Ed Schmidt of “Edward”

Posted on February 11, 2026 by robby

Listen in as Ed Schmidt, creator and performer of Edward, discusses melodramatic origins to fictionalized short stories, a “theatrical epistolary novel,” doing what you can do and not what other playwrights do, cutting out the middle men, object—>story vs. story—>object, and finding the sustainable model that works for you.

“…somebody else’s life started to emerge from this, and at a certain point I realized, ‘this is a play, told this way.’ […] And I thought, ‘how could I do this thing, which is really kinda anti-dramatic…and make that theatrical in some way’…”

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Xhloe Rice & Natasha Roland of “What If They Ate the Baby?”

Posted on December 16, 2025 by robby

Listen in as What If They Ate the Baby? playwrights, directors, & performers Xhloe Rice and Natasha Roland—Xhloe & Natasha—discuss being fascinated by history, deep absurdity, dressing up in femininity (as opposed to the masculinity of their last NYC show), zooming into a slice of life, true crime re-enactments, green spaghetti, candy-coated plasticky artifice, and not letting anything go to waste.

“…my biggest tip when you come see this show is, let it happen to you—don’t hurt yourself trying to get to the bottom, ‘what does this mean?’…just wait for the car ride home…”

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Eliza Palter, Vena Howard, & Kat Quiñones of “The Goo”

Posted on September 26, 2025 by robby

Listen in as The Goo director Eliza Palter, along with performers Vena Howard & Kat Quiñones, discuss unintended distance from your friends, efficient vibes, the built-up pressure of your 20s, creating compelling stage pictures on a picnic blanket, activating ideas & notions, sitcom framing, being real & having the hard conversations, and what a modern examination of the themes of The Importance of Being Earnest could look like.

“…it’s an ensemble piece, it’s funny, it’s about a bunch of people sitting around and talking about nothing, getting nowhere…and while this play isn’t a one-to-one adaptation…you have this sense that there’s something burbling under the surface that we’re not quite getting at. It’s a meditation on authenticity, on performance…”

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Mark Lonergan, Ryan Shinji, & Book Kennison of “I’ll Take It”

Posted on September 17, 2025 by robby

Listen in as I’ll Take It performer Ryan Shinji & composer Book Kennison, along with director Mark Lonergan, discuss success by proximity, coexisting in small spaces, conceptualization and minimizing, bodies and boxes in space, object manipulation, possible futures, dancing around each other, and what’s going on with this wild ride of a show in a box.

“The concept is three friends who are living together in a very tiny apartment, and over the course of the show they drift apart, they come back together…it’s a very classic New York story, and experience, and it’s told through the mediums of circus & physical theatre. So it’s not just people standing and having a relationship…it’s people doing spectacular, extraordinary things with their bodies…”

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Ned Du, Sissi Chen, Didi Won, Boyu Chen, Tien-Li Wu, John Jiang, Josh Lau, & Hannah Limbrick of “Not Our Home, Not Our Home”

Posted on August 28, 2025 by robby

Listen in as Not Our Home, Not Our Home playwright Ned Du, director Sissi Chen, performers Didi Won, Boyu Chen, Tien-Li Wu, John Jiang, & Josh Lau, and composer Hannah Limbrick, discuss the meaning of family, lost cats, enough or too much, freedom, enmeshment, what twists us apart, “love and responsibility,” mirrors of ourselves, and the purpose of guilt.

“…this show is really about the concept of guilt. How does guilt move us, how does guilt animate us to do very, very silly things. Also, it’s about the question of immigration; who do we leave behind, how does it change us, and more importantly, how do we maintain ourselves as a family despite, for example, straddling the Pacific…”

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Isabel Sanchez, Enrique Huili, and Eliza Palter of “In the Mouth of the Beast”

Posted on August 14, 2025 by robby

Listen in as director Eliza Palter and performers Enrique Huili & Isabel Sanchez of In the Mouth of the Beast discuss spelunking, climate change, father-daughter relationships, highs and lows, worldly stakes vs. the personal, trust, pushing the limits of your resources, life and death, making impossible choices, and what we’re willing to sacrifice.

