A NOTE FROM THE ARCHIVISTS
After watching Offstage, you’re already familiar with the incredible amount of compassion and hard work that went into the creation of this show. Every single person on this team- from the cast and composers to the production team- put their heart and soul into making sure that these stories were told properly and beautifully. Now, we want to share with you the other stories from the process: the stories that went on behind the scenes.
Katherine and I have had the privilege of sitting down and talking with many members of the production team, as well as the cast and composers. Our method was simple: we want to show you what they want you to know about them and their creative process. While you’ll see our names scattered throughout, Offstage, Backstage is not a curatorial project; it’s our way of allowing you to explore everyone’s hard work, which so often goes unseen during a traditional theatrical process.
We hope you use the archive to learn more about your favorite songs, discover how the different departments did their work, and most of all, get to know the people behind this production. Like the stories you saw on the screen, their stories matter, and we’re honored to help tell them.
— OLIVIA KORMOS, Archivist & KATHERINE LEISTER, Assistant Archivist
a note froM the director
"Process over product." These are words that Matthew and I repeated to ourselves time and again in the development of Offstage. We wanted to make sure that every step of the way, Offstage would foster an empathetic and educational environment for all those who worked on it. In a world where nothing was certain, this meant creating our own process from the ground up, from learning how to conduct fun and healthy rehearsals virtually to navigating how to safely film in person. This has been a process that none of us have done before, and may never do again, and thus one that we felt it was important to embrace as part of what this show is. Developing Offstage meant learning how to be okay with some bumps in the road, knowing that every problem has a solution so long as you have the drive to find it, and learning that sometimes that solution is better than anything you could have imagined before.
Offstage embraces each moment and piece of who we are as we tell our stories, and this archive does exactly that for our show itself. Our mission has always been to tell the stories too often left off the stage, and we are so excited to bring you even more of those through Offstage/Backstage.
— ZOË LILLIS, Offstage Director
LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
In-person rehearsals and filming for Offstage took place in Lower Manhattan and Jersey City on the ancestral homeland of the Munsee Lenape people. Tisch New Theatre acknowledges this history and recognizes the historical links between the land on which New York University sits and the Lenape. Through our company’s mission, TNT seeks to build relationships with Indigenous communities and nations through academic and artistic pursuits, partnerships, historical recognitions, and community-building practices.
For more information, go to https://thelenapecenter.com/ or https://native-land.ca/.