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savings and more inspiring flavors. It's

1:09

almost impossible to write down

1:11

and document the nuance of the way that the body

1:13

can move. So I'm very

1:16

physical in the room. I will

1:18

dance full out with my cast,

1:20

with my team, and it's,

1:24

for me, it's not just what it looks like. It's also what

1:26

it feels like on the body. Welcome

1:30

back to Working. I'm your host, Ronald

1:32

Young Jr. And I'm your

1:34

other host, Isaac Butler. Isaac,

1:37

it is wonderful to be chatting with you again.

1:39

Tell me, whose voice do we hear at the

1:41

top of the show? We heard

1:44

the voice of Justin Peck. He's a

1:46

choreographer for stage and screen and serves

1:48

as the resident choreographer at New York

1:50

City Ballet. All right, that sounds

1:53

impressive. Why did you want to talk to Justin

1:55

Peck right now? Well, he is

1:57

currently represented on Broadway with the many, many

1:59

Tony Awards. nominated critically beloved show, Illinois's.

2:01

The show is a little bit difficult to

2:03

describe, and in fact if you read the

2:06

reviews, even the positive ones, they're kind of

2:08

a little bit like, uh,

2:10

how do I talk about this? But the

2:12

short version is it's an evening length

2:15

dance theater work that he co-created that

2:17

is set to the Sufjan Stevens album,

2:19

Illinois, which many of our listeners probably

2:21

know as Come On Feel the Illinois,

2:23

since that's what it says on the

2:26

on the booklet. The show

2:28

has no spoken language, it

2:30

is just the songs from the album,

2:33

it tells actually multiple stories over the

2:35

course of the evening through dance, it

2:37

has a live band playing the album

2:39

with arrangements by the great Timo Andres.

2:43

Sufjan does not perform in the show, he was

2:45

never going to perform in the show, that that's

2:47

not the setup, but even were at the setup,

2:49

he um he is currently recovering from a chronic

2:51

illness. And so his singing

2:53

parts are actually distributed among three singers

2:56

who are all amazing, I

2:58

mean the three truly truly amazing singers.

3:01

This sounds incredible, I don't know anything about any

3:03

of what you said, but it sounds like it's

3:05

going to be a good conversation, but I imagine

3:08

you have a little bit more for our Slate

3:10

Plus members? Uh yes, we

3:12

talk a lot about influence, there's a

3:14

lot of influences beyond just the album

3:16

that go into the show, including earlier

3:18

dance theater work by Susan Stroman and

3:20

Twyla Tharp, and one of his most

3:22

recent high profile gigs was doing the

3:24

choreography for the Spielberg film of West

3:26

Side Story, and you kind of can't

3:29

do that without thinking about the

3:31

original choreography by Jerome Robbins. So I was

3:33

just very interested in how he thinks about

3:35

his influences and being in a historical art

3:37

form that you know there's a lot going

3:40

on behind each dance, and so I thought

3:42

he might have some interesting thoughts on that.

3:44

Again I'm a newbie to everything that you're

3:46

saying, but I'm very excited to hear this

3:49

conversation, and for our Slate Plus members, you'll

3:51

get to hear all of that at the

3:53

end of this episode, and if you aren't

3:55

a Slate Plus member, it's really easy to

3:57

join. As a Slate Plus member, you You

4:00

get to hear extra segments on this

4:02

show and others like the Culture Gab

4:04

Fest and Karen Feeding, the parenting podcast

4:07

formerly known as Mom and Dad are

4:09

Fighting. You'll get bonus episodes of podcasts

4:11

like Slow Burn, and of course, you'll

4:14

never hit a paywall on slate.com. To

4:16

learn more, go to slate.com/working plus. Okay,

4:22

let's hear Isaac Butler's conversation with

4:24

Justin Peck. Your

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olly.com. These statements have not been evaluated

5:00

by the Food and Drug Administration. This

5:02

product is not intended to diagnose, treat,

5:04

cure, or prevent any disease. Justin

5:08

Peck, thank you so much for joining us

5:10

on Working to discuss your process. Thank

5:13

you so much for having me. I

5:15

want to start by congratulating you.

5:17

You just had your kind of

5:19

opening night celebration last night. You've

5:22

also, I believe, recently won a

5:24

Lortel Award for choreographing the Buena

5:26

Vista Social Club Off-Broadway. You're nominated

5:28

for many Tonys for Illinois, as

5:30

is the show in general. That's

5:33

primarily what we're going to be talking

5:35

about today. It's an evening length narrative

5:37

dance work set to Sufjan Stevens' Illinois

5:40

album, currently tearing up

5:42

Broadway. Before we get to talking about

5:44

that, though, you know, you're in an interesting

5:46

point of the process that we get some

5:48

questions about from our listeners. I know a

5:50

lot of people struggle with, which is what

5:52

I jokingly refer to as the, you know,

5:55

bringing the cow to market part

5:57

of the process. You've made a thing, and now you've

5:59

got to go... talk about it to a bunch of

6:01

people. You've been

6:03

really in the public eye at least

6:05

for a decade now, right? That's

6:08

when Ballet 422, the documentary about you came

6:10

out. So you've been through this process many

6:12

times. What have you learned about doing it?

6:14

And were you always comfortable with it? Or

6:16

were there things you had to do to

6:18

kind of figure out how to get comfortable

6:20

talking about and promoting your work? No,

6:23

I think a lot of this work,

6:25

this end of the process, comes with

6:28

experience and just doing it again

6:30

and again and thinking

6:32

proactively about how to reflect on the

6:34

work. But luckily with

6:37

a show like this, it's such a

6:40

special project to me personally. It's

6:42

a very easy one to talk

6:44

about. And that's not always the

6:46

case. So I'm actually really happy

6:49

to be out speaking about this

6:51

work. Obviously, this show is

6:53

a big hit. People love it. It's gotten extraordinary

6:56

reviews. It's not always true. Sometimes

6:58

you make something and you believe

7:00

really strongly in it. But you

7:02

never know until the

7:04

audience is in and stuff how it's

7:06

going to be received. How do you

7:08

prepare yourself for that

7:10

moment and kind of define success on

7:12

your own terms so it doesn't get

7:14

defined for you? Yeah,

7:17

that's really tricky, especially in

7:20

a theater making context and in a

7:22

theater making context that has

7:25

an eye towards a commercial

7:27

potential. I

7:30

think, especially with a project like this, which

7:32

is so unique, I had to just always

7:34

tell myself, this is the show that I

7:37

want to make. This is the show that

7:40

I believe is from my own voice.

