certain place. But dancers—dancers do it all the time.
DANI | I am curious how the industry has changed for you over the past two years. Do you feel like you have more agency than you did before? Do creative teams feel like they’re more on a level playing field?
LORIN | All of the shows did one, two, three, or four days of work on what is an equitable rehearsal room, community values, company principles, diversity training, anti-bias work—and each show did it a little differently. And it was really wonderful. The process brought the whole room together. In those moments you are asked not to be the director, not to be the choreographer, not to be the actor. So you start the rehearsal process off simply as individual people. And that definitely changes the dynamic, in a good way.
Manu Narayan, Jessie Austrian + Ben Steinfeld in the Fiasco Theater/ Roundabout Theatre production of MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG, choreographed by Lorin Latarro
PHOTO Joan Marcus
JOANN | I firmly believe that people can do way more than they think they can. I will push people, but I also think, because Lorin and I both were performers, that we have an advantage. We understand what it’s like to do a show eight times a week, what it takes. When we turn the picture around, we have a better understanding. Our communication, I think, I hope, is better, is more open. My guess is, even prior to the last few years, most choreographers were already doing a lot of that.
We are physical beings ourselves, so we understand what it takes for the body to perform. We understand what it takes to keep up. We understand the upkeep and what it takes to get yourself ready every single day to do that show at night.
LORIN | Yes! My whole life, I kept hearing about this stereotype of a choreographer— angry, relentless, masochistic: “Do it again, again, again, five, six, seven, eight!” JoAnn, you worked with Jerome Robbins. I didn’t. Maybe it was that? Who knows. But I am telling you, I have worked with the Martha Graham Company, with Twyla Tharp, with MOMIX, in 14 Broadway shows—with any choreographer I have been lucky enough to work with, I have never come across this false archetype of a choreographer. I never saw it. Never experienced that thing. I only saw it in the movies. I have heard people joke about this stereotype, but it has not been my experience. Ever.
The question of agency is an interesting thing. As a choreographer, I understand the responsibility of leading a room and the responsibility of collaborating closely with the director and writers and the music team and, of course, pushing the narrative and physical energy. But I feel very purposefully invisible. In other words, I try and recede and see pictures, focus on story, and make sure that the performers are the center of attention and the ones being taken care of. I never feel like I use this position in a sort of swordwielding way. In fact, I feel like the more I remain an architect—making pictures and creating, and in certain instances, devising together—the more they shine. The more the story shines.
JOANN | I agree with you, Lorin. I would also say that 99 percent of the time, in my experience, dancers want to come in, they want to do it, they want to be phenomenal. They want to shine for you. They want to work for you. As I was saying before, I was worried about, “Oh my God, they haven’t jumped. They haven’t done anything. Is there stamina?” And I said, “Mark it, mark it.” They did not mark it. They were full-out. They wanted to be because, first of all, they haven’t done it in so long, and this is their love. Dancers are athletes—and you have got to love it to want to do it because it is not easy. It’s physically exhausting. It’s mentally exhausting. And the lifespan is short. So, to be a dancer, you’re an athlete. And there’s a discipline aspect that dancers have, no matter what. It’s ingrained in them. The fact that I give them a voice to say, “Is it possible that we can do this instead, because I’m having trouble?” That’s fantastic. But 99 percent of the time they’ll go, “Okay, I’ll make it work.”
LORIN | Right. It’s making the space for it to be okay, to change something. And also holding onto the room to allow for breakthroughs, because what’s better for an artist than “I’m not going to do it. I can’t do it. I just did it!” Sara Bareilles was up there eight shows a week getting lifted and thrown around, and she loved it. And she was great at it! That part of being an artist—having a breakthrough—is a cherished and unique experience that makes us grow. So it’s a space for all of these things simultaneously.
DANI | The theme of this issue is “How have we changed?” For each of you personally, do you feel like something has changed and shifted in your philosophy, in how you work? I know we’re not out of it yet, but is there something that you’re going to take from this time moving forward? And then, if you zoom out, do you feel like there are certain things in the industry that have changed that are good, that are positive, and you’re excited to move forward with them?
JOANN | There are a couple things for me, personally. One is being able to walk into a room or see a show and not count how many people of color are on the stage. They’re just people. I want the best talent in the room. When we’re casting, this is the kind of work we’re going to be doing. This is the style, the style we’re going to live in. This is the movement I want to work with. I want whoever can do it. That’s who I want. I don’t look at the facade. I want the talent. I want the human.
