When Mosaic Theater decided to stage two-time Pulitzer Prize recipient Lynn Nottage’s satirical Fabulation or The Re-Education of Undine, artistic director Ari Roth sought a director who could find something perhaps a little different from the script. Roth placed a call to Eric Ruffin about directing, though it wasn’t a slam-dunk yes.
Nottage’s play tells the story of Undine, a successful African-American publicist who quickly drops down the social ladder once her husband runs off with her money. Pregnant and now broke, Undine must fall back to her childhood home in the projects and face the realities of the world she left behind.
“I knew the play from having seen it, but wasn’t terribly excited about [directing] the play originally,” Ruffin admits. “But then I read it and I realized that it was written as a love ethic. Every now and then you stumble upon a play that just feels like a playwright is being prescriptive to a community. To me, I saw this as both an indictment but also a formula on how we can cure or aid the development of how an individual or collectives can thrive in the western world.”
Plus, Ruffin loves ritual theater and tapped into that aspect right away when he read the script.
“This reeducation of Undine is a ritual and it’s sprinkled throughout the storytelling but I don’t know that I’ve ever seen anyone recognize that ritual,” he says. “When I create theater, I want to create the kind of theater for people who have never been to a theater before and I also think there are plays that titillate you emotionally and audiences process in a cerebral way when they process the whole thing, and every now and then you have a play that gives you an out-of-body experience when you take it in.”
Ruffin’s from the director’s school of thought that it’s good to have all three.
“I just thought it was all possible with this, as it’s layered with thought, layered with heart and no longer is it just spectator and actor,” he says. “I also think that plays come to you when you’re supposed to experience them, whether that’s the director, actor or audience. It helps us evolve in a certain way, and it was just appropriate that I would pick up a play that would acknowledge culture, family and heritage, because that becomes the foundation of driving things forward.”
Ruffin, who was nominated for a 2015 Helen Hayes Award for directing for Theater Alliance’s Black Nativity, is making his debut at Mosaic. His first show in more than two years, he was eager to get back in the game—just in the way that he wanted.
“What I attempted to do is create in the transitions some interstitial tissue that connects the storytelling,” he says. “I think there is an innate ritual that’s inherent in the writing, but I don’t know that I’ve ever seen it realized. You can’t change the text, you can’t change characters, but all you can do is conventionalize the work so that an audience gets it. And I attempted to actualize the ritual. I borrowed slightly from the Ifá religion, which has come through the Atlantic slave trade and come across to the Americas.”
He was inspired by Miseducation of Negro, a book by noted African American historian Carter G Woodson, who wrote about how sometimes those who are educated distance themselves from the black community thinking they are “better than” or “more knowledgeable then” others, and that disconnect undoes both the individual and the community.
“I find that to be true to a certain extent,” Ruffin says. “It was in the ’70s when Howard [University’s] students stood up and said they wanted some African American studies in the curriculum, but prior to that, the curriculum was identical to the Ivy Leagues. There was not attention to their own culture, and it held true for a really long time and still to a large degree holds true. This is Lynn’s nod to that book.”
Fabulation or The Re-Education of Undine, August 21 – September 22, 2019. Details and tickets
The play stars Felicia Curry as Undine, and features a cast of Aakhu TuahNera Freeman, William T. Newman, Carlos Saldaña, Lauryn Simone, Kevin E. Thorne II, James Whalen and Roz White.
“Felicia is a dream and I’m having such a great time working with her. I am the kind of director who says, here’s the vision, here’s the concept, and this is my understanding of what’s been written, and I will sit and watch the choices you make and guide you through the storytelling to make sure the narrative is told clearly,” he says. “I love to collaborate. Felicia is an incredible collaborator.”
As are the others in the show, and Ruffin is having a lot of fun with his cast in the rehearsal room.
“I went to Howard and there are a number of people associated with the production who are either Howard alumni and one is even a current student, so it was serendipitous. It all came together as it should,” he says.
While the show speaks specifically to female empowerment and a black woman’s journey, Ruffin feels the universality comes from the grapple with cultural identity and uniqueness.
“We’re sometimes asked to erase those things in order to thrive in America. But more and more, people are able to see the cultural currency that comes when you celebrate your uniqueness and your identity,” he says. “People can use their identity to thrive in America, not hide who they are.”
The post What Eric Ruffin found while directing Lynn Nottage’s Fabulation or The Re-Education of Undine appeared first on DC Theatre Scene.