We welcome back Emily Dendinger with The Grand Illusion Show. In this historical comedy, we are given a look into the real life of magician Adelaide Hermann.

Orlando Shakes: Who or what inspired you to become a playwright?

Emily Dendinger: I loved telling stories as a kid and thought for a long time I would become a novelist. I used to make my sisters reenact plays in our basement, and I think that was actually the beginnings of my birth as a playwright. I also danced for a long time, which gave me a love of the stage, but as a kid I was interested in a lot of things: archaeology, books, ballet, astronomy. Maybe in middle school or so, I had this moral conundrum about what I wanted to be when I grew up, and it suddenly dawned on me that if I was a playwright I could combine all the things I loved into one. I’d get to be a writer for the stage, and I could write about all the other things I was passionate about.

Orlando Shakes: What is your favorite part of the writing process?

Emily Dendinger: I really love being in rehearsal for a production because that’s when the play really comes to life. I believe my job as a playwright is to create a blueprint, but it’s only when the director, actors, and designers are involved do you really get to see the play come into focus. I’m very collaborative in my process, and my favorite moments are when the actors and designers start to uncover things I didn’t even know existed in the play. There always comes a moment in rehearsal when an actor knows their character better than I do and start making discoveries on their own and that’s really when the characters start to take on a life beyond what I might have envisioned in my head.

Orlando Shakes: What was the specific trigger for writing this play?

Emily Dendinger: I love writing about little known women in history, and when I heard an NPR segment on Adelaide Herrmann, arguably the first female magician, I knew immediately I wanted to write a play about her. I remember buying her autobiography before the segment was even finished, and when I read it, I was immediately struck by her story. I started doing research not just on Adelaide, but also magic on a whole, seeing shows, conducting interviews, and reading as much as I could. One of the things that was both fascinating and upsetting to me what how many of the prejudices Adelaide faced back at the end of the 19th century still exist today.

Orlando Shakes: What is the theme or focus of this play?

Emily Dendinger: This is a play about a tough, talented, intelligent woman who prioritized vocation over family, and was rarely (if ever) called “nice.” She’s tenacious. She goes after something and eventually, she gets it. We want to learn something from Adelaide, now more than ever, when the everyday demeaning acts against women in every field, are finally being dredged to the surface. Adelaide was called a “bitch” and a “witch.” The same biases she faced a hundred years ago still run rampant today. Today, 90% of magicians are men. The Brotherhood of Magicians didn’t allow women in until the 1990s. Assistants are still valued for their appearance as much as their ability to squeeze into tiny boxes, and their role is still above all to make the magician “look good.” By all accounts, Adelaide was an exceptional magician. If she’d been a man, she would have been remembered alongside Thurston, Houdini, and her husband, but the same adjectives used against Adelaide we still hear used against powerful, intelligent, capable women today. This country has a problem with women, and on the eve of an election year, now is the time to produce this play.

Orlando Shakes: What four words or short phrases first spring to mind to describe your play?

Emily Dendinger: Engaging and entertaining, illusion and misdirection, strong female lead and bullet catch

Orlando Shakes: Is there something you’d like to write about or see a play about that hasn’t been done before?

Emily Dendinger: What a good question! I feel like whenever I want to see a play onstage that I haven’t, I try and write it! I guess right now I’m raving more fun and theatricality in my theatre. Lately I feel like all of the plays I’ve seen have a feeling akin to eating vegetables: I know they are good for me, but I just don’t want to see them. I want to see plays that inspire, entertain, frighten, evoke, and delight rather than just rehashing old ideas, narratives, and structure. TV is so good right now that I often ask if a play passes the “would I rather be home watching Netflix” test, and far too many plays lately don’t pass this test. Recently, I saw Derren Brown’s magic show, Secret, on Broadway and it did all the things I think good theater ought to do. I guess to answer this question, I’d like to see theater willing to push boundaries whether in genre, content, or structure.

Orlando Shakes: What is it like returning to PlayFest a year later?

Emily Dendinger: It’s wonderful! I’m so grateful and humble to return. Every opportunity for a play to be seen in front of a new audience is a gift. Last year I was here with #GodHatesYou, which is a difficult, tough, complicated play that I am very proud of and was produced this summer at UCF directly due to this festival. The Grand Illusion Show is also wrestling with complex issues, but it’s a very different kind of play. It’s about women. It’s a comedy, and maybe most importantly, it’s a lot of fun. I’m really excited to be back with a play that’s intended to delight as much as evoke conversation.

Orlando Shakes: If you are willing to talk about it – what new projects are on your horizon?

Emily Dendinger: I’m developing a play inspired by the women I grew up with. It tells the story of three sisters in a rural Virginia farmhouse, caring for their ailing mother, who suffers from dementia. Prior to her illness, their mother was a leading but unsung member of the first-wave feminist movement. Now, an attractive young male academic with a hidden agenda has come to the sisters, asking their permission to write a book about their mother. Unbeknownst to him, the sisters have secrets of their own, and not everyone is going to make it out alive. Inspired by the works of Shirley Jackson and William Faulkner, the Kavanaugh hearing, and personal stories of sexual harassment, injustice and misconduct, I’m just starting to work on this fatally feminist Southern Gothic thriller. And it too is, hopefully, a lot of fun.

About the Playwright: Emily Dendinger

Emily Dendinger is a Brooklyn-based writer by way of Virginia. Her plays include No Home for Bees (2017 Source Festival Finalist), Little House in the Big City (2017 NNPN Showcase Finalist), and Pocketful of Sand (winner of the 2016 Activate Midwest New Play Award and 2015 Alliance/Kendeda finalist). She is a two-time winner of Theater Masters and has been a finalist for the City Theatre National Award, 2017 Emerald Prize, and Heideman Award. Emily has worked around the country with companies including Actors Theatre of Louisville, Route 66, The Lark, Sideshow Theatre, The Alliance, NNPN, Curious Theatre Company, NJ Rep, Orlando Shakes, Ashland New Play Festival, and TimeLine Theatre. Her work has been developed at The Perry Mansfield Festival of New Work, and Tofte Lake Residency. Emily was the 2015-2016 NNPN Playwright-in-Residence with Curious Theatre Company and is an alumni member of TimeLine’s Writers Collective. Emily is a graduate of the University of Iowa’s Playwright’s Workshop.