Phelim McDermott on Theatre-Making, Directing, and Opera

(DONATE at www.ONKEITH.com to keep the series going!) Phelim McDermott is a prolific, award-winning performer-director and an Artistic Director of the ingenious Improbable theatre company (UK). All of Phelim’s theatre-making has been profoundly influenced by Keith Johnstone’s teaching and methodology. In this interview, Phelim talks about Life Game, the format Keith created that has remained an important part of Improbable’s repertoire since 1998. He talks about how impro helped create the text of Shockheaded Peter (1998), the Olivier Award-winning junk opera that Phelim directed and helped conceive. Finally, for over a decade, Phelim has been directing the operas of Philip Glass (Satyagraha, Akhnaten, The Perfect American) for the Metropolitan Opera, LA Opera, English National Opera, and elsewhere. These productions have garnered rave reviews not only for Phelim’s directing but for Improbable’s visually stunning aesthetic. Most recently, Phelim and Philip co-created Tao of Glass, and in this episode Phelim speaks on how impro, once again, supported this extraordinary collaboration www.improbable.co.uk Please note! This will be the last video for our first season! If you like what you see, please consider donating so we can keep these interviews going! Go to our website, www.OnKeith.com, and click on the "Donate" page! We have several more interviews that need to be edited, including a mini-doc on the original Theatre Machine players! Plus, any additional funds will go to paying for future interviews that can be shot.