7:43

It's the first show that I've

7:46

developed from the ground up, from

7:49

the initial seed of an idea to now

7:52

a fully realized show, which

7:55

is a big moment for me. And at

7:57

the end of the day, I just wanted to be

7:59

authentic to... my instincts and

8:03

my own tools and my vocabulary as an artist. And

8:07

knowing that like, this is something that

8:09

is a little bit outside of the

8:11

box, it comes

8:13

from a real love of musical theater

8:15

and yet the delivery of the show

8:17

is not the most conventional, it's not

8:19

a traditional book musical. And

8:22

I felt like, okay, this could go

8:24

one of two ways, it could either

8:27

be embraced and celebrated or it could

8:29

just sort of go over people's heads.

8:31

But it was a risk that we

8:33

felt like we wanted to take because

8:35

it was the only way we felt

8:37

like we could interpret this

8:39

album and take the risk

8:42

and be true to our instincts. You've

8:45

worked with Suffian Stevens and his

8:47

music, you know, a few times,

8:49

I know for multiple reasons, including

8:51

unfortunately the health crisis he's been

8:53

going through, he was not directly

8:55

involved in this production. But

8:57

what was the germ of that idea? When

8:59

did it hit you that, oh, I wanna

9:02

do a evening length

9:04

dance piece to the Illinois album? Okay,

9:07

so when I first

9:09

heard the album, it came out in 2005.

9:13

Yup. I was 17 when I heard it

9:16

and it was one of my first

9:18

exposures to Suffian's music and

9:20

I was blown away by

9:22

it. I just felt like, oh my God, this

9:25

is a whole universe of music

9:27

and storytelling and also that it

9:29

had a lot of very interesting,

9:32

challenging, unconventional time signatures

9:35

and it felt like it

9:37

was very compelling for dance,

9:40

like it made me wanna dance and it also

9:42

made me wanna explore storytelling

9:44

and I was like, okay,

9:46

this guy has it. He really has this

9:48

innate ability to write something for

9:51

theater and for dance and

9:53

this was before I met him and before I started to

9:55

work with him. And

9:58

I Just sort of put a pin in that.

10:00

And. When. About my life and

10:02

I started to work with you can

10:05

I want to send two thousand and

10:07

eleven. And we started

10:09

to collaborate. Mostly a New York

10:11

City Ballet, he would write scores

10:13

for dances that I would choreograph

10:16

and builds, and he would raising

10:18

of for full orchestra, sometimes for

10:20

just piano and everything in between.

10:22

And we will see we've made

10:24

probably five or six dances together

10:27

in our dreadful operations On and

10:29

then around twenty fourteen we're working

10:31

on a ballet called Everywhere We

10:33

Go for New York City Ballet

10:35

and we were hanging out a

10:38

lot. Going to dinner and stuff and I

10:40

would just like. Randomly. Bring

10:42

up the prospect of it taking Illinois,

10:44

his album Illinois and turning it into

10:47

something and he sort of deflect. It

10:49

ends we I would bring it up

10:51

again. Those are a little bit relentless

10:53

about it and it's actually like a

10:56

few years for him to kind of

10:58

realize that I was very serious about

11:00

it on that it was this kind

11:02

of whisper of an idea that wouldn't

11:05

go away and dumb. And

11:07

eventually. He caught on

11:09

tell this and with like okay

11:12

I can tell you really wanna

11:14

do this on I think for

11:16

Sufyan like the music is a

11:18

blast from the past Blake he

11:20

he felt like you had moved

11:23

beyond that and he's a very

11:25

forward moving forward thinking artists he's

11:27

not ones and to go back

11:29

into his song catalog and work

11:31

on older stuff and so. His.

11:34

Intention from the beginning was really like. Giving.

11:37

Us his blessing to take this

11:39

on the song cycle and interpret

11:41

it and bring it to life

11:43

and in the way that we

11:45

can imagine it right and is

11:47

that normally wear Your ideas for

11:49

dances start with what the music

11:51

is going to be, Ah,

11:53

it's depends on the context, like

11:55

if I'm creating work for. Let's.

11:58

Say for New York City Ballet in more

12:00

often than not, The. Process

12:03

begins with music arms with

12:05

a worked for theater like

12:07

Illinois. The. Storytelling has

12:09

to come first. That's the

12:11

number one priority on there

12:13

can be. Choreography.

12:16

That is inspired by the music.

12:18

That is really cool but if

12:20

it has nothing to do with

12:22

the storytelling then it falls away.

12:25

I'm and that's something I've learned

12:27

from the process is I've been

12:29

on working on narrative works like

12:31

ah, choreographed between Eating Revival of

12:33

Carousel right? More than the Steven

12:36

Spielberg directed Ah West Side Story

12:38

film and Twenty Twenty One and

12:40

a bunch of other projects where

12:42

it's like you have to kind

12:44

of flip. The focus and

12:47

prioritize the storytelling. And.

12:49

How did that story takes

12:51

shape? You. Know from our a

12:53

we want to do something with this album

12:56

to it's the story of these character that

12:58

it moves and three acts and an epilogue.

