{"id":1832,"date":"2011-10-25T23:56:17","date_gmt":"2011-10-26T03:56:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www3.arts.umich.edu\/ink\/?p=1832"},"modified":"2011-10-25T23:56:17","modified_gmt":"2011-10-26T03:56:17","slug":"idris-is-coming-idris-is-coming","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/2011\/10\/25\/idris-is-coming-idris-is-coming\/","title":{"rendered":"Idris is Coming! Idris is Coming!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tomorrow is a very exciting day for me.\u00c2\u00a0 Really, for all of Ann Arbor. \u00c2\u00a0For myself, I get to see my good friend Idris Goodwin<\/a> for the first time in nearly three months. He will be coming from Iowa City, where he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s pursuing an MFA in playwriting, to read from his New York Times <\/em>acclaimed book These Are The Breaks<\/em>.\u00c2\u00a0 He has been featured on HBO\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Def Poetry Jam<\/a>, has produced some rap albums, and his latest play, How We Got On, <\/em>about three suburban kids who find their identities and forge friendships through hip-hop in 1988 was produced by the National Playwrights Conference at the Eugene O\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Neill Theater Center<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 That is where we met, and I think we both had one of the best summers of our lives. \u00c2\u00a0For the benefit of the rest of Ann Arbor, tomorrow night he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be joined at the Tea Haus<\/a> with friend and fellow author Kevin Coval<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know much about Mr. Coval, but if he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a friend of Idris\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m sure he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s worth checking out.\u00c2\u00a0 His website says he is an educator, poet, the co-founder of Louder Than a Bomb: The Chicago Teen Poetry Festival, and a regular contributor to Chicago Public Radio (you caught me, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m an NPR nerd).\u00c2\u00a0 I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m sure this will be a great night at a small venue in one of my favorite parts of Ann Arbor.<\/p>\n

It still kind of amazes me that I am lucky enough to call Idris a friend.\u00c2\u00a0 I had one of the best internships available to theatre students this past summer.\u00c2\u00a0 I was privileged enough to work in the literary office of the Eugene O\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Neill Theater Center.\u00c2\u00a0 The O\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Neill presents four conferences during the summer: the National Playwrights Conference, National Music Theater Conference, National Puppetry Conference, and National Cabaret and Performance Conference.\u00c2\u00a0 I realized it was a big deal as it was happening, but it wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t until I got back to school that I realized just how big.\u00c2\u00a0 Just as a quick idea of the caliber of plays and musicals presented at the O\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Neill, here are some notable alumni: Fences<\/em> by August Wilson, Uncommon Women and Others <\/em>by Wendy Wasserstein, Fuddy Meers <\/em>by David Lindsay-Abaire, In the Heights <\/em>by Lin Manuel-Miranda, Avenue Q <\/em>by Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx, and [title of show] <\/em>by Hunter Bell and Jeff Bowen.<\/p>\n

I was a literary intern, a position that I will cover when I do my overview of dramaturgy, but most importantly for our purposes today, I was assigned as the literary representative to How We Got On<\/em>, as well as Quiara Alegr\u00c3\u00ada Hudes\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s The Happiest Song Plays Last<\/em>.\u00c2\u00a0 The team I worked with on How We Got On <\/em>absolutely changed my life.\u00c2\u00a0 I know that sounds like such a beginning career 21-year-old thing to say, but it is 100% true.\u00c2\u00a0 The respect that I received throughout the process meant the world to me and has given me the confidence necessary to work in a field as tough as theatre.\u00c2\u00a0 Am I still terrified to graduate in May?\u00c2\u00a0 Absolutely.\u00c2\u00a0 But do I feel worlds more prepared than many of the other people trying to pursue the same career I am?\u00c2\u00a0 You bet.<\/p>\n

Idris is a playwright.\u00c2\u00a0 At the O\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Neill, playwrights are demi-gods.\u00c2\u00a0 At some theatres, they worship the actors.\u00c2\u00a0 At others, the directors.\u00c2\u00a0 At the O\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Neill, the text is what is sacred.\u00c2\u00a0 Idris could have very well written off this teeny non-hip-hop girl from the middle of nowhere, but instead he embraced the idea of a lit rep immediately.\u00c2\u00a0 We bonded over our Michiganian heritage\u00e2\u20ac\u201dFaygo and Better Made chips, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have an accent,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and Bell\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s brewery.\u00c2\u00a0 Rather than being his assistant, we worked as a team.\u00c2\u00a0 The same can be said of the wonderful director and brilliant dramaturg.\u00c2\u00a0 I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m still not sure what I did to deserve such a creatively satisfying work environment.\u00c2\u00a0 One of the first days at the O\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Neill, the interns were told that everyone there wanted to help them become the next generation of theatre professionals.\u00c2\u00a0 I smiled but on the inside I sort of rolled my eyes.\u00c2\u00a0 It seemed clich\u00c3\u00a9 and just a nice thing to say.\u00c2\u00a0 I never expected the love, friendship, and respect that I left with in August.\u00c2\u00a0 My experience altered me not only as a dramaturg but also as a playwright and reader.\u00c2\u00a0 On top of what I learned about myself as an artistic individual and the field more broadly, due to the nature of the play I also got to learn about fun things like hip-hop and rap in the 80s, WWF, and watertowers.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the most important lesson I learned that summer was from Idris.\u00c2\u00a0 I learned how to rap.\u00c2\u00a0 But he still does it better.\u00c2\u00a0 Come see him do his thing tomorrow night at the Tea Haus.\u00c2\u00a0 I know I will.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tomorrow is a very exciting day for me.\u00c2\u00a0 Really, for all of Ann Arbor. \u00c2\u00a0For myself, I get to see my good friend Idris Goodwin for the first time in nearly three months. He will be coming from Iowa City, where he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s pursuing an MFA in playwriting, to read from his New York Times acclaimed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":35,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[17,12,13,15,16,14],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1832"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/35"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1832"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1832\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1835,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1832\/revisions\/1835"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1832"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1832"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1832"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}