We were lucky to catch up with Josh Short recently and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Josh thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. We’d love to hear the backstory behind a risk you’ve taken – whether big or small, walk us through what it was like and how it ultimately turned out.
In my position there can be a temptation to program work that has already been “proven” as successful.
What’s hard is learning how to provide opportunities for artists and work that takes risk.
Audiences are smart, and while it can be easy to convince ourselves that audiences just want familiar programming all the time the truth is that they come to the theater to experience something new that they’ve never experienced before.
In a couple of weeks we’ll start rehearsals for the final production of our 2022/23 season: a “doo-wop” inspired musical about the Italian Baroque painter Artemisia Gentileschi.
When the playwright, Darcie Dennigan, first approached me about this new work it was still yet to be written. It was an idea in her head, and while I didn’t quite understand it fully I’d been fortunate to collaborate with Darcie over the years. Her work is among the most adventurous, innovative playwriting that I’ve ever seen, and as a producer and a director I’ve always considered it an honor that she trusted me with her work.
So when she brought up this idea for a doo-wop inspired musical about Artemesia, it was an easy “yes”.
It’s a risk – we could’ve programmed any well-known play instead – but that’s why we’re here. We’re here to provide those playwrights that take risks with a place to do it, and our audiences are as adventurous as they come.
When you work with people you trust, who trust you, then the risk of doing something new and outside the box is never as scary as it could be.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
Josh Short is the Founder and Artistic Director of Providence’s award-winning Wilbury Theatre Group, where he’s produced hundreds of workshop and full-scale productions of work by local and world-renown artists with a commitment to artistic excellence and community engagement.
In addition to his work as a producer with the Group Josh has directed many productions, including; The Humans, Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812, Lifted, Dolores Goes to Poetry City, Krapp’s Last Tape, Decameron, Providence; RESCUE! Or, The Fish; Fun Home; The Pleiades; The Pirates of Penzance or, The Slave of Duty; The Skin of Our Teeth; New and Dangerous Ideas; Spring Awakening; The Lieutenant of Inishmore; The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity; Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead; Blasted; Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson; This Beautiful City; Detroit; Ui [oo-ey]; and The Threepenny Opera. As an actor with the Wilbury Group he appeared in Constellations, The Caretaker, Gruesome Playground Injuries, Straight White Men, Ui [oo-ey], and the group’s inaugural production, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?.
In 2014 Josh led The Wilbury Group’s efforts to establish FRINGEPVD The Providence Fringe Festival with 50 handpicked artists in just 5 venues throughout Providence. In the five years since, FRINGEPVD has grown to become a voting member of the United States Association of Fringe Festivals, the World Fringe Congress, and stands as the largest fringe theatre festival in New England.
In addition to his work with The Wilbury Group and FRINGEPVD, Josh has worked with Gloucester Stage Company, Perishable Theatre, The Gamm Theatre, The LaJolla Playhouse, The Gaslamp Quarter Drama Department, The Provincetown Tennessee Williams Theater Festival, and The Providence Black Repertory Company, where he served as Associate Producer from 2008-2010. A proud member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, a national theatrical labor union, he also serves as a member of Congressman James Langevin’s Arts and Culture Advisory Committee, as a mentor with the Rhode Island Foundation’s Emerging Leaders program, and is a graduate of the Pi II 2020 class of Leadership Rhode Island. He has been recognized by GoLocalProv among 20 Who Made in a Difference in 2020, by Providence Monthly as Who to Watch in 2021, was among the recipients of the 2021 PBN 40 Under Forty Awards, and is the 2022 recipient of the Tom Roberts Prize for Creative Achievement in the Humanities presented by the Rhode Island Council for the Humanities.
A graduate of the University of Rhode Island, Josh lives in southern R.I. with his wife Christine and their three children: Olivia, Raegan, and Jackson.
What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?
I’m fortunate to be part of an artistic community that values art that takes risk – but there’s always room for that community to grow.
Theatre is a communal experience – it can’t happen without the presence of the actors onstage and the audience in the seats. It can’t happen in a vacuum, it NEEDS that audience participation more than any other form of art.
Society needs to understand that their presence and participation in the work is essential to our very existence. Financially, Artistically, and in every other way: we don’t exist without the support of our audiences. Taking the theatre for granted is the first step in our extinction.
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
When I was in school studying to be an actor, I was always taught that the director needed to be the smartest person in the room. They should be an expert on all things, and have the right answer for every question.
I directed by first few plays under this illusion – and it was an extraordinarily difficult process every time. It left very little room for growth and collaboration, and the end results were typically stale.
With experience though it became clear that the director’s role in the room is more suited to being a collaborator. Listening to and creating a space where the actors, designers, and all involved have the room to share their own ideas and build the production together.
Yes, the director must prepare and come in to rehearsal with their own thoughts and beliefs about the play – but they must also be open and ready to throw it all out the window.
The work we do as theatre artists is collaborative, and it’s the director’s role to facilitate that collaboration and guide the production to become what it can only be because of the collective vision of the individual artists working on it.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.thewilburygroup.org
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thewilburygroup/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheWilburyGroup
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-wilbury-theatre-group/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheWilburyGroup
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/wilbury-theatre-group
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-wilbury-theatre-group-providence
Image Credits
Photos by Erin X. Smithers