Review Fix Exclusive: Inside ‘Babel’

January 3, 2017 Patrick Hickey Jr. Theatre 0

Review Fix chats with “Babel” director Jeremy Williams, who discusses the upcoming production and why he’s excited to be a part of it.

About Babel:

BABEL will play a limited engagement at The Theater at the 14th Street Y (344 East 14th Street, New York, NY 10003). Performances begin Wednesday, January 18, 2017 and continue through Sunday, February 5.

BABEL is a physical spectacle that reinvents one of the oldest stories in the world: The Tower of Babel, told through Acrobatic Dance Theater. The company of 22 powerful dancers build the world of the play, a sculpture garden of bodies. Sitting in three quarter round, the audience is immersed in the tower where performers climb, fly and play–building it so high that it offends the gods.

Review Fix: What inspired BABEL?

Jeremy Williams: WT McRae shared his vision of BABEL with me over a coffee in 2013. He had all kinds of questions about how to tell this story about the origin of language with bodies rather than words. The story of BABEL shows up everywhere in our culture and in many other cultures around the world. It’s a common myth that speaks to many people. I love working with common stories and finding new ways to tell them. BABEL is an old story told in a totally new way.

Review Fix: What do you think makes it special?

Williams: We strive to build a company that is diverse in backgrounds, age, gender, body type, and cultural heritage. Our audiences always tell us how special it is to experience this kind of diversity within the storytelling. For me, BABEL is special because of the people involved. It’s an incredible community of 30+ artists actively working on the show right now. Plus we’ve had an additional two dozen or so collaborators with us along the way over the past 3 years.

Review Fix: Why is it an important time to tell this story?

Williams: BABEL is about coming together to build something great despite our differences. After the tower falls and language is divided the hope is that people will not build anything so great again. However we know this is not the case. BABEL shows us a way to move beyond conflict and misunderstanding. I think we desperately need that right now.

Review Fix: Who will connect with this story the most?

Williams: Anyone who loves to see humanity, not just individuals, succeed through striving together.

Review Fix: What do you want people to take away from this?

Williams: That humans are incredible. That working and striving together is beautiful. That we can overcome differences between us without all needing to be the same. Difference is something to be celebrated.

Review Fix: Why must someone see it?

Williams: It’s an incredible combination of acrobatics, dance, and acting to tell a powerful and exciting story.

Review Fix: What’s next?

Williams: For BABEL, we are making a film version and a tour. There’s always more fun for BABEL! We are also presenting The Woman Who Was ME this spring in NYC as well as our Latin-Jazz cabaret A Mexican Affair. We also have a few new shows in development. The CTC kitchen is always cooking up something!

Review Fix: Anything else you’d like to say?

Williams: WT and I are so excited to be running in rep with our friends Cirque-Tacular Entertainment and their show Snowkus Pocus. We love that you can experience circus and physical storytelling in two different ways.

To learn more about BABEL visit http://www.convergencescollective.org/babel.html

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14262 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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