13:00

It's kept his opening of kind of short

13:02

stories and than a lengthy story in the

13:04

middle of going to bring Jackie Simpli story

13:06

on like how how did that take shape

13:08

for you. It started

13:10

in this kind of like dream

13:12

phase of listening to the songs

13:15

and going really deep into the

13:17

lyrics and reading them and just

13:20

thinking about. These. Songs from

13:22

a character point of view I'm

13:24

and latching on to certain lyrics

13:26

that could incur the story turn

13:29

that really like jumped out at

13:31

me and I started to think

13:33

about shaping this kind of coming

13:35

of age narrative based on the

13:37

songs, knowing that you can wrote

13:40

most of his music when he

13:42

was in his own. Coming

13:44

of age phase and his own

13:47

life. and I think this music

13:49

really resonated with an entire generation

13:51

of people who were experiencing that

13:53

in their own personal ways. And

13:56

his son is just one of

13:58

those albums that. If people

14:00

know if they like, really know, if they

14:03

really love it. it has like a profound

14:05

effect on T Ball. It helps them understand

14:07

themselves and understand the world better. It's certainly

14:09

had that effect on me. Ah, me too.

14:12

I mean, I met my wife ear this

14:14

album came out so the honorary like yeah

14:16

yeah yeah yeah has a very it's like

14:18

totally tied in to that time for me

14:20

to such an extent that I actually have

14:23

trouble listening to it sometimes now because it's

14:25

so much. Like. Me

14:28

in my twenties, you know? Yeah.

14:30

I mean, isn't that interesting? Have played music,

14:32

has the ability to deflate. Bring. Back

14:34

memories like what what meet new

14:37

you like locations and so now

14:39

than tastes and all of that

14:41

and can be Yeah and it.

14:43

With an album like Illinois by

14:45

Suzanne Stevens it's like a lot

14:47

of that is just like so

14:49

vivid and heightened it's own to

14:51

capture that. Some of that in

14:54

this project as well It's Bites

14:56

is getting back to like developing

14:58

the narrative on. So. I

15:00

was kind of. Pursuing.

15:02

This idea, the slate of age

15:04

story and then I have this

15:06

breakthrough of like. We.

15:08

Need a framing device to. Deliver.

15:11

Some of the story telling that

15:13

I'm thinking about and. And

15:15

I came up with this. This.

15:18

Setting of said campfire.

15:21

And it felt like. Something.

15:25

That worked aesthetically with the music.

15:27

A lot of the music second

15:29

row for this album feels feels

15:32

very d I y en feels

15:34

very much like songs that are

15:36

would be played around a campfire.

15:39

There's a lot of like tennis

15:41

is murder. Bollozos failed with a

15:43

ghost stories. There's ah there's all

15:46

kinds of storytelling that explored that

15:48

that just feels like it would

15:50

be perfect for you know a

15:53

night outside with friends. Around

15:55

the campfire. And

16:08

so the campfire became

16:11

the portal into the storytelling.

16:14

So at that point I had these kind of

16:17

general ideas floating around and

16:20

I was like, I really need a

16:23

writing partner to come onto this

16:26

to help shape the storytelling and the

16:28

narrative and the characters and the clarity

16:30

of all that. And that's when

16:32

I reached out to Jackie Sibley's

16:34

jury who was a Pulitzer Prize. Did

16:36

you know her before? Did you

16:38

know Jackie before? I didn't know

16:40

her. Yeah, she was like someone

16:42

who I knew of and someone

16:44

who a lot of my

16:46

colleagues spoke really highly about. And

16:49

so we just got a coffee early on and

16:51

this was really when this whole project was like

16:53

a little seed of an idea with some of

16:55

these concepts floating

16:58

about and we really hit it off immediately.

17:00

It was like one of those moments where

17:02

you're like in the first five minutes you're

17:04

like, oh, this is the person that I

17:07

need to be doing this project with. And

17:12

so you mentioned that on a project like

17:14

this, the narrative has to

17:16

come first. So how fleshed

17:18

out was that before you started actually figuring

17:20

out what the dances were going to be?

17:23

I spent a little time

17:25

early on in the studio

17:28

just workshopping what the staging

17:30

language of this show would

17:32

be. And what

17:35

does that mean, workshopping the language? What is

17:37

the, I don't know, hour to hour, day

17:39

to day of that process? Yeah, so

17:41

that's the first session we did. I want to

17:43

say it was like just a two week session

17:45

and I asked some

17:49

wonderful performers that I've worked with

17:51

on other projects to join me

17:53

in the studio and we would

17:55

rehearse for like six hours a

17:57

day and we would just spend... working

18:00

on a few of the songs and

18:03

just loosely build out members

18:06

that allowed us to kind of figure

18:08

out what is the way

18:10

in which the body moves to this music

18:12

and how does this universe

18:15

that we're creating feel energetically

18:17

and physically and

18:19

so it was not fully specific

18:22

in regards to the narrative it

18:24

was more like what

18:26

are the colors of this world and

18:28

are you asking them to improvise

18:31

to the music or are you coming in with

18:33

set steps or are you listening to it and

18:35

telling them hey try this or is it some

18:37

mix of those or yeah I usually

18:39

come in with some

18:43

like thematic steps so if I

18:45

I'll listen to a song like

18:48

come on feel the Illinois and

18:51

then I'll come into the room with like

18:53

five short sequences and I'll

18:56

teach the dancers these sequences

18:58

and then respond to how

19:00

they're interpreting the movement on

19:02

their own bodies and

19:04

it has this sort of like passing the

19:06

ball back and forth thing where they're able

19:08

to absorb what I'm giving them I'm able

19:10

to absorb what they're giving back to me

19:13

and then it becomes it like melds into

19:15

this language and that's why it's

19:17

so important to work with with

19:19

dancers and artists that really for me that

19:21

really get my way of moving

19:24

in my process and

19:26

I have to say like every

19:29

person in the cast is hand selected

19:31

and there's some sort of backstory to

19:34

how I know them and the kind of work I've

19:36

done with them or how I've seen them perform yeah

19:39

totally curious about that specifically with

19:41

okay so Jacksonville there's

19:44

this incredible eruption of tap dance

19:47

that's very unexpected and wonderful and

19:50

joyous into that number and I was curious

19:52

I was like were you thinking oh I

19:55

needed tap dance here I need to cast someone

19:57

who can do you know my normal moves and

19:59

all They have to answer whether that

20:01

you knew that the affairs knew they

20:04

could tap dance and built that for

20:06

that. Yeah, it's the second. It's real.

