Blog Entries from Trust

The 2009-2010 Jeff Award Nominees are announced!

Congratulations to all of the Equity Wing Joseph Jefferson Award Nominees! Below you'll find a list of our 7 nominations for our productions of "Trust," "Icarus," and "Hephaestus: A Greek Mythology Circus Tale," plus Ensemble Member Joey Slotnick's nomination for Best Actor in a Principal Role (Musical).

NEW WORK – PLAY
David Schwimmer and Andy Bellin - “Trust” - Lookingglass Theatre Company

ACTOR IN A PRINCIPAL ROLE – MUSICAL
Joey Slotnick - “Animal Crackers” - Goodman Theatre

ACTRESS IN A PRINCIPAL ROLE - PLAY
Allison Torem – “Trust” - Lookingglass Theatre Company

SOUND DESIGN – LARGE
Ray Nardelli - “Hephaestus: A Greek Mythology Circus Tale” - Lookingglass Theatre Company and Silverguy Entertainment

LIGHTING DESIGN – LARGE
Brian Sidney Bembridge - “Hephaestus: A Greek Mythology Circus Tale” - Lookingglass Theatre Company and Silverguy Entertainment

ORIGINAL INCIDENTAL MUSIC
Ray Nardelli, Andre Pluess, Kevin O'Donnell and Josh Horvath - “Hephaestus: A Greek Mythology Circus Tale” - Lookingglass Theatre Company and Silverguy Entertainment

ARTISTIC SPECIALIZATION
Bridges Media - Multimedia Design - “Trust” - Lookingglass Theatre Company
Sylvia Hernandez-DiStasi - Circus Choreography and Movement Direction - “Icarus” - Lookingglass Theatre Company

In Conversation With David Schwimmer

Interview by Literary Manager Margot Bordelon 

You’re an active member of the Board of Directors of the Rape Foundation in Santa Monica. Will you talk a little bit about your work with the organization and how it led to your interest in writing about internet predators?

I’ve been supporting the work of the Rape Treatment Center for more than ten years. I have heard countless stories and met many victims of rape and sexual assault (men, womenand children), and know well the devastation of this trauma—to both the victim and his or her loved ones.Much of my participation has been fundraising, promoting awareness, prevention and education, and acting in and directing several television spots that address various issues such as date rape and “rape drugs” like GHB and Rohypnol. A few years ago, at an annual fundraiser for the Rape Treatment Center, one of our invited speakers was a father in the community who spoke about the process of coming to terms with his daughter being groomed and subsequently raped by an internet predator, and the conflicting feelings of guilt, rage, pain, impotence and responsibility that nearly destroyed him. His incredibly frank and revealing story profoundly affected me, and I realized then I had found my path into dramatizing this delicate and difficult subject matter in a way that everyone—especially men—could relate to.

What is the single most important thing you hope audiences walk away with after seeing Trust?

I don’t know that I can narrow it down to one idea, message, or experience. It is my goal that Trust faithfully convey several things: the experience of a parent when their child is victimized; the many conflicting emotions and complicated psychology that a child victim experiences both in grooming and recovery; the lack of appropriate staffing, funding, publicity, and prioritization given to the police and FBI to combat this problem; and the necessity, urgency and relevance of the subject matter.

Will you describe your process in researching and writing Trust?

With my co-writer, Andy Bellin, I set out to write Trust first as a screenplay with the conviction that the story should reach the maximum number of people possible. We spent four months researching and interviewing countless experts in the medical, legal, computer and law enforcement fields, and had special access to both an agent with the FBI who I’d befriended at the Rape Treatment Center as well as Gail Abarbanel, Director of the RTC and many of the counselors of the child victims there— not to mention several brave young women who shared their stories with us. We then spent nine months writing the script, constantly consulting with Gail as well as the police and FBI to ensure accuracy—both from a procedural standpoint as well as an emotional and psychological one. I just finished directing that script as a feature film. However, both Andy and I felt that the intimate, personal experience offered by live theatre was an equally compelling way to present this story, so we adapted the screenplay for a stage production at Lookingglass, my artistic home of twenty-one years.