People always ask: how do you work with your husband? I think what they’re really asking is: how do you work together without wanting to kill each other?
Don’t get me wrong, we have our moments. I wouldn’t equate them to scenes out of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, but occasionally someone will walk out of the room muttering obscenities.
But it got me thinking, how do you work with your spouse? So asked another playwriting couple, David Hein & Irene Sankoff.
David says: “because it’s a collaborative medium, theatre’s the art of compromise. You’re not going to agree on everything.” So setting up boundaries is key. “We have rules,” says Irene with a coy smile. “Like, no talking shows before breakfast.”
When I ask them how they started all this, the answer is very familiar. Like a lot of married couples, they felt they never got to see each other.
As Irene put it “It seemed like we were always passing at the door as one came in from work and the other went out.”
They decided to pool their talents and write something they could both be in. The result was the hit show My Mother’s Lesbian Jewish Wiccan Wedding.
Based on David’s real life, the show was picked up by Canadian theatre impresario David Mirvish. It played to packed houses in Toronto before heading off to win over audiences and critics in New York.
They quickly learned that their “make work” project hit a much deeper chord.
Says Irene “Theatre is not only relevant but can also be very powerful.” David adds “One reviewer said we were an ‘All ages lesson in tolerance.'”
All I can say is thank goodness they weren’t spending time together, or else we’d have missed a true gem.
David and Irene are busily working within their boundaries creating their next show, as well as prepping new productions of MMLJWW. In the meantime, if you’re in the GTA this Tuesday, you can catch David and 2 other very talented (and cute) singer songwriters as they perform 3 Guys from the Prairies.