Julia Miles
Well, actually not until Tuesday, April 7th, the official publication date of The Silver Swan: In Search of Doris Duke (Farrar, Straus & Giroux).
On Tuesday, I’ll be writing a post about the way I researched and wrote my biography over the past ten years, and also about the virtual reading I will be doing—to replace my postponed reading—with Garcia Street Books here in Santa Fe. They have my biography now and are ready to ship it, and to arrange for me to autograph copies for my readers. The bookstore can be reached at 505-986-0151.
Instead of Swan talk, I’m attaching an announcement about the recent death of my dear friend and mentor, Julia Miles, founder of The Women’s Project and Productions in New York City in the 1980’s (now WP Theater).
I was one of the original group of playwright-supporters who helped to facilitate the birth of an off-off-Broadway theatre that over the years had been the prime producer of plays written and directed by women. In the 80’s, women playwrights and producers were seldom seen or heard in New York or anywhere else, and the fact that this has somewhat changed in 2020 is largely due to the Women’s Project.
I’m moved by the testimony of the theatre women who held readings in Julia’s apartment in the years of her decline. They handled her increasing disability with tact and creativity so that she was never left out of the on-going conversation.
A great example for all of us, primarily what Julia did and was but also for the support given her by her community of women.
From the League of Professional Theater Women:
We are sad to announce that one of our co-founders, Julia Miles, passed away on Wednesday, March 18, 2020, following a long illness.
Julia Miles was an influential theatrical force for decades, making her impact felt in New York City theatre and especially in the lives of women theatre artists. At the League’s Theatre Women Awards in 2016 Estelle Parsons said, “I remember the very first meeting of the very beginnings of the League, at the bottom of an escalator at the old American Place Theatre on West 46th Street, where Julia Miles had the Women’s Project downstairs. It was 1982. There we were–me, Julia, Margot Lewitin, Liz McCann, and I think Marsha Norman–out in the middle of the downstairs lobby, standing around, discussing what we wanted this new organization [The League of Professional Theatre Women] to be, and how we were going to make it happen.”
In memory of Julia’s contribution at the League, Maxine Kern and Gail Kriegel remember how it all began:
We were sitting at an award lunch at Sardi’s and talking about our favorite subject: how the League should and could have a place for playwrights and directors to hear their work. When both the League and The Women’s Project was founded by Julia Miles, there were regularly scheduled monthly readings. Gail had her first two plays read there, which Julia then produced. It had been a way to get feedback, to network and to make friendships. So why weren’t we doing it today? As we sat there in Sardi’s, in walked Julia.
The three of us, Maxine, Gail and Julia sat together and we talked. Julia let us know she had stepped down as the Artistic Director for The Women’s Project and that she missed doing theater. She felt that she did have enough memory loss to impede her running a dynamic women’s theater in the heart of NYC, but nonetheless, her desire for theater was as strong as ever. Gail and I listened and we empathized. Then she passionately exclaimed, “I’m all alone in a big 3 bedroom apt on Central Park West, why can’t we do theater there.” We put our three heads together. Julia was as excited as we were with the offer of her apartment as the place to hold readings. And for the next 5 years, once a month we met in Julia’s living room with a League member who had a play to develop, a cast, an invited audience of no more than 20, some bottles of wine, a variety of cheeses and Julia in her special chair listening to our women’s works in process.”
It was special having these readings in Julia’s beautiful apartment high over Central Park. She always made us feel at home; always gracious. And Julia’s Reading Room became, to many of us, an important, supportive space because there, over a glass of wine, a cheese and cracker, someone’s homemade cookie, you could hear your work and know that the feedback came from friends and colleagues who understood the process.
The amazing thing was that, although Julia was getting sick at that time, it was the beginning of her Alzheimers, and she might interrupt the reading to be reminded of the title of the play and who the writer was, after the play was read, she was the one you could count on to be spot on about what worked and didn’t work in the script. We will never forget her and were proud to have worked with her.
Leave a Reply