To Download a PDF of an Interview with Anna Deveare Smith, Director / Producer

Resilience

The Role of the Arts in Resilience

An Interview with Anna Deveare Smith, Director / Producer, The Anna Deveare Smith Pipeline

EDITORS’ NOTE Anna Deavere land a TV show that runs for nearly support process in the arts, other than through Smith is an actress, playwright, 20 years such as Grey’s Anatomy. Most, teaching environments. I also like new ideas, teacher, and author. Her most recent however, have short-term employ- and I’m fascinated by what my students bring play and fi lm, Notes from the Field, ment, and no one can predict what into the room. I’ve taught since 1974 and I never looks at the vulnerability of youth, will yield fruit. Hence, many work in a grow tired of meeting new people and learning inequality, the criminal justice sys- variety of media. In my case, I am an about their imaginations. This may or may not tem, and contemporary activism. academic as well. This was a big deci- indicate that I’m working with the next genera- The New York Times named the sion to make, and for years being an tion of leaders, per se. stage version of Notes from the Field actress and being a tenured professor Your work has been pivotal to help- among The Best Theater of 2016 and did not work well. You have to declare ing people understand racial inequality Time magazine named it one of the what and when you will teach months and what it can mean for people’s lives and Top 10 Plays of the year. HBO pre- in advance. At my level, as an actress I livelihoods. How have the events of recent miered the fi lm version in February Anna Deveare Smith might get a job and not fi nd out until a months impacted your work? 2018. Looking at current events from week or even a couple of days before The events following the murders of multiple points of view, Smith’s theater combines what my schedule will be. I was able, however, George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, the journalistic technique of interviewing her to fi gure out a way to put it all together. The and Rayshard Brooks have certainly impacted subjects with the art of interpreting their words center of my work is the kind of theater that I my work and my personhood, but it is too early through performance. Her plays include Fires In create. From that, a variety of other opportuni- to say how. the Mirror, Twilight: Los Angeles, House Arrest, ties have come my way. So, for me, I focus on How do you define resilience and and Let Me Down Easy. Twilight: Los Angeles what I am doing at the moment. what do you see as the role of the arts in was nominated for two Tony Awards and Fires in resilience? the Mirror was runner-up for the Pulitzer Prize. I’m studying resilience at the moment so Smith co-stars on the new ABC / Shonda Rhimes I’ll have a better answer a year from now. For series, For the People. She also appears on the now, I think it’s the ability to withstand and hit ABC series Black-ish. She previously starred resurrect regardless of your circumstances. Art as Gloria Akalitus on Showtime’s Nurse Jackie, “Artists should be can give people courage. This is a mystery. You and as the National Security Advisor on NBC’s can’t promise it and I don’t think we as artists The West Wing. Films include The American should promise it. It’s such a personal and mys- President, Rachel Getting Married, Philadelphia, studied, particularly terious moment – the moment when a work of Dave, Rent, and The Human Stain. In 2012, art unearths a potential that you may not be President Obama awarded her the National aware of. Regrettably, in an era that is pos- Endowment for the Humanities Medal. She was the ones who are not sibly overly interested in pathologies, we think the recipient of the prestigious 2013 Dorothy and of works of art “triggering” troubling thoughts Lillian Gish Prize for achievement in the arts. In in the spotlight, to or feelings. There are even warnings in some 2015, she was named the Jefferson Lecturer, the theaters that this triggering may happen. Works nation’s highest honor in the humanities. She of art are sometimes, and probably not that was the 2017 recipient of the Ridenhour Courage have an understanding often, if you think of a lifetime, going to suggest Prize and the 2017 recipient of the George Polk something to the viewer or participant that is Career Award in Journalism. Smith is the found- otherwise discreet. ing director of the Institute on the Arts and Civic of what keeps people How has your personal resilience helped Dialogue at New York University, where she is also to drive your work? University Professor at Tisch School of the Arts. going when rewards Oh, you can’t be in a sometime profes- sion – and that’s what I’d call the arts, except Did you know at an early age that you were for the one-percent lucky few – a sometime attracted to the arts and had a creative side? are in short supply.” profession. You can’t survive in a sometime I was attracted to the arts, but the attraction profession without resilience. Artists should be did not lead to anything substantive until I was studied, particularly the ones who are not in 23 years old. the spotlight, to have an understanding of what You are involved in many different keeps people going when rewards are in short projects. Will you highlight your work and supply. key areas of focus? What interested you in teaching and Who are some of the resilient leaders It is true that I am involved in different working with the next generation of leaders? you see today? projects. This is not odd for performing artists. I like teaching because I like people and We just lost one of the most resilient – the Some are fortunate enough, for example, to I like process. There’s no way to market or late Congressman John Lewis.• VOLUME 43, NUMBER 4 POSTED WITH PERMISSION. COPYRIGHT © 2020 LEADERS MAGAZINE, LLC LEADERS 105