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Welcome to artists in the city the series is designed to introduce you to some of the professional artists who are doing exciting works in the communities and neighborhoods of New York here now with our moderator Mrs Doris from. Thank you and welcome once again to artists in the city and past broadcast my guests have been artist who have moved out of Bell worries concert halls theaters and museums to share the excitement of their work with a larger audience and in many cases to involve people in creating works of art of their own these areas have left their signature all over our city in the form of sculpture in the park or open space a large warm euro painted on the side of a building or a storefront workshop my guest today is Miriam cologne one of Puerto Rico's outstanding actresses in the United States miss Cologne is the founder of the Puerto Rican traveling theater a street theatre company which is now in its fourth season this summer Miss Cologne is making her debut as a director by staging Perry Thomas' the golden streets. As an actress Miss cologne has appeared in seventeen plays in New York and in five major films and Hollywood among them the Appaloosa and one I jacks opposite Marlon Brando among her Broadway credits are in the summerhouse the innkeeper's and most recently a costarring role in the wrong way light bulb off Broadway she has featured in me Candido highway robbery and Mattie and the moron and the Madonna and costarred in the ox cart. Miriam Cologne is a member of the Actor's Studio and has been appointed by Marilyn zee to New York City's Cultural Council welcome Mary I know that our background could go on longer than AS But I think our listeners would be most interested in hearing about what you've been doing this long hot summer in the streets of New York can you tell us a little about both Harry Thomas and this new play that you're directing for the communities of New York City years I've been terribly excited to have been able to present the golden streets as you know this is the first play by Mr Thomas I came in touch believe it about a year ago and he brought it to the house in the form of a. Draft and I realized that. It had a theme that was very interesting because it deals with a border Rican family and how they face the problem of addiction you know one of the sons so are right then and there I started. Meeting with Mr Thomas and trying to interest him to take time from his many activities so that this draft could be developed into a full length play which did happen and of course. I was especially fortunate because when I brought it to the city I brought it to their Mayor Lee insists urban Action Task Force and to the parks recreation and Cultural Affairs Administration I suggested it as a possibility for the summers and. I had the beginning there was some question as to exactly what the play wanted to say and whether it was the kind of a theme that could conceivably agitate rather than illuminate and that God they where perceptive enough and. Understanding enough to marry interrupt for a minute marry him out when you talk with Perry Thomas did you discuss the fact that this could be done in the streets of New York did he do you think in writing this play have that in the back of his mind a new kind of audience that this would be introduced to or did that not no not or not really I think he wrote it as it came out of his subconscious as if his imagination actually it was I thought that this play has a tremendous impact. In terms of the language you know he writes in a very special way he has a combination of Spanish and English and it is terribly terribly important because. We don't have many dramatists at least among Puerto Rican dramatists that capture the essence of that particular segment of the population and who have the first hand knowledge as he has it because as you know Mr Thomas is an ex drug addict and ex-con backed with a tremendous childhood full of pain and of suffering and learning and bitter experiences but he's also a beautiful example of a human being that survived or that that did not collapse under it so that his play had a very special significance to me not only in terms of the play in terms of the discovery of a new dramatist But in terms of. Projecting the image of somebody who has been caught yet has survived it and that to me has tremendous significance Well I would think so I think also our course one doesn't expect the audience to know all about the author but certainly if his material is as you explain it has a particular relevance to today to the problems faced by you and and adults alike are living through perhaps some of the experiences he's lived through how did you find the audience reaction when you took this to the streets Oh it's fascinating it's fascinating we have gone to neighborhoods where there is great deprivation in terms of children with no power until figure in terms of the lappie Deshaun of buildings in terms of. The general mood it's so interesting to go with this play to the IS different neighborhoods and the way they react to it the reactions are very very varied very strong and for example we've had neighborhoods let's say the main character that is the addict is called Luis. My We were in a neighborhood the other night at a hundred and thirty eighth. Between Brooks and Willis and there were about three hundred louis in the audience and they would laugh but then they would listen attentively and then they would ask questions they would ask questions to the character. To the actor or interpret in Luis they would come back and they would just you know talk to us and make friends and sometimes there were some laughter in places that it was not supposed to be laughter so I interpret it like maybe there being some recognition of the truth as played on the stage that maybe ran some truth in them very very fascinating Well now this this is in itself very interesting because I'm sure this is the audiences that you've played through to throughout the city are relatively new to theater experiences and I think as you say. Probably even during the play's presentation questions would be thrown at the act because now you've had both sides of the you've been on the stage in traveling theater and now as a director do