DAISY: Research & Partnerships

Hello all. It’s Sean Devine here, your trusty political-theatre storyteller. There’s something I’m excited to relay to you. It’s a project that’s been over ten years in the making, and now it’s about to start. My newest play-in-development DAISY has been germinating for a decade, when I first read about advertising maverick / political consultant / communications theorist Tony Schwartz back in 2003. In 2007, I got to meet Mr. Schwartz in his NYC studio-apartment (a famous abode in the annals of political history) just a few months before he passed away. From there, a long-time relationship with the family of Tony Schwartz ensued. And a fascination with the man that Marshall McLuhan himself called “a genius”.

With the support of the Canada Council and BC Arts Council, as well as some well-maneuvered partnerships, I’ll be in New York City and Washington, DC over the next week conducting research for this new play with some pretty amazing sources. I’ll be blog-posting about it, but here are some of the highlights to look forward to:

• doing an audio-recording stroll of the midtown Manhattan neighborhood documented by the agoraphobic Tony Schwartz, who rarely ventured outside his zip code, but conveyed the “sounds of his neighborhood” to the world, who came to visit him.
• interviewing some of the retired ad executives who helped make the infamous “Daisy” ad, at the worldwide headquarters of the DDB advertising agency (the firm that inspired Mad Men)
• having my first meetings with NYC’s EPIC Theatre Ensemble, a famous off-Broadway company known for their socio-political works. EPIC is not only partnering with us in the initial development of DAISY, but they’ll be presenting a staged reading of RE:UNION with their associate artist David Strathairn in January.
• meeting Vern Thiessen!
• heading down to Washington, DC for a quick two-days of intensive research at the Library of Congress’ Tony Schwartz Collection, where I’ve been granted special access
• meeting with DC’s Wooly Mammoth Theatre Company, to talk to them about RE:UNION, DAISY, and Canadian theatre!
• seeing some amazing NYC and DC theatre, to boot.

Stay tuned, and stay curious, my friends.