20:08

Like is Byron Settle is like a

20:10

unicorn of a dancer. and he he's

20:12

the rare dancer who is. A.

20:15

Phenomenal tap dancer and also

20:17

a phenomenal mover and all

20:19

other forms. And he's really

20:21

a master of his cross.

20:23

And it's he's he's that.

20:25

It's. Hard to find a dancer with.

20:28

His. Reins on by I knew I

20:30

wanted him involved. I had worked with him

20:33

on as. A. Tap dance music

20:35

or that I was developing before Illinois.

20:37

Ah, that didn't pan out for a

20:39

couple years actually and so I knew

20:42

Byron quite well through that process and

20:44

a new his way of moving and

20:46

his curiosity and he always had either

20:49

thing I notice about him as he

20:51

always. Had this like strong

20:53

eye contact with me and it just

20:55

made me feel like he was really.

20:57

Engaged. And present and absorbing

21:00

everything I was. Delivering.

21:02

And an able to sort of bounce

21:04

things back to me and so he

21:07

in in in a strange way to

21:09

gave me the confidence and I was

21:11

able to on to give him the

21:13

confidence. and so much of this work

21:15

with dance is about like this exchange

21:17

in the room. so yeah that that's

21:20

also for me. that number is is

21:22

a little bit of an ode to

21:24

the first broadway show that really. Inspired

21:26

me to start dancing in the first place

21:29

which is bringing a noise bringing the funk.

21:31

ah of that show. I saw that show

21:33

on Broadway the outside of Cleveland show yeah

21:35

and I've seen a couple of probably shows

21:37

that see the on choreographed shuffle along and

21:39

our but with the one he did recently

21:42

pal Joy I'm in his His choreography is

21:44

incredible yeah I mean he's kind of a

21:46

person or hero of mine and I started

21:48

out actually the tap dancer. Ah,

21:50

which not a lot of people

21:52

now because as seen that show

21:55

and and just loving that craft

21:57

and eventually you know that for

21:59

me led to theater and to

22:01

other forms of dance and ballet

22:04

and things like that. So it feels

22:08

like a real ode to that childhood

22:10

moment of seeing that show to incorporate

22:13

this number and Jacksonville with Byron tap

22:15

dancing in it. We'll

22:20

be right back with more of Isaac Butler's conversation

22:22

with Justin Beck. Fees

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23:20

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to subscribe to working wherever you get your

23:41

podcast. Okay,

23:49

let's hear more of Isaac's conversation with

23:51

Justin Beck. So

23:53

you say, you know, you come into the room with some things

23:55

worked out, you're bouncing it off the dancers, then they're kind of,

23:57

you know, bouncing it back to you and so on and so

23:59

forth. and so forth. Do you

24:01

work that out in your body? Because you trained

24:03

as a dancer obviously, or is it more at

24:05

this point because you've done it so many times,

24:08

is it just like you write down on a

24:10

piece of paper or they do this, this, this,

24:12

this and this? What does that development look like?

24:15

Yeah, I mean it's almost impossible

24:17

to write down and

24:19

document the nuance of the way that the body

24:21

can move. So I'm very

24:23

physical in the room. I will

24:25

dance full out with my cast,

24:29

my team, and I

24:31

want to feel what it feels like.

24:33

For me it's not just what it

24:35

looks like, it's also what it feels

24:37

like on the body. And so

24:39

I'm very active in

24:42

that way, and I would say I

24:46

do a lot of repetition with this movement

24:49

to get to the root of what I

24:52

want it to be, and the process for

24:54

me in the studio before I get with

24:56

the dancers involves doing

24:58

a sequence over and over and over and

25:01

over again, sort of chiseling away exactly what

25:03

it is and then filming it and

25:05

making sure that I get, you

25:08

know, I just film it on my iPhone, but I want to

25:10

make sure I get like a very

25:12

solid accurate documentation of what the movement

25:15

is. And just

25:17

going through that process downloads

25:20

the movement into my muscle memory, and

25:23

I almost never reference these videos, but

25:25

it's like for me it's important to

25:27

go through the process of it to

25:29

find what it feels like. And

25:34

then of course I bring that to the cast

25:36

and then we have this exchange, and I try

25:38

to use a lot of imagery

25:41

rather than just saying like, okay this is

25:44

the step. A lot of metaphor and imagery

25:46

that I can give the dancers

25:48

so that they can not just

25:50

like do it in strictly

25:53

a physical way, but so that it

25:55

incorporates their imagination and so it

25:57

adds layers of storytelling to the

26:00

to the movement that they're doing. Some

26:03

of the songs, or the

26:05

dances I should say, have like a very concrete

26:07

relationship to the lyrics of the song, and some

26:09

of them don't. So like, just to take one

26:12

example, like in

26:14

the song Chicago, they are literally on

26:16

a road trip to Chicago, right? But

26:18

in the song Decatur, the lyrics are

26:20

about two brothers and their stepmom and

26:22

this complicated relationship that they have. Whereas

26:24

the dance is about this sort of

26:26

love triangle with these

26:28

two boys, and Henry is in love with his

26:30

male best friend, and his male best friend is

26:32

in love with this woman, et

26:34

cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And I'm

26:36

just curious about how you figured out

26:39

how to oscillate that relationship, and how

26:41

to train the audience to

26:43

understand that it's not always gonna be

26:45

literal, but sometimes it will be literal.