you find that as an actress on the stage in the stories that this is disconcerting not to have the. Sort of pristine. Well behaved audience that you might get in a theater where things are quiet in the stages up front in the audience it's very nicely out there and listen I'm sure it's quite different. Is now what happens to the actors honest and well at the beginning it's a little bit jarring. Because their reactions are guarded they are so absolutely free there's are so conditioned by what we say good manners by the kids this is their playground and we hit many audiences. With so many kids many of whom their only exposure has been to television that they watch a play like they watch television and since they are in their playground they talk because they feel absolutely free and it's it's beautiful because if they don't like you they say things to you or if they like you they cheer they applause sometimes they boo you know like the villains and they say things back like there is a kid playing the role of hot dog and. Last night for example we were in Red Hook and the kid was a hot dog but go away here is your name really what. That's really I could see that would be a great challenge to an actor or actress it's almost as though you don't have to sit home and wait for the critics to review your play there even though you're the lewdly is telling you as you're performing what they like what they don't like and I think this is very significant in street theater today there's been a lot of talk about street theater and what is it really is it taking Broadway production putting it on a mobile unit and bringing it into the street or is there something very different happening and a whole new way of looking at this on the part of of writers of actors of directors How do we involve audiences who are involving themselves and how do we respond to this on the professional side do you have any words of wisdom for the young playwright who may be very concerned with this really all theater because street they had a certainly has a heritage that goes back to the Elizabethan days if not before. What do you think in terms of material now you've done four seasons has been your most successful kind of material to bring to people. Well I find that play is that have some relevance to the problems of today are the most. Successful with these audiences of course they're always the classics and of course. There are other plays that have a reputation but if you bring in plays where they somehow recognize themselves or their neighbors and that in some way you know have some quality they respond and I think. For example this particular mission of taking the theater to the streets to me is so important because these are the audiences that I am interested right now I don't care if they laugh at the wrong moment but I love the fact that they come back and they tell the butterfly and the other play we're doing you are now a butterfly and you say that you are now butterfly then she said the other day this was a particularly care of the she said to the girl you're not butterfly she said can you really fly because she was supposed to have arrived from someone land this is in the lark a play we're doing I prefer that kind of an audience I think these are the forgotten people I think that if the theater is going to have. A future and if it's not going to keep the tearing rating I hope you know you have read this latest article in The Times on Sunday what is happening Well the thing is that I think we should keep cultivating and finding audiences forward a theater and they don't necessarily have to be the Broadway audience as I think there can be theaters in Harlem and in Brooklyn and Red Hook and in little Betsy had. Or parts of New York City and they enjoy it so why not go to them why not have theaters in all of those places also I hope that writers will come more to grips with the problems that our youth is going to day and right things that could be of value to these youths that are. Are watching that are fun viewers fabulous audiences their intelligence their way they interpret what you're trying to say there quickness is so rich it's so beautiful that I think more should be written but it should be written with roots in what we are living in what they are going through and oh my I think we can win millions and millions of untapped sources who have it's so wonderful approach I think and that leads me to question how you got involved with the whole concept I guess it's four years ago of you as an actress who were certainly could be spending your summers making movies or even vacationing which I'm sure Cajun way is nice but instead you're coming back to the city from whatever your own career has from wherever your career has brought you in and spend these hot months in the streets of New York what what was the impetus what was the philosophy you brought when you first started this well it was really. My own where ness of what is happening. In our See it is it is the pain that I experience how our population I am talking specifically about the Puerto Ricans and about the blacks and about not only them but they're the people who are trapped. I want to reach them and it's just wonderful a thing that there is the means of a traveling theater so that I can take my profession and my aspirations as an actor has a little bit away from the frivolous kind of thing where I am an actress I work in Hollywood here and there I do starting growers' on television but having found an opportunity to be that and at the same time can. Tribute something to my city and to my people. In terms of a theater that plays for them and in some cases with them was such a tremendous discovery that I said well it fulfills a tremendous purpose it takes the being an actor out of that pedestal and you also feel like a human being and in their humble way you feel like you are contributing something you are sharing some of your time some of your concern and in terms of what it has done for me as an actress of course it has helped me technically in terms of that if you can play for an audience like that where you can play for any audience if you can still keep your concentration and your discipline as an actor but in terms of a human being it has also in reach because each neighborhood. It's a lesson I had a