The Magical Making of Michael Maggio

So it comes as no surprise that Maggio is directing the world premiere of Rebecca Gilman's latest multi-tiered drama, Boy Gets Girl running through April 8 on the Goodman mainstage. The Chicago-based playwright has garnered much critical acclaim for her insight into capturing intricate nuances of dialect while examining all sides of a controversial issue.

In Boy Gets Girl, a casual blind date turns into one woman's stalking nightmare. Gilman explores sexual politics and sexual outlets through the lead reporter character, her duplicitous date, assorted news room co-workers and even a director of low-budget sexploitation films.

"What's so fascinating about Rebecca," shares Maggio, "is her ability to take a subject that can be reduced to movie-of-the-week material, then delve very deeply and treat the echoes or reverberations of a situation. She also has a terrific ear for dialogue. The words sit very easily in the actors' mouths." The director was impressed with Gilman's Spinning Into Butter, a brutally frank drama about confronting racism, when it premiered last season at the Goodman studio. It will debut at New York's Lincoln Center Theater this summer. He hopes to continue this intellectually fulfilling collaboration.

Dedicated to nurturing up-and-coming artists, Maggio has been a longtime associate professor of theater at the Theatre School of DePaul University and directed several student productions. Last July, he was appointed Dean of the Theatre School and is in the process of adding "more rigorous" theater studies programs, including a dramaturgy major. The university is now engaged in four faculty searches to broaden the scope of the curriculum, especially in the areas of world and minority theater.

"I had been on the debate team in high school," he relates. "Then I started out as a speech and drama major at DePaul. So, early on, I would look at a play like it was a legal brief. I felt I had to establish a point of view and prove that my argument was correct based on evidence in the script. As I matured as a director, I gave myself permission to respect the possibility that, during the rehearsal process, I would learn more. The ideas would gradually unfold. And I didn't necessarily have to figure out all the answers."

Maggio recalls two pivotal events that helped enlighten him about the magical possibilities of live performance. As a child, he saw a production at the Pheasant Run Resort-Dinner Theatre in St. Charles (Illinois) of The Golden Fleecing, a military comedy starring Larry Hagman (who, at the time, was at the height of his "I Dream of Jeannie" fame). The aspiring director was enthralled by a special effect which caused a radio to explode on stage.

Later, while attending Holy Cross High School in Chicago, he happened upon another war-themed play, No Time for Sergeants, presented in a student production starring one of his friends. That experience somehow demystified theater for Maggio. "I guess I always had a fantasy mindset," he laughs. "Theater gave me license to do make-believe."

He has directed Titus Andronicus for the New York Shakespeare Festival; Elmer Gantry at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C.; and Rough Crossing at the McCarter Theatre in Princeton, as well as productions at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, the Actors Theatre of Louisville and the Cleveland Playhouse. Maggio also won an Obie Award for his direction of Wings at the Joseph Papp Public Theater.

As artistic director of Northlight Theatre (when it was based in Evanston, Illinois) for four years, he staged the world premieres of Dealing, the musical City on the Make and Heart of a Dog. At the Goodman, his world premiere production of Bulgakov's Black Snow received five 1993 Joseph Jefferson Awards. Other award-winning productions include A Little Night Music and Wings at the Goodman.

When asked if he plans on directing more shows around the country, Maggio expresses some hesitation--noting his commitments to the Goodman and to the Theatre School. But he did point out his interest in remounting Chicago-generated theater projects in other states. "I also feel very spoiled to work at the Goodman," he acknowledges. "It is my artistic home. When I work at the Goodman, I feel like I'm driving a high-performance automobile. There is such a terrific support system in place here. Tech week is not agony. It's similar to a filmmaker who works with the same crew all the time."