26:47

Absolutely, yeah. That was a big

26:50

challenge with the show. And I

26:52

think some of that has to do with the

26:55

unique poetry of these lyrics,

26:57

and that unlike

27:00

a traditional musical

27:02

score, a lot

27:04

of the lyrics are quite profound.

27:07

They're open to interpretation.

27:10

There's songs on this album

27:13

that I've listened to and read the

27:15

lyrics for years, and I still haven't

27:17

unlocked. It just feels like I've

27:20

been, and I think that's also

27:22

why people love the music, is

27:24

because it continues to feed that

27:26

curiosity and just having

27:28

the opportunity to interpret it and

27:30

discover what it means to oneself.

27:34

And they're often super

27:37

dense with references, like to Jacksonville

27:39

has references to everything for the

27:41

Underground Railroad, to Helen Keller, to

27:43

specific locations in the city. Yeah,

27:45

yeah. Yeah, so a lot of the songs

27:47

had to do with distilling

27:50

it down to, what is the

27:52

one sentence that this number,

27:55

in relation to the song, wants to communicate?

27:59

And so... So I think simplifying it

28:01

and then building it out again from there was

28:03

a big part of the process for a lot

28:05

of those songs. There are

28:07

certain lyrics in certain songs

28:09

that feel very

28:11

concrete, like you said, where

28:13

the audience can hear exactly what

28:16

is being sung. I Drove to Chicago

28:18

in a van with my friends, right?

28:20

That's a very simple

28:23

lyric, also a very

28:25

meaningful lyric, and one that is delivered

28:27

very clearly. I Drove to New York

28:30

in a van with

28:32

my friends. But

28:36

I think like, you know,

28:38

with like a song like Decatur, when

28:41

you're in the audience and you're just hearing that song for

28:43

the first time, it's

28:45

difficult to understand what exactly

28:50

is literally being communicated. Singing

28:53

man, this earth is over-sown,

28:55

the cosmos slide on the

28:57

face of the operas, the holes

29:01

in their veins, they

29:04

came up, clapping in the spirit of

29:06

the A.D. So

29:08

in a song like that, we're able to sort

29:10

of like just blur the

29:13

focus a little bit and hone in more

29:15

on the aesthetic of

29:17

the song, more on the music and

29:19

treat it almost as a way to

29:21

underscore a scene

29:24

we're watching. So a lot of times the

29:26

show feels like you're watching a silent film

29:28

and it's being underscored by the music

29:31

of the album and sometimes by the

29:33

lyrics, sometimes those can be like tentpoles

29:35

to help tell the story. And

29:38

I felt like the music of Decatur, it

29:40

just reminded me so much of like, almost

29:43

like that film Stand By Me. Like it

29:45

has this kind of like small town, like

29:48

youth bonding and like just

29:50

bored out of your mind,

29:52

trying to like make

29:55

the hours and the days pass,

29:58

dreaming about how to to get

30:00

the fuck out of your small hometown

30:03

and move to the big

30:05

city and pursue opportunity and find

30:08

your tribe and unlock

30:10

your creativity. So

30:12

in a lot of ways, the

30:15

show has moments of impressionistic

30:17

staging and there's these

30:20

elements being delivered to the

30:22

audience in their individual lanes.

30:24

So from the music, from the

30:26

staging, from the energy, and it

30:28

kind of enters the viewer's brain

30:30

and they put it all together.

30:34

And it gives them a little bit of

30:36

room to interpret it and bring themselves to

30:38

it. And I think that's what people are

30:40

really responding to because a lot

30:42

of musicals are

30:44

slightly more spoon-fed or they're like, it's

30:46

all sort of put together in front

30:48

of you before you have the

30:51

chance to assemble it in your mind. Yeah,

30:54

totally, totally. The show

30:57

does not quite follow the

30:59

album in order, but it almost does.

31:01

There's a few songs you moved. So

31:03

close, so close. I have to imagine

31:07

my head cannon for this. The story I have in

31:09

my head is that you were trying to do the

31:11

album with no changes. You were trying to do it,

31:13

like the initial gambit was, and then there came a

31:15

day where you were like, I just

31:17

can't make this work. We have to move zombies

31:19

here and we have to move this other thing

31:22

here. Is that correct? Is that what

31:24

happened? I just wanna know what that day was like

31:26

for you and how you came to that conclusion. That

31:28

is 100% correct. I

31:31

think we all went into this and we were like, how

31:34

amazing would it be if we could

31:36

tell an entire narrative arc without changing

31:38

the order of the album? Is that

31:40

possible? And we actually did attempt to

31:42

do that in a

31:44

couple of the initial workshops. And

31:47

we just felt like we were

31:49

lacking some narrative clarity and just

31:52

like, I

31:54

think the framing device of the campfire

31:56

storytelling really helped us in

31:58

our ability to move. move a few songs

32:02

to the front end of this. And

32:04

also, the structure of the show

32:06

is very unique in that it

32:09

starts out almost as

32:11

a review, right? Like you're like watching these

32:13

short stories being told one at a time.

32:16

And I think what that does is it

32:18

helps to train the audience in

32:21

the rules of this

32:23

show. And because it's its

32:25

own unique delivery, by

32:27

the time we get to the main event, which

32:30

is our protagonist Henry's story and

32:33

sort of the much more lengthy

32:36

and linear second act that we

32:38

experience, they're really in

32:40

the world of the show and they

32:43

understand it and they

32:45

understand just like how the

32:47

storytelling works. So that was a reason

32:49

why we felt like shifting a few

32:51

songs around would help us. And at

32:53

the end of the day, like miraculously,

32:55

we were able to use all of

32:58

the music of the album and then

33:00

some, we didn't cut any

33:02

song. And I think that was really important

33:04

to us because we wanted to deliver to

33:06

the Sufian Stevens, Illinois fans,

33:10

the experience of this album. I really

33:12

consider it to be one of the

33:14

great albums of the last several decades.

