After 62 years, the Stella Adler Studio of Acting is making its Off-Broadway debut. The studio's artistic director Tom Oppenheim, Adler's grandson, took over the school 15 years ago with a mission to bring vibrant, professional-level theater to the studio. With the creation of the Harold Clurman Laboratory Theater in 2001, the studio began producing professional shows internally.
One of 2010's works, Israel Horovitz's "Lebensraum," received funding from an independent donor, and now the studio is bringing the Holocaust-themed show Off-Broadway. Oppenheim spoke with "Back Stage" about what producing theater Off-Broadway means for the studio and Adler's legacy.
Back Stage: Why did you decide to present a show Off-Broadway now?
Tom Oppenheim: The Harold Clurman Laboratory Theater has been productive for five years, doing 3 shows a year here. Really it has to do with opportunity. We've been champing at the bit to build this theater company and present ourselves to the bigger community for some time. And we did this show last year, and we happened to get funding to move it.
Back Stage: How did you choose this show?
Oppenheim: We did it in the Harold Clurman Festival of the Arts in 2010. [Stella Adler's second husband] Harold Clurman was a co-founder of The Group Theatre. A lot of the work has to do with a sense of being socially engaged, being connected to the world in terms of issues of the day. For example, the way the Group Theatre did theater.
A cast member, Aidan Koehler, who is a [Harold Clurman Lab] company member, gave me the play. It has enormous social relevance. It's also an extraordinary theatrical production. Three actors play 50 different characters. It's essentially about war and peace, peace and reconciliation, and the effort to achieve reconcilliation. The deep question at the heart of it is: What might actors do in the face of atrocity and injustice?
Back Stage: How has the production changed from its festival presentation?
Oppenheim: Not much. We're really able to replicate the set in the Abingdon. There's some more technical abilities that we have in the Abingdon that we didn't have in our little black box theater. You want to stay alive in the new space. In spirit, it's grows out of its original incarnation.