New Marlborough — Resident, playwright, and performance artist Taylor Mac (who uses the gender pronoun judy) will speak about creativity at the New Marlborough Meeting House on Saturday, August 3, at 4:30 p.m. The Meeting House is located at 154 Hartsville-New Marlborough Road.
A Laguna Beach, Calif. native, Mac has had a storied career in the entertainment field. Among Mac’s many achievements is winning the MacArthur Genius Grant in 2017 and being a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for “A 24-Decade History of Popular Music” that same year.
In 2019, judy was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Play for “Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus.” Recent projects include appearing as the title role in a New York City production of Virginia Woolf’s “Orlando,” as well as a musical version of “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil” at Chicago’s Albert Goodman Theatre. Scheduled to appear with Mac is Heather Christian, who is a Drama Desk Award and two-time Obie Award winner.
Christian is a singer, playwright, and composer working with judy on a musical about Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas: “Clarence, in a Pause.” “We are both unicorns in the American theater,” Mac told The Berkshire Edge. “There aren’t many people who work like us.
This event will be an opportunity for anyone who is interested in the craft of theater to come and listen to some of the different approaches to our craft and how we think about form and content.” Mac said that Christian and judy will be performing some selections from the work-in-progress musical. However, judy would not give away song titles.
“The musical is about how we feel about Clarence Thomas,” Mac explained. “It’s a theater piece about how we think about him, how we feel about him, and all of the complicated feelings. It’s about our legacy of white supremacy in America and its legal ramifications.
It’s about how they just make us lean into our empathy and push it away. We will be talking about that and how we work together, what our tastes are, and how we like to make art.” Mac will also talk with Christian about creativity and the creative process.
“I think of artistic expression as a form of citizenship,” judy said. “You should be creative, and you should pay attention to what is going on in the world and find a way to be in conversation with it.” Mac said that judy has lived in New Marlborough for 20 years but has been coming to the Berkshires for over 30 years.
“The main thing that I love is that my husband is here, and it’s been his home for 40 years,” Mac said. “What’s not to love? It’s beautiful. I love the history of thinkers that have occupied this area, and how they have commingled with others.
I also love how intellectualism doesn’t have to be devoid of the working class, even the Puritan work ethic. The Puritan aspects of it all do get me down a bit, I admit.” When asked for elaboration on “Puritan aspects” of the Berkshires, Mac said, “Even though it’s, like, one of the more progressive places in the world, [the Berkshires] comes from a deep, deep Puritan community.
” “Those are [people] who are not the original occupiers of the land, but they occupied the land for quite some time,” judy explained. “They spread a lot of that [Puritanism] down through the generations to us. There’s a lot of a sense of Puritan dominance over expression.
There’s a lot of, like, ‘You’re not supposed to do this, you’re not supposed to feel, and you’re not supposed to behave that way.’ I do like to combat a little bit by living here. I know that it’s a gentle world up here.
There are a lot of artists here because it’s close to New York. I don’t really think of myself as having a home, but [the Berkshires] would probably be the closest I could say that I have a home.” Mac said that judy sees the Berkshires as a progressive community, despite some of its conservative facets.
“It’s just about recognizing how we’re not free of [the conservative aspects],” Mac said. “I don’t think there’s a lot of self-reflection when it comes to this. I think you have to recognize why you feel the way you feel, your tastes, and how these Puritan ideals have been passed down.
I think recognizing how we’re not free of it is important because I think there is a lot of resistance in thinking that anything is wrong with it.” For tickets and information on the event, visit the New Marlborough Meeting House’s website ..