33:17

And I felt like I

33:20

wanted to provide the opportunity for

33:22

people to experience it in its entirety. One

33:26

of the peculiar demands of this project is

33:28

that the dancers have to act. And

33:31

by which I mean, I mean, dancers act

33:33

all the time, but not act the way

33:36

that dancers often do, which is their whole

33:38

body is expressing the emotion. It's

33:40

the choreography, it comes out of the choreography,

33:42

but act in the way that theatrical actors

33:44

do, which is to express an emotion in

33:47

a fairly realistic way. And

33:49

I'm just curious about obviously

33:52

some of who you put in the show. You

33:55

must've been thinking about that, but how

33:58

you talked about those moments of. sort

34:00

of, shall we call it,

34:02

more traditional narrative theatrical acting or whatever,

34:04

as opposed to kind of the

34:06

way we think about acting in more traditional

34:08

dance. Yeah, I mean, these

34:12

are performers

34:14

in the show who are not

34:16

only great dancers, many of them are

34:21

great screen actors. I actually worked

34:23

with a bunch of them when

34:26

we made the West Side Story film, and I

34:28

was able to observe how they

34:30

performed on camera, doing scene

34:32

work. And obviously,

34:34

on a project like that, they also have

34:36

to have a strong dance

34:38

ability and dance training. So

34:42

that was huge in informing

34:44

my casting process and figuring out

34:47

who the right players are to

34:49

bring into this. And

34:51

the way we talked about the acting in this was

34:55

a kind of hybrid

34:58

of theater stage acting and also

35:00

on-camera film acting.

35:03

Again, going back to this

35:05

idea of it feeling almost like a

35:08

silent film in that we wanted certain

35:10

scenes. When we see the two guys

35:12

in the car when they're driving to

35:14

Chicago and they're just sort of still in

35:20

this moment while the verse is being sung,

35:22

I wanted to almost feel like a close-up of the

35:24

two of them. And we're watching and we're

35:27

able to see what

35:30

exactly they're feeling in this moment in a

35:33

very subtle way. And then,

35:35

of course, there's moments in that song

35:37

where it bursts alive and the car

35:39

shatters apart. And then this massive kind

35:41

of adrenaline dance energy of

35:44

speeding down the freeway. So

36:03

it was a big mix of all

36:05

those things. And again,

36:07

like just finding the cast. It's

36:10

a cast of real unicorns

36:12

because everyone has these incredible

36:14

acting chops and then a

36:16

strong dance background.

36:20

And part of my goal with this show

36:22

is to make a dance music goal that

36:24

could be a vehicle for this generation of

36:27

great dancer actors.

36:31

It's so rare to have a show like this

36:33

and I think it's a reason why there aren't

36:35

more of them because there's no like foundation for

36:37

them to thrive off of. And

36:42

so it really comes from a love of

36:44

these artists and wanting to create something for

36:47

them and I'm very inspired by them. Justin

36:52

Peck, thank you so much for joining us here on

36:55

Working to Talk about your process. Thank

36:57

you so much. This was great.

37:03

Up next, Isaac and I will talk

37:05

more about dancing and defining success. Stay

37:08

tuned. Isaac,

37:18

what an interesting interview. I've learned

37:20

so much. Thank you so

37:22

much. I appreciate that. So you asked a great

37:24

question that I just want to straight up steal

37:26

and ask you. Go for it. You're

37:29

talking about the show, Illinois, being a great

37:31

success and not knowing how it's going to

37:33

be received until the audience interacts with it.

37:36

You're a person who puts out work and

37:38

has to prepare for reception as well. I'm

37:41

wondering how do you define success and prepare

37:43

for it so it's not defined on someone

37:45

else's terms? This is

37:47

a thing I really learned with my last

37:50

book with The Method and it was sort

37:52

of a hard one feeling that came out

37:54

of my stage work. You

37:57

work so hard for this thing that you're going to put

37:59

up as a director. director, or as a producer,

38:01

or whatever, and you really believe

38:03

in it, you've really drunk the Kool-Aid on it, or

38:05

whatever, and you get it up in front of an

38:07

audience, and they just don't laugh, they don't think it's

38:09

funny, or you know whatever it is, and it's so

38:11

soul destroying. And I just realized

38:13

that for nothing else than

38:16

to protect my own emotions, I had to

38:18

start figuring out what I thought success was,

38:20

what it meant to me. And

38:22

that changes from project to project, but I had

38:24

to really define this is what I think

38:28

success is. That doesn't mean I'm going to get it. I'm

38:31

not saying set your sights low, you have to

38:33

be honest with yourself or else you'll feel like

38:35

a failure no matter what. But if you can

38:38

just literally write it down, this

38:40

is success, and hold on

38:42

to it, then it will stop

38:44

you from being disorganized by all

38:46

the good and bad stuff

38:48

that comes out of bringing something into the world. So

38:51

the method, I had specific goals with what I

38:53

wanted it to be success wise. I

38:55

wanted to feel like I had done the best job I

38:57

had done with the book, that I did the book

39:00

I wanted to do well. I did feel

39:02

that. I wanted to feel

39:04

like I had meaningfully intervened in

39:06

the public conversation around acting and

39:08

what acting is, and I

39:11

wanted it to sell well enough that Bloomsbury

39:13

would presumably be interested in my doing another

39:15

book with him. Like I wanted it to

39:17

get me another book, not like automatically,

39:19

you still have to work for that stuff. You

39:21

know, and it did all three of those

39:23

things, which was really wonderful and extremely gratifying.