“…you really get to see how people perceive themselves, as compared to how they really are…”

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Steve Burns & Matthew Freeman of “Steve Burns ALIVE”

Posted on July 25, 2025 by robby

Listen in as the co-writers of Steve Burns ALIVE—Steve Burns, performer, and Matthew Freeman, director—discuss the performer-audience relationship, going through some weird experiences, holding hands, asking for help, hermit crabs out of their shells, humans & humanity on the internet, having a conversation with an old friend, ancient technological testaments, the “inherent unsatisfactory nature of being alive,” and the kind of show that can only come from a place of deep friendship and creative respect.

“…it’s built to be a story for the audience, not just a confessional; it’s thematic, about the nature of the authenticity of our relationships through screens, and our relationships to each other…it’s an exploration of communication…”
“…in modern terms, it is really kind of an exploration of what a para-social relationship is, mediated by technology…”

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David Carl, Katie Hartman, & Michole Biancosino of “David and Katie Get Re-Married”

Posted on June 25, 2025 by robby

Listen in as writers/performers David Carl & Katie Hartman of David and Katie Get Re-Married, along with director Michole Biancosino, discuss litigation possibilities, drama school in the ’70s, heading to Edinburgh, psychopathy, wrangling, 9 a.m. dramatic improv (without a director), writing for yourself, confusing your audience, improvising into weird emotional places, and working with your friends and idols.

“…this man wears boat shoes, and quotes ‘The Zoo Story’…”
“And now I wear crocs!”

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Xhloe Rice & Natasha Roland of “A Letter to Lyndon B. Johnson or God: Whoever Reads This First”

Posted on June 13, 2025 by robby

Listen in as Xhloe Rice & Natasha Roland, the creators and performers of A Letter To Lyndon B. Johnson or God: Whoever Reads This First, discuss doing your own everything, learning curves, making your show mobile, finding a tire, the sinister myth of nostalgia, dressing up in masculinity, chemistry, “becoming people together,” going through a traditional writing process before tearing the script apart, settling disputes with your creative partner, and pulling the rug out from under your audience.

“…all of our work is historically influenced. We play a lot with clown, and absurdity…a lot of American movies, especially about the ’60s and ’70s…are so, like, ‘remember when everything was great, and it was the good ol’ days?'”

“We call it this ‘mythic American boyhood,’ that everybody wanted, but not necessarily anyone got…”

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Scott C. Sickles, Jesse Edward Rosbrow, Amanda LaPergola, Brian Silliman, & Alyssa Simon of “Hellish Delights”

Posted on May 9, 2025 by robby

Listen in as Hellish Delights playwright Scott C. Sickles, director Jesse Edward Rosbrow, and performers Amanda LaPergola, Brian Silliman, Alyssa Simon, discuss finding delight in characterizations, humor traps, storytelling, second chances and the effects of time on the work, finding the through-line, puppets, and what it means to be in hell.

“…I feel like the plays, parts of them, feel very different now than they did five years ago. I don’t know much of that is just that, our world has changed…how much of it was, it was in the back of our minds, ‘working’ for five years, or, we’re five years older, with five years more experience…”

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The off-off-Broadway podcast

Category Archives: Directors

Ed Schmidt of “Edward”

Xhloe Rice & Natasha Roland of “What If They Ate the Baby?”

Eliza Palter, Vena Howard, & Kat Quiñones of “The Goo”

Mark Lonergan, Ryan Shinji, & Book Kennison of “I’ll Take It”

Ned Du, Sissi Chen, Didi Won, Boyu Chen, Tien-Li Wu, John Jiang, Josh Lau, & Hannah Limbrick of “Not Our Home, Not Our Home”

Isabel Sanchez, Enrique Huili, and Eliza Palter of “In the Mouth of the Beast”

Steve Burns & Matthew Freeman of “Steve Burns ALIVE”

David Carl, Katie Hartman, & Michole Biancosino of “David and Katie Get Re-Married”

Xhloe Rice & Natasha Roland of “A Letter to Lyndon B. Johnson or God: Whoever Reads This First”

Scott C. Sickles, Jesse Edward Rosbrow, Amanda LaPergola, Brian Silliman, & Alyssa Simon of “Hellish Delights”