INTERVIEW WITH PLAYWRIGHT LINDSEY FERRENTINO
Education Dramaturg Ted Sod spoke with Playwright Lindsey Ferrentino about her play Amy and the Orphans.
Ted Sod: What inspired you to write Amy and the Orphans? Does the play have personal resonance for you and, if so, how? What do you feel your play is about?
Lindsey Ferrentino: My aunt Amy had Down syndrome and was raised mostly in state-funded institutions, foster homes, and group care. We always had a close but, at the same time, distant relationship with her. She was picked up and taken home for holidays, visited a few times a year, flown to Florida for an annual two-week family vacation, but no one in my family was ever a part of Amy’s life on a daily basis. After her death and the death of my grandparents, I was left wondering how my grandparents—extremely loving, family-oriented individuals—gave up their child to foster care. In my search for an answer to this question, I came across some journals from my grandparents during a time when they were in couple’s therapy. What fascinated me was that giving up Amy was certainly mentioned, but it was given equal weight to their other problems—stress about money, a daughter at home who was chronically ill, concerns about their body image, sex life, etc. These journals helped me to see them as more complicated human beings in an extremely difficult situation. My family’s relationship to Amy was complicated to say the least—filled with equal measure of joy, guilt, pain, and happiness, but the guilt and pain were all ours. Amy remained a loving, funny, movie-obsessed soul whose language was limited, but whose ability to express herself was not. After Amy’s death, I was left wondering how well we really knew her. This play is about personal responsibility to family and to yourself. It is about the meaning of family. Is family comprised of people you choose and spend your time with, or is blood really thicker than water? How well can you ever really know someone else, especially those you are related to? I think the play is also, and importantly so, about joy. To celebrate, onstage, the life of a person with Down syndrome and to see them as autonomous human beings.
TS: Will you give us a sense of the kind of research you had to do in order to write this play and how you went about doing it?
LF: In writing this play, I did a lot of personal family research. In addition to reading my grandparents’ therapy journals from the ‘70s, I interviewed my mom, aunt, and uncle about their childhood memories of Amy, how it felt growing up with a sibling with Down syndrome during a time when this was not as culturally welcome as it is now. I then contacted an agent—Gail Williamson—who represents talented actors with Down syndrome throughout the world. Jamie Brewer, who Gail recommended to me as a potential Amy, happened to be free during a visit to New York. She was walking the catwalk during NYC’s Fashion Week (Jamie was the first person with Down syndrome to ever appear there). She had some time between a press junket and a party, and we sat down at her hotel to chat about all sorts of things: life, ambition, men, dreams, hopes, family and—more than anything—her love of the theatre. Spending two hours in Jamie’s company completely blew my mind in terms of what people with Down syndrome are capable of—even though I’d known someone with Down syndrome all my life. My aunt was raised in group homes. Jamie went to public school, lived independently, and attended college. She also memorized lines, shared scenes with the likes of Jessica Lange (on "American
4 ROUNDABOUT THEATRE COMPANY
Horror Story") and performed her own stunt work on the show. Jamie is the most driven, focused, passionate, hard-working actor I’ve ever had the privilege to work with. She not only loves the work, but it is her life. She spends her time off studying film and great performances, taking lessons, dreaming of her next project, connecting with other actors and directors, and giving speeches as an advocate for the Down syndrome community. This play would not exist without Jamie Brewer —her feedback and love of theatre made me determined to write the title role for her. Jamie spoke to me at length about how she was used to “dumbing herself down” to play someone with Down syndrome because her own cognitive abilities were higher than an audience’s perception of her capabilities. I promised to write Jamie a role that not only honored my aunt’s life, but also let the audience experience Jamie Brewer as an autonomous, career-driven human being.
I also had a similar experience when I met the actor Eddie Barbanell —Eddie is the understudy for this production. I returned to Jamie’s agent, asking to take meetings with additional actresses. I told her that I’d consider meeting with an actor if they were passionate about doing a play. She introduced me to Eddie who, as it turns out, lives a few hours from my parents in South Florida. Eddie and his mom met my dad and me at a diner along I-95. I told Eddie he didn’t need to prepare anything but that we’d just chat about the play. Eddie brought me a signed copy of his movie The Ringer along with offering to perform Shakespeare. “Shakespeare?” I said. “What Shakespeare?” He had Julius Caesar, Romeo, and Puck prepared and proceeded to perform the most word-perfect, clear Shakespeare I have ever heard.
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