39:26

So six months after it came out, it

39:28

got its first incredibly negative review, like a

39:30

review that I didn't even read all the

39:32

way. Like I just started skimming it. I

39:34

saw the byline, I had a feeling it

39:36

was going to be negative. I started skimming

39:38

it. I got to the first like dunk

39:41

and I was like, I can't read this anymore. And so

39:43

I just wrote the publicist at the publishing house to be

39:45

like, is this as bad as I think it is? She's

39:48

like, it's bad. I was like, okay, great. And

39:50

you know, like that hurt for like a couple days and

39:52

then I was able to get over it. And I think

39:54

the reason why I was able to get over it was

39:57

that I had defined success on my own terms. And

39:59

the Definition didn't have anything to do with reviews.

40:01

I like that And so I just think it's really

40:04

useful whether it's putting a podcast out into the world,

40:06

which you've done many many times, you know or Directing

40:09

a play writing a book or whatever just holding

40:12

on to This is

40:14

what I actually set out to do You

40:16

always can have that no one can take that away from

40:18

you if you're honest with yourself about what it is Yeah,

40:21

I could agree with that. I think there's something to be said

40:23

about If I'm

40:25

setting my own expectations Whatever that

40:27

may be then it really doesn't matter what everyone

40:29

else thinks they should be as long as I

40:31

can hold to Mind it gives me something to

40:33

focus on. I think that's a great strategy. Totally

40:36

like I'm sure you know, like wait for it

40:38

I'm sure was a bigger success than you had

40:41

in your head I mean, it was a huge

40:43

success is a huge success and I'm sure that's

40:45

very gratifying But but also like, you know, I'm

40:47

sure you had your own ideas for yourself of

40:49

what the successful version of that was Yeah, you

40:51

know Yeah for me it was just I was

40:54

like I really just want the show to make

40:56

an impact and yeah I want to get a hundred

40:58

thousand downloads and we did both of those things. So

41:00

I was like great. Yeah Yeah, and

41:02

then the rest is like the rest is like

41:04

ice cream. Do you know what I mean? It's like, oh you mean I

41:06

get to sit here and eat this sundae from here on out, you know

41:08

It's really good Or if you fail it because

41:10

i've had things where I defined the terms of success and

41:13

I didn't reach them Yeah, you know that happens, too Um,

41:16

it actually is still helpful to have

41:18

done it because then you don't get

41:20

lost in all the other ways that

41:22

you could define failure It's like it's

41:24

these specific things. Why didn't it do these

41:26

things and then you can go learn from

41:28

that? I I love it I'm I'm stealing

41:30

this I'm going to do it

41:32

more intentionally. This is a great strategy Thanks,

41:35

Isaac. You asked a lot of good

41:37

questions in this interview And I love

41:40

the question that you asked about dances

41:42

having concrete relationships to the songs versus

41:44

ones that don't I

41:46

feel like that ends up being a question about

41:49

adaptation in general Especially in the

41:51

day and age where everything gets a sequel

41:53

or a cinematic universe and even the properties

41:55

we thought would never get adapted Are

41:57

now being optioned to be something else

41:59

like There's a battleship movie

42:01

which come on guys But

42:05

I think just the time that we should announce

42:07

that they've they've optioned this for an opera There's

42:09

one I don't think those listeners know this that

42:11

we've been an option for six opera cycle

42:14

the work No,

42:17

no, we're working pocket working pocket. It'll be a

42:20

series of options. I'm ready simulcast on Netflix. I'm ready

42:22

I'm playing myself as long as they know I'm playing

42:24

myself and I'm singing for myself I Think

42:28

Justin answered the question Well, but I

42:30

loved when you were talking about training

42:32

the audience in what was literal when

42:35

you're writing Have you ever had to do that or

42:37

have you seen the good examples where this type of

42:39

training the audience is done? Well, yeah,

42:41

I mean I gotta say I loved his answer about

42:44

that I really loved it because this is a thing

42:46

I think about all the time particularly when watching movies,

42:48

you know Jonathan Franzen didn't

42:50

come up with this term But it's the

42:52

first time I encountered it was in like

42:54

one of the essays He wrote around when

42:56

the corrections came out about setting up the

42:58

contract with the reader You know,

43:00

he basically says like you got a couple pages

43:02

to establish for the reader Like this is what

43:05

this book is doing. Let's both agree that we're

43:07

doing this and now let's enjoy the ride I

43:11

think that one of the

43:13

things the beginning of your project does Whether

43:15

hits the a podcast or a

43:18

book or whatever is you are Establishing for the

43:20

audience what the rules are and you are teaching

43:22

them how to watch or read or listen to

43:24

it And that's why beginnings are so important I

43:26

had a directing mentor who told me once that

43:29

actually the director's job in the first five minutes

43:31

of a production is to make The audience know

43:33

that they're in good hands that like the choices

43:35

are being made intentionally You know and it because

43:37

as soon as an audience feels like that's not

43:40

the case and there's a weird energy and you can

43:42

feel It when you're in the room They

43:44

just like suddenly clam up and they won't accept anything

43:46

you want them to do You

43:48

can always break the rules you establish, of

43:51

course, but you have to be really self-conscious

43:53

about it I think a director who's a

43:55

master at this is Steven Soderbergh He often

43:57

because he his projects often have different rules

44:00

even though so many of them are heist films or whatever,

44:02

but like if you think about the

44:05

beginning of Out of Sight, right, which is

44:07

like the perfect movie, you have this like

44:09

very charming bank robbery, it goes wrong, and

44:12

then he goes to throw the tie and

44:14

there's a freeze frame and then a crossfade

44:16

to him in jail, right? And so you've

44:18

actually already got the entire formal vocabulary of

44:21

the movie is right there that we're going

44:23

to be jumping around in time, that we're

44:25

going to be using freeze frames to orient

44:27

you, you should pay attention. When there's a

44:30

freeze frame, the final freeze frame in the

44:32

movie happens once all of the

44:34

chronological scrambling is over and the movie's just

44:36

going to move straightforward in time, you know, like

44:38

all that sort of stuff. Every one of his

44:40

movies, he does a really good job, whether you

44:43

like the movie or not, of figuring out what

44:45

those rules are and communicating them to you immediately.

