Transcription
Extra I:
MIGUEL
The Alpert Award, I never got it. I started just sending them a picture of Susan Lucci when they'd be like, you've been nominated, I just send them a picture like, here we go again.
CYNTHIA OLIVER
I know a couple people who have that relationship with Alpert. I don't even, you know, I just release the expectation there. You know, I mean, with US Artists it was interesting, because... they, for a while they were giving feedback. And I would get the feedback. And I'd be like, "Okay, well, if I get nominated again, I'll work on it this way." But every time it was a different kind of set of expectations, so the application was different, or the, you know, so I finally at a certain point, I was like, you know, what, I don't want the feedback, because it's not going to be relevant to the next time or the next panel, or, you know, so, and this last time. I wasn't going to submit an application. I was like, fuck that, it's not gonna happen! My husband said to me, I'm gonna turn back on you what you've always said to me, you gotta be in it to win it. I went New York Lotto message, right? And he threw a New York Lotto message right back at me. And I was like, Okay, touché. I'll submit an application. And so when it came this time, I was I was in absolute shock. I did not expect it. I thought, you know, fourth time… didn't happen three times, it's not gonna happen on the fourth time, but it did. So yeah.
Extra II:
MIGUEL
It's happening all before the project gets underway, it's happening as the project is going, how does that timeline work?
CYNTHIA OLIVER
Much of it happens before, so that I could start to map out how the work is going to happen. And also, you know, whatever theater might be commissioning us, so that, you know, we know our premiere date, and I work backwards from that. Sometimes I don't have a theater, or a premiere date, and I can just kind of create and experiment. And then along the way, as the vision gets clearer, then, you know, that might materialize through a number of different efforts. So that, you know, it's, it's happened in a couple of different ways. But I do have to say that, you know, being now in the past 20 years, a part of a university system and a research university, a research university that acknowledges and understands creative research, and gives me access to funds here, I could use I mean, it's not enough to put on a full production. But I can access a certain amount of funding to get started on something to experiment on something. Here is a place where I have space, especially during the summer, not during the year because you know, the spaces are all occupied during the school year, but in the summer, spaces are free. So I could conceivably apply for money, either from the institution itself or from my state. The State Arts Council has independent grant grants for independent artists. And then I bring people here and we can work, you know, nicely for, you know, a month or so or two over the summer. That is huge.
MIGUEL
Absolutely huge.