tremendous lesson last night in a dilapidated horrible neighborhood in Red Hook where the buildings have been abandoned where the docks are where there are no lights where there are many many problems in the community and despair yet I went to a place where they have built a plaza for the children somebody gave them a donation and they were able to buy one thousand dollars worth of sand so that in between two buildings the children can play with sand and make little castles then some owner of a building gave them space behind the building so they made a quaint little got to be and what are you getting plus that these are called Lost in the US and they put roses they plant roses instead of bombs they they paid and they made a great big hole in the street and they buried all the garbage and then on top of it they put out a memo that they were playing saying that there's no dead man buried here only garbage and this is in honor of the people who fight poverty I was in freefall I went to my house last night and I was I was so in the past and having met these I think these are the real heroes Well it's certainly an experience that sends chills up and down my spine because I think it shows that people can if they are given anough encourage men can do a great deal on their own. And all it takes sometimes as you said this one donation of applause which stirred people up showed what could be done and then on their own found their own resources their own talents and went ahead and made some changes in their community I think this is what we've found with our artists who've gone and work with them in terms of paints and adding a whole new model year to a neighborhood. By creating a warm you're all or placing a piece of sculpture and now as you come in with it or and what this does and how people get a new sense of self a more positive sense of who they are what they can be it offers an alternative to a life that I'm sure for many for a long time seemed hopeless and desperate and I I strongly feel that the arts help people to. Find this this alternative I mentioned that we have to put all our energies and all our creative thinking into new approaches to reach people on a more positive basis but tell me Mary Now what about you as an actress have you can imagine how you do have time but I guess if the Puerto Rican travelling theatre functions primarily in the summer does so far yes although I hope to make it a year round thing but I do function as an actress and as a matter of fact I'm just delighted because I did a gone smoke in me and C.V.S. just informed me that it has been selected as the open air of the Gunsmoke season and it's going to be shown on Monday September fourteenth at seven thirty channel till the chapter is called chattel and I go star with the God of the mounted band so I'm very excited that C.B.S. chose it as the opener of the Gunsmoke season and it's a good road oh I'm sure it is well I'm sure our listeners will. Be very fascinated and I think it there's always something interesting about of voice that comes over the air and when you have an opportunity to see the person which reminds me too in terms of the actors you mentioned before that an audience is very eager after a performance to meet the actor actress and as you said this sort of brings them down from their pedestal of some mythical make believe thing. Here and gives people a chance to know these are human beings with great concerns and and how have you found this relationship this breaking down of the barrier between actor and audience are in the discussions that you may have with youngsters and the kinds of questions that I ask and the feeling tone that to you sense well it is a beautiful situation. Usually I screen my actors. Kind of carefully I don't want in my company people no matter how talented that don't have this special feeling about playing in the ghettos if if they do not have any kind of rapport with that I gently stay away from them you see because there is a commitment not only from the actor but from the human being and I usually I'm secretly satisfied when I see the actors answering questions to kids and they come back they ask questions last night there were two kids a girl and a boy a brother and a sister asking about the kind of there of Luis. When you really dead did you really take drugs and the little boy said I'm not going to never take that I'm not going to never take this was the same words he used so that this is important I think I think it would be very bad if the actors go there and keep in the bars don't come down and talk to the kids and if there are questions to many of them and one to join us my heart is broken sometimes cause you know we don't have a training on it at this stage but we hope to have it if we keep getting help from the CD on the Parks Department and from interested people such as the foundations are so that it is terribly important and it's good it's good to talk. These kids it's a pull feel tremendous purpose I like that idea of a possible training program or workshop perhaps to develop other actors for future performances I think this is this sharing of experiences is vital to. Fulfilling certain needs that often our schools are unable to meet or other community resources don't have that of the creative energies of our young people today and I certainly wish you luck in fulfilling this overall dream of a workshop or training center that goes along. With the Puerto Rican traveling theatre I could see a whole nurturing beginning a workshop program and as the actors develop perhaps even touring with the theater as they become all of their you see this is certainly among my plans set except that you know it's very complex to get these things approved etc but I have made contact with foundations right now the Rockefeller Brothers Fund has been very kind to us well Mary and I'm sorry to interrupt but I'm I'm I wish you great luck and success I think it's wonderful what you're doing for our city and Mary in Cologne thank you so much for joining me today on artists in the City thank you thank you Mrs Friedman that concludes today's broadcast if you would like information on today's program or if you have any comments or suggestions for future broadcast write to artists in the city W. N.Y.C. New York one hundred zero zero seven.