44:48

I really like that you use that example because

44:50

I think that he has made movies that I

44:52

think would otherwise not like, although

44:54

he does a lot of heist films, he makes

44:56

them good because I believe in those rules. Like

44:58

he sets the rules at the beginning and then

45:00

there's some rules that bleed over from other movies

45:02

because you're like, you know, we're about to watch

45:04

a Soderbergh film. So like it feels like you

45:06

can just watch those and feel like you're in

45:08

good hands. And I feel like what you're talking

45:10

about here is trust, saying like if you have

45:12

the trust of an audience, they will go where

45:14

you take them, which I really appreciate that. Yeah,

45:17

totally. Now, let me ask you, I know you're a man

45:19

of many talents. Is dance

45:21

one of them? Do you have a favorite type of dance

45:23

you like to do or see done? I

45:25

can't dance at all. I am

45:28

terrible at it. Like I am more terrible

45:30

than the most stereotypical white guy at a

45:32

wedding while the cha-cha slide is being played

45:34

in the background that you could possibly imagine.

45:36

They tell you the instructions of the cha-cha

45:38

slide. I know. I mean, I do it

45:40

with the cha-cha slide is the only dance

45:42

I do at the wedding and I do

45:44

it with like great or slow dance, right?

45:46

You just rock back and forth. But the cha-cha

45:48

slide and I do it with great energy and enthusiasm

45:50

to make up for my lack of talent. And it's

45:52

great because they tell you what to do.

45:54

I do like watching

45:57

dance. I almost never enjoy narrative

45:59

dance. which is why I wanted to talk

46:01

to Justin because I liked Illinois so much. But

46:05

I do love dance. I

46:07

especially, actually the kind of dance I love

46:09

the most, I gotta say, is tap. I

46:12

love American tap. My

46:15

knowledge of it is extremely basic, but

46:17

I used to be a drummer, and

46:19

so part of it is obviously the

46:21

percussive element. I love it because it

46:23

is an American home-grown art form.

46:26

We don't have that many. There's musical

46:28

theater, jazz, tap, and it

46:30

comes out of this deep

46:32

and incredible history of

46:35

the African American experience in this country,

46:38

and somehow all of that pain and

46:40

exuberance and everything is all in it.

46:42

I just, I love it. I find

46:44

it so incredible. Also,

46:47

side note, my wife briefly worked for Savion

46:49

Glover as his like advance man. She would

46:51

like go to wherever, the venue, and help

46:53

set up for the event and everything like

46:55

that. And so she loves tap

46:57

too. I

46:59

wanna say for listeners out here who would just wanna

47:01

see some tap, go to YouTube, look

47:04

up the Nicholas Brothers, just

47:07

look up Nicholas Brothers. It'll be the first

47:09

thing that comes up. It's their dance from

47:11

the landmark film Stormy Weather. There's also two

47:14

incredible documentaries, both of which are streaming on

47:16

the Criterion Channel and on Amazon right now.

47:18

One is called No Maps on My Taps,

47:20

which features Sam Man Sims, Bunny Briggs, and

47:23

Chuck Green preparing for a tap off

47:25

in Harlem that will be underscored by

47:28

Lionel Hampton. Lionel Hampton and his band

47:30

are in it. And he

47:32

did a followup, that director did a followup

47:34

called About Tap, which is hosted by the

47:36

great Gregory Hines. I saw Gregory Hines

47:38

perform in Jelly's Last Jam as a kid on

47:40

Broadway. And I was just like, this is the

47:43

most amazing thing. And then a few years

47:45

later, got to see Savion do Bring Into

47:47

Noise, Bring Into Funk. I've seen a couple

47:49

shows Savion's choreographed. I just think it's the

47:51

most amazing thing. Now me

47:53

and every listener out there heard

47:55

you just say, my knowledge is

47:58

extremely basic on tap. It's

48:00

two documentaries in like three names. That's

48:02

it. That's it. I just recited a

48:05

history of tap in less than two minutes.

48:08

So I'm. No, look,

48:10

look, it's nothing. This is the very basic level. This

48:12

is like 101. Sure. 101

48:15

level. Sure, I think. If you want to

48:17

get into the seminar level, I'm not the man to

48:19

talk to. It's funny. I also want to tell you,

48:21

I too used to be a drummer. So I see

48:23

we have that connection as well. Oh, that's incredible. You

48:25

play piano too, right? I play piano now, yes. Yeah.

48:29

I grew up playing piano and then switched to

48:31

drums in high school. Well, they're both percussive

48:33

instruments. I think we've talked about this. Yes,

48:35

I think we, yeah. Yeah, incredible. Well,

48:39

that's all the time we have this week. We hope

48:41

you enjoyed the show. If you

48:44

have, remember to subscribe wherever you

48:46

get your podcasts. Then you'll never

48:48

miss an episode. And just

48:50

a reminder that by joining Slate Plus, you'll

48:52

get ad-free podcasts, extra segments on shows like

48:54

Slow Burn, and you'll never hit a paywall

48:57

on the Slate site. To

49:00

learn more, go to slate.com/working plus. Special

49:03

thanks to our guest, Justin Peck, to

49:05

Kevin Bendis for the prep help for

49:07

this week's episode, and to our producer,

49:09

Cameron Drews, the man of Metropolis

49:11

who has stolen our hearts. We'll

49:13

be back next week with Ronald

49:16

Young Jr.'s conversation with author Emma

49:18

Copley Eisenberg. Until then, get back

49:20

to work. What's

49:28

up, sandwich heads? Today on Stevo Sandwich Reviews, we've

49:31

got the tips and tricks to the best sandwich order. And

49:34

it all starts with this little guy right here, Pepsi Zero Sugar. Partial

49:37

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49:49

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and the one thing that's never been eaten is a

49:53

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49:55

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49:57

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50:00

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