Looking to Thanksgiving

We're in the midst of previews for "A Midsummer Night's Dream," and I find myself looking forward to a little holiday. Thanksgiving is my favorite U.S. tradition. We have nothing like it in Indonesia, or in the U.K., the two countries in which I grew up. The theatre to me is like the Thanksgiving table - it provides an event around which friends and family (and strangers) can congregate and share in a basic, fundamental human activity. For me, making a feast and making a play are two not so different things. My directing mentor in grad school watched me cook dinner for him and told me that he had diagnosed everything he needed to understand about my directing from my cooking technique. I was not entirely sure what he meant at the time, but the comment stuck in my head and I can now see a clear relationship between how I cook and how I direct! I love to use the freshest produce from the farmer's markets, and love to explore how an unexpected combination of meats might interact with one another. I have my stock ingredients that go into everything - garlic, ginger, organic soy, truffle oil, palm sugar, organic chicken stock, cilantro, chives and habanero chilli peppers - but I tend to mix, blend and cook them into the meal in a different way each time. I cook to taste, and never with a recipe. The food is a form of Asian fusion soul food - a reflection of all the different cultures I've been exposed to. Recently, I've become very interested in cooking each individual component separately, and finally mixing them all into the final dish by hand. It makes the contribution of each different element very distinct, but still cohesively blends together. That philosophical transition is clearly reflected in how I am approaching the different elements of the design process for The Red Umbrella! I am excited to see how my exposure to the culinary pleasures of Dallas will influence my theatrical aesthetic!

Some dishes I've encountered and loved during my time in Dallas:

(posted by Ed)