Review Fix Exclusive: KJ Sanchez Talks ‘Unity’

Review Fix chats with director KJ Sanchez who discusses Kevin Kerr’s “Unity” and its run at the Gene Frankel Theatre on Aug.6-23.

Breaking down the production on the goals and inspiration behind it, Sanchez lets us know what makes this play extremely special.

For more information on the production, click here.

Review Fix: What made you want to be a part of this production?

KJ Sanchez: I have wanted to direct this play for a very long time – years in fact. I was working in Vancouver, directing The Oresteia there when I encountered this play and met the playwright Kevin Kerr. I fell in love with it. Then I started following the work of Project Theater – I went to see their production of Ken Ferringi’s Occupation and became a big fan. I thought this would be a good fit so I gave the script to Joe Jung to see what he thought. Unity 1918 needs a strong, adventurous, inventive ensemble with a good sense of humor who can also be honest and real and these are all the things Project Theater does and is.

Review Fix: What’s your creative process like?

Sanchez: I do as much research as I can – and with this play there’s a ton of fascinating research about the time, the flu, the war, Canada’s role in it, etc – but when I get into rehearsal I set aside all that homework, all the months of conceptualizing and drafting staging ideas – I set all that aside and build the work off of and with the actors. I love actors and invite them to the table as generative artists. We have built this show together. Each day I’ll give then an exercise, like, “come in tomorrow with three different ways to make the sound of a train rolling into the station and make this sound out of found objects in your kitchen.” The next day each one will present their ideas and I’ll build the sound score and staging off of what they’ve offered. What a great job I have, right? That’s half of my process – building the production with the actors, hand-in-hand. The other half is thorough examination of the characters, their history, back story and looking at who they are and what they want in a – well, for lack of better description – a tradition rooted in realism. Even though the play has poetry in imagery and editing, the scenes are very honest and so my job as director is to help the actors tap into that very real, very human experience. It needs both realism and poetry and I think that’s where my process works best, is in the combining of those two.

Review Fix: What makes you different from other directors?

Sanchez: Since I began my career as an actor, I believe in giving actors ownership and creative voice. I also have had a very eclectic career — I write documentary plays, I run my own company (American Records) I do not only new plays but classics, I was in the SITI Company, I also did lots of kitchen sink plays and my very beginnings were in Ballet Folklorico dance. So I bring all that diversity to each production and work to make each production have a style, genre and tone all its own.

Review Fix: What makes this production special?

Sanchez: It’s a perfect fit, the ensemble’s talents and creative impulses are a perfect match with Kevin Kerr’s black humor, generosity of spirit – the way he finds love and joy in the darkest places – and his language. The cast is perfectly equipped to travel between the banal and the profound, just as Kevin’s writing does. All the stars lined up for this one.

Review Fix: How is your cast unique?

Sanchez: They are unique because they are a company, and a company that makes a lot of different work together. They also all have many talents – not only as excellent actors but Alicia Dawn Bullen, who plays Mary, is the props master (and an artists as such) Joe Jung who plays Hart wrote the music and Jessi Gormezano who plays Bea is a writer and producer in her own right, etc. It’s one of the things I love about this cast – they’re all renaissance people.

Review Fix: What did you learn about yourself through this process?

Sanchez: That I’m most comfortable living somewhere in the twilight between hope and despair. Ha! Not as a person. As a person, I’m a rather cheerful but boring person. But as an artist I’m most comfortable in stories like Unity 1918, stories where people are in their bleakest hour – facing an apocalypse is pretty bleak, right? – yet there is no melodrama, no self-pity, there’s lots of gallows humor and there is always a ray of hope. There’s always life down there in the darkest places, and those are the places I love to traverse. I like living in the gallows.

Review Fix: What are your goals for the production?

Sanchez: First and foremost that this great play gets the audience it deserves. It’s hailed in Canada – winning the Governor General’s Award – yet few too people know about it here, and that has to change.

Review Fix: Who do you think will enjoy it the most?

Sanchez: Oye. It’s cliche to say everyone but really? Everyone.

Review Fix: What’s next?

Sanchez: Next I direct Laura Eason’s Sex With Strangers at Cincinnati Playhouse in the park and then I get ready for my play about football X’s and O’s which is being produced at Baltimore’s CenterStage, with Tony Taccone directing.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14230 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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