The Broadway production of SCHOOL OF ROCK, choreographed by JoAnn M. Hunter
PHOTO Matthew Murphy
And I’m hoping that that’s where we’re going to go. That we don’t say, “Oh, okay. We’re ticking a box right now. We’ve got, let’s see, so many Black artists, so many Asian artists, so many female artists, so many trans artists.” I want to look up on stage and see talented people working together, coming together, and loving it! The original young actors of SCHOOL OF ROCK—when you looked up onto that stage at the Winter Garden, it was like the streets of New York City. Eclectic, unique, special, diverse. Fabulous!
Not every show has to be that. There are some shows that are going to be very specific to a region, to a culture, to a demographic, to a situation that can’t do that. And that’s okay, too, depending on the story you’re telling.
On a personal note, I was fortunate enough to work in dance as much as I did, but there were many jobs I didn’t get because of what I look like. And I remember watching the movie CHARLIE'S ANGELS, the remake with Drew Barrymore. I wanted to be a Charlie’s Angel. Let me tell you, when that movie came out and Lucy Liu was a Charlie’s Angel….I went, “Oh, my God.” To see other people in television, on stage, doing more, seeing more of that, for me, personally, is quite thrilling. I’m not saying I would’ve gotten the role. I’m not saying that. I’m saying it would’ve been nice to be up for CHARLIE'S ANGELS.
DANI | When you are chosen because you are what folks believe to be the best talent and not just checking a box, doesn’t that feel so much better? You can feel the difference between, “It feels like there was some box checking that had happened here” versus “I was the best person to be in this space for this opportunity.”
JOANN | I agree. I don’t want to be hired just because I have to fill a quota. I don’t want to be hired as a choreographer because I have to fill a quota. I want to be hired because I am right for the job. I don’t want to not be hired or not even get thought of because of what I look like or what my identity is. But don’t hire me just to tick your box; hire me because, you know what, I’m right for this gig.
LORIN | I agree wholeheartedly. I’m very optimistic about the way things are moving. It seems like everybody has taken responsibility in a personal way, and everyone is having more honest conversations and asking more difficult questions. And we’re already seeing exciting work come out of this moment. For me, philosophically, it’s really about slowing down the process, having laser focus, and asking nuanced questions with directors and writers; sitting and marinating in material longer. The “why” of the story has to feel strong now. I am taking on shows that feel important and relevant to me personally. I find myself asking the question, “Why this? Why now?”
Oh, here’s a tiny work change example: pre-pandemic, I would never ask for time for notes with the company. I always deferred that time to the director, but now I just ask, “May I have 15 minutes to do group notes?” It’s easy to make mistakes and not have a thoughtful response when you’re trying to do something catch-as-catch-can, or have an associate run and catch somebody before their dinner break. That didn’t work for anybody. No one wants to get a note while they’re putting their makeup on before the show.
JOANN | I feel the same way as Lorin, and I think, for me, asking to have your own voice, to have your voice in the room—I don’t necessarily think it’s just because of the last moments we’ve been in, but also because of experience. Because with experience comes more knowledge, comes more confidence. So when you’re first starting out, you’re thinking, “I’m just this peon—what do I have to say?”
I think also being women is layered on top of it. We always say we’re sorry. It’s like, “No, no, you go first.” I mean, I still do it and I’m like, “Oh God, JoAnn, stop it.” But, with age, hopefully comes a little bit more knowledge and confidence, and unfortunately age is happening. No, fortunately. I should say fortunately.
DANI | Is there any advice you’d give to other choreographers right now, in this moment?
JOANN | People have asked me that when I was a performer, and I always had an answer. As a choreographer, as a creator, I think maybe it’s the same answer. I used to say to aspiring dancers and performers—you have to love it. Because it’s not easy, as I said. And you have to do it because you love it, not because you want an accolade. Because accolades are far and few between. You have to do it because you want to be in the room. Because you want to banter with other people. Because you want to see how the roads intersect and then they go apart and then they intersect again.
LORIN | I always remind myself how lucky we are to be surrounded by music all day long. And that’s just one reason to love the work.
JoAnn M. Hunter + Lorin Latarro
PHOTO Amanda Crommett
