The primary Stages Off-Broadway Oral history Project

Celebrating the visionaries who created New York's vibrant Off- and Off-Off-Broadway theater.

John Jesurun

John Jesurun

Multi-Media Artist, Director, Playwright

Interviewed on: Tuesday, August 6, 2019
Location: at Primary Stages
Interviewed by: Sally Plass
Interview #165
"A lot of these people did not go to theater school…it was kind of the Wild West and that’s the way we liked it…this immediacy was going to be formed into something solid and meaningful…"
John Jesurun Highlights
Video Length: 6 Minutes, 52 Seconds
John Jesurun Interview Part One
Video Length: 1 Hour, 50 Minutes
John Jesurun Interview Part Two
Video Length: 57 Minutes, 23 Seconds
John Jesurun Interview Part Three
Video Length: 1 Hour, 37 Minutes

John Jesurun is one of the most influential multi-media artists in the Off-Off-Broadway avant-garde movement. Throughout his career, he has written and directed and designed plays as a vehicle for his art. Included in his works are: CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #1-36 (1982), BIRD’S EYE VIEW (1982), NON CHANG PIECES (1983), DOG’S EYE VIEW (1984), NUMBER MINUS ONE (1984),  RED HOUSE (1984), CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #37-42 (1984), SHATTERHAND MASSACREE (1985), DEEP SLEEP (1986), WHITE WATER (1986), BLACK MARIA (1987), CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #43-45 (1988),SUNSPOT (1989), EVERYTHING THAT RISES MUST CONVERGE (1990), BLUE HEAT (1991), IRON LUNG (1992), SOUTHERN CROSS (1993), POINT OF DEBARKATION (1993), SLIGHT RETURN (1994), PEARLY IRIDESCENT (1994), JOAN D’ARK (1994), CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #46-50 (1995), FAUST/HOW I ROSE (1996), AFTER IMAGE (1997), CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #51-53 (1997), LAND OF THE LIVING (1999), SNOW (2000), BARDO (2003), CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #54-55 (2003), CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODE #57 (2004), CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODE #58 (2004), SEPTET PART 1 (2005), CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODE #56 (2005), PHILOKTETES (2005), SEPTET PART 2 (2006), FIREFALL (20062009), LIZ ONE (HER SECRET DIARIES IN THE LAND OF 1,000 DANCES) (2009), CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #59-61 (2014) STOPPED BRIDGE OF DREAMS (2012),SHADOWLAND LIVE (2015), DISTANT OBSERVER (2018), NOW MY HAND IS READY FOR MY HEART (Direction,Design)(2019).  Some of the notable Off-Broadway theater spaces he has worked in include: BAM, Club 57, Dance Theater Workshop, Incubator Arts Project, Danspace,The Kitchen, La MaMa E.T.C., The Pyramid Club, and Soho Rep.

John Jesurun was born in Battle Creek, Michigan in 1951, and moved frequently while his father was in the army. His family spoke English and Spanish at home and he learned other languages when they were deployed overseas. As an artist he attended Philadelphia College of Art, now renamed University of the Arts, where he fell in love with sculpture. After graduating with his Bachelor’s Degree in art and sculpture, he pursued his Masters at Yale in sculpture and film. In New York he made a living being a content analysis for CBS and became an Assistant Producer on The Dick Cavett Show. His talents as a writer, film maker, artist and sculptor united in the downtown club scene where he could build multi-media productions challenging the perception of simultaneous realities. 1986, he won an Obie Award for Playwriting for DEEP SLEEP (1986). Throughout his career, he has been the recipient of a Rockefeller Foundation Playwrights Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship for Creative Arts, a MacArthur ‘Genius’ Fellowship, Foundation for Contemporary Arts Fellowship, as well as a Playwrights Fellowship and a Visual and Media Arts Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. Varied directing/design credits include Roy Nathanson’s Jazz Suite, “Fire at Keaton’s” with Debby Harry and Elvis Costello at St. Ann’s, Brooklyn, Harry Partch’s opera “Delusion of the Fury” at the Japan Society and music video for Jeff Buckley. His work has been produced and presented by numerous venues including the Walker Arts Center, the Wexner Center, Kampnagel Theater, Berliner Festspielhaus, National Theater of Mexico, Mickery Theater,  Granada Festival,  Eurokaz Zagreb, Bogota International Festival, Vienna Festival, Kyoto Performing Arts Center and Spoleto USA. He has directed his work in German, Italian, Spanish and Japanese. His work is published by Performing Arts Journal, Ediciones El Milagro, Theater Communications Group, Sun and Moon Press, Yale Theater Magazine, Index, Felix, Theater der Zeit, Backstage Books. Recent publications include “Shatterhand Massacree and other Media Texts”published by Performing Arts Journal and “Media Trilogy” by NoPassport Press. Teaching at DASARTS/Amsterdam, Justus  Liebig University, Goethe University, New York University, Tokyo University,Kyoto University of Art and Design, The New School, Bard College, Carnegie Mellon and Stockholm University of the Arts. 

Mentioned in Interview

Black-Eyed Susan, Robin Breed, Steve Buscemi, Dick Cavett, Merce Cunningham, Michael Feingold, Richard Foreman, Philip Glass, Lillian Hellman, Albert Hunter, Mimi Johnson, Valerie Charles, Carmen de Lavallade, Judith Malina, Mary McCarthy, Bernadette Peters, John Mackenzie Philips, Larry Pine, Tito Puente, Jane Smith, Ellen Stewart, Meryl Streep, Larry Tighe, Michael Tighe, Sigourney Weaver, BAM, Berliner Festspiele, Chocolate Factory, Club 57, Dance Theater Workshop, Incubator Arts Project, Japan Society, The Kitchen, La MaMa E.T.C., The Living Theatre, Mabou Mines, The Pyramid Club, Soho Repertory Theatre, AFTER IMAGE, BARDO, BIRD’S EYE VIEW, BLACK MARIA, BLUE HEAT, CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #1-36, CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #37-42, CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #43-45, CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #46-50, CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #51-53, CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #54-55, CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #56, CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODE #57, CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODE #58, CHANG IN A VOID MOON EPISODES #59-61, DEEP SLEEP, DOG’S EYE VIEW, EVERYTHING THAT RISES MUST CONVERGE, FAUST/HOW I ROSE, FIREFALL, IRON LUNG, JOAN D’ARK

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