Interview: Director Barry Edelstein Talks THE WANDERERS' Journey From The Old Globe to New York

Anna Ziegler's The Wanderers, presented by Roundabout Theatre Company, is now in previews and will officially open on Thursday, February 16, 2023 at the Laura Pels Theater in the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre (111 West 46th Street). The plays star Katie Holmes as "Julia Cheever", Sarah Cooper as "Sophie," Lucy Freyer as "Esther," Dave Klasko as "Schmuli," Eddie Kaye Thomas as "Abe" and is directed by Barry Edelstein.

Barry Edelstein is the Artistic Director of The Old Globe in San Diego, where The Wanderers had its world premiere in 2018. Edelstein's Globe directing credits include the world premieres of Rain and, the American premiere of Life After, The Twenty-Seventh Man, Picasso at the Lapin Agile, and Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale, Othello, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, and, during the pandemic, Hamlet: On the Radio. Edelstein was also the Director of the Shakespeare Initiative at The Public Theater from 2008 to 2012, and the Artistic Director of Classic Stage Company from 1998 to 2003. Edeldstein is the creator, writer, and host of the podcast Where There's a Will from the Globe and Pushkin Industries, out now!

The Wanderers marks Edelstein's first time returning to New York to direct a play in over 10 years. BroadwayWorld spoke with Edelstein about returning to New York, his journey with The Wanderers, being at the helm of The Old Globe and more!

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The Wanderers is currently in previews Off-Broadway. You are the Artistic Director of The Old Globe in San Diego, but it's been over 10 years since you've directed a play in New York. What has it been like for you returning to New York to direct The Wanderers?

Incredibly exciting. Really fun to be back in the middle of this great theatre community, really fun to work at the Roundabout, which is such a great theatre with so much support for artists. New York has changed a lot in the 10 years that I've been gone, and I was a little nervous about what it was going to be like, but it really feels like a homecoming and feels great.

You directed this play in its world premiere at The Old Globe in 2018. What was it that drew you to The Wanderers?

Well, The Old Globe commissioned the play, developed the play, and premiered the play. So, The Globe's relationship with it is deep and long. And the answer is a couple of things, the first thing is Anna. Anna Ziegler is one of the most interesting and compelling voices writing plays in America right now. I think we're living in a golden age of American playwriting. Generally, there is just stunning writing going on in many cities around the country, and in many, many genres, and Anna is at the front of the ranks of contemporary writing for the stage. And I say that because there is something very unique about her voice, Anna is a poet, a novelist, there is a literary bent to her work, particularly this script, which is about writers. But there is a sense of the expressive possibilities of the English language that has a wonderful, deep craft, and deep command of structure at the same time as being beautifully truthful and really, really transporting.

So, I just think there is something unique about her voice that made The Old Globe want to deepen a relationship with her. And then she wrote this play that is extremely original, and very complex, in almost a kind of Stoppardian kind of way, it's got that level of intellectual puzzle to it, and so, I was won over the second I opened it.

And has your relationship to the material changed throughout the years, throughout this process?

Yes, of course, it would be impossible for it not to! Any time you get to do a play a second time, it's always this wonderful process of rediscovery, because you're working with a different group of collaborators, you're working in a different context, a different city, a different audience, and every one of those changes affects your relationship to the piece. But also, I'm older, five years later, post-pandemic, my kids are older than they were the first time. One of the issues in the play is what it's like to be a working artist and raise a family at the same time. The first time I did the play my kids were very young, and now they're a little older, and a little more self-sufficient, and so that whole dynamic in the play I respond to differently. Things like that. As your life changes, your relationship to art changes too. The nice thing is the piece is so rich, and has so much going on in it, that it kind of sustains and rewards the repeated inquiry.

Speaking of new collaborators, The Wanderers has an all-star cast, can you tell me what it's been like working with them to bring this show to the stage?

Yeah, they're fantastic. The group that did it in San Diego was also absolutely marvelous, and I'm grateful to them for their tremendous work, and this group too, they're fantastic actors. We've had a really wonderful, deep time together, that's involved a lot of real sharing of intimate, personal stuff. When you get into it, and you get into big questions about loss of a parent, and about struggling with the balance between career and family, if you're going to do it right, you've got to open up really personal stuff. And wonderfully, the room has been a safe space for all of us to do that.

And a consequence of Covid is it's kept our room free of outsiders, it's a bubble, it's just those of us who come to work every day, we're tested every other day, we're really rigorous about contact with the outside world because we're trying to keep everybody healthy. And the strange consequence of that, is we've become this little pod of people, like people on a little life boat in the middle of the ocean. It's just us, and there has been almost nobody from outside of our orbit. And so, the level of family intimacy and connectedness has risen really quickly.

What do you hope that New York audiences take away from this play?

The play very specifically is about the pernicious human habit of always believing there is something better just around the corner. And the play is about how this sense that 'There must be something out there that is finally going to make me happy, but I haven't found it yet' is toxic, is damaging to us. And what we need to do instead is learn that there is beauty all the time right in our lives, if only we can allow ourselves to see it. That's really what the play is about.

It's a very New York-y thing because we all have apartment envy, and we're all jealous of who is going to what dinner party, and who's been invited to what event, and so there is this sense of, "Oh, if only I get invited to that party I'm finally going to be happy." And this play is exploring that, and asking us to consider that there's a way to live your life and recognize that there is miracle in every moment, if only you can shift your perspective to see it. So, that's what I hope audiences will take away.

The Old Globe is having quite a year. Almost Famous, which had its world premiere at The Old Globe just premiered on Broadway. How does it feel for you at the helm of it all, knowing that The Old Globe is such an incubator for creativity and success?

And Dancin', which is about to start previews on Broadway also started at The Old Globe! 26 Broadway shows over the life of that theatre started there. How does it make me feel? Proud, excited. I just think that something really special is happening in San Diego. And it's the privilege of my life to be involved in it in the way that I am, it's great. There is an audience in San Diego that loves new work, there is a philanthropic community in San Diego that really believes that a great city should have great arts institutions, and the consequence is that the art ripples out from there. So, I'm incredibly proud. I walk through the theater district, and I look up at the marquee, and I go, "Wow, that show started in this beautiful venue in the middle of beautiful Balboa park," and I remember the first phone call where I said, "Yes, let's do it." And it just makes me feel like I'm walking on air. It's a very special, beautiful feeling.

Do you have any final thoughts you'd like to share?

I want to make sure that I completely credit Anna's brilliant writing, she's very special. I want to acknowledge the great design team that's come together, and I want to thank Roundabout for sticking with the show, because it was originally scheduled for 2020 and then the pandemic postponed it. And it would have been the easiest thing in the world for the theatre to say, "Well, different time, we need to move on." And they didn't, they stuck with it, and it's very moving, and I'm very grateful.