'Moving Forward': a conversation with Rob Corbett

I remember meeting Rob many years ago in the late 80s and early 90s when he had directed a production of ‘The Wizard of Oz’ at the Whitby Courthouse Theatre.  Yes, that was a long time ago. He completed his theatre training at Sheridan College and his specific writing training at George Brown and around Rob had also interned at The Stratford Festival in southwest Ontario.

Recently, I attended a reading of Rob’s play ‘Outside the Lines’ staged by Port Perry’s Theatre on the Ridge. According to the theatre’s Facebook page, the play is the story of two people, whose lives are impacted through a chance meeting. Linda (played by Port Perry resident Carolyn Goff) is a passionate volunteer out to save the world, while Harrison (played by Oshawa resident Craig Martin) is a charismatic but self-centred and irresponsible artist not even interested in saving himself.

Full of wry humour that explores the consequences of living within and outside the boundaries of convention and expectation, ‘Outside The Lines’ reaffirms that there is always room for friendship, compassion and growth.

Rob and I had a quick conversation between readings in the Church.  Thank you for the conversation, Rob. I do hope I will get a chance to see ‘Outside the Lines’ sometime soon as a full scale production when it is safe for us to return to the theatre:

It has been an exceptionally long eight months since the pandemic began, and now the numbers are edging upward again.  How are you feeling about this? Will we ever emerge to some new way of living in your opinion?

 It’s been a roller coaster. It’s been a challenging time for me anyway. My mother got very sick and passed away a few weeks ago. It’s been a weird challenging time.  In spite of what I do, I’m not generally a big social person. When we found out that we would have to stay home and not leave our houses, part of me just cheered as if I’ve been training for this my entire life. 

Those moments of panic, those moments of real sadness, those moments of real loneliness. I have a family I live with. There are four of us in the house and I’ve good friends who I connect with, but it has been challenging.

Define ‘soon’ regarding the second part to your question if we will emerge to some new way of living.  Eight months is an incredibly long time. I remember when the announcement about the lockdown from the Premier that this might be awhile. People were thinking a few months, but I was thinking we can’t do this and here we are eight months later.  We will emerge. There’s no question about that as cultures and societies have emerged from anything the universe has ever thrown at us.  Is that gonna happen soon?  I don’t know. If you asked me six months, I would have said yes, soon.

And I would have been wrong. I have a friend who swears that theatre will not come back for another 12 years.  And I don’t know where those numbers are coming from. I thought we would have been done by the summer, and that didn’t happen.

I’m trying to get through tomorrow.

How has your immediate family been doing during these last eight months?

My immediate family is doing okay. I’ve got two daughters, one is eighteen. This was to be her year off. She had great plans and she has stayed home.  My thirteen-year-old is at school and that’s been challenging. She’s heavily and deeply social as a person. I think my 13-year-old has felt it more than most of us have.

As an artist within the performing arts community, what has been the most difficult and challenging for you professionally and personally?

Personally, I don’t perform much. I have performed on stage, but it’s something that I don’t focus on.  It was a few years after I graduated that my heart and soul were behind a pen and not behind a footlight. But I miss the gathering.

As a writer there is so much of that which is solitary already. My work as a teacher at the colleges has been horrible. It’s going well, but the online classes have been challenging. I’m not technical and the learning curve has been overwhelming and incredibly time consuming. My commute is wonderful as the traffic is great from one room to the next but sometimes objects get in the way.

I miss people and I do not describe myself as an overly social person. I miss theatre. I miss knowing that theatre is going on.

My professional teaching has been deeply impacted. Students are awesome and this generation is so computer savvy and connecting online anyway, but I miss interaction with students in a room. But my writing life has been kind of awesome, some really cool stuff going on there.

Were you in preparation, rehearsals, or any planning stages of productions before everything was shut down?  What has become of those projects?  Will they see the light of day anytime soon?

I was, but the beauty of writing is that I can have a cast of ten and know none of them has the coronavirus.  At this point they’re all still in my head. When it became clear that this was not going to be over in a few months, I settled down and resigned myself to this fact and wanted to know how this was all going to work.

I suddenly had a lot more time on my hands but no motivation. I’m not writing for a particular date when a production is to open. Getting that impetus to keep moving is important.  What I’m writing now is the biggest piece that I’ve ever worked on which is strange in a time of isolation that I’ve the most populous cast for a play, ever. The show is called ‘Bigger’: A Giant, A Beanstalk, a Thief, A Murder and Some Sex. Don’t Bring the Kids.

These stories that we are retelling have survived worse things than this. They’ve survived holocausts and plagues, far more dangerous than what we are experiencing now.

What have you been doing to keep yourself busy during this time?

There hasn’t really been time for Rob until recently, I’m very grateful to have my teaching work but as a household our income has dropped considerably through Covid. Financially, things have been challenging so I’ve been taking on extra work because I’m able to do so. I teach English online to kids in China.

I’m also teaching at two colleges.

I’ve been ridiculously busy and it’s only been in the last three or four weeks, actually before my mother got really sick where I realized I needed to cut myself some slack. Everyone I know is so worried because they have no work or they’re so overwhelmed because they have so much extra work to do. I’ve received a bit of extra money from the colleges to get things online but it hasn’t really been compensated for the hours. Fair enough because the colleges have been bleeding money.

It’s been an interesting journey the last month to pull back and say, “I will work only this many hours”, and make those clear and distinctive breaks.  I’ve defined my work hours even though I’m at home, but I’ve had to do it in no other way like I’ve had to before.

I’ve also binged watch a show called ‘The Good Place’ which is four seasons and saw all of it in a week and a half.

Any words of wisdom or advice you might /could give to fellow performers and colleagues?  What message would you deliver to recent theatre school graduates who have now been set free into this unknown and uncertainty given the fact live theaters and studios might be closed for 1 ½ - 2 years?

My heart breaks for the whole community and all the communities.  Nothing specific, but I think we need to remind ourselves that we’re doing okay.  If we’re still here and we’re still showing up in the middle of this chaos, we’re doing okay.  We are.

Hang in there. I talked to recent graduates and shared with them that it’s never been a smart choice to get into the arts. It’s never been a smart choice. It’s ludicrous.

Yes, I’m doing well but it’s because I also have my teaching and it’s awesome and I love it. I’m not making a living from the art I create.

People are discovering ways to create art that are incredibly creative. My friend, Chris, has created a one man show that can be played in courtyards and backyards.  Wow! This is creative stuff.

I’d also tell people that in times of adversity we see people who are trying to get through. And the best things they discover continue with challenging stuff. The Renaissance showed up just after the Plague. The greatest surges of art ever also came out of trying circumstances.

Do you see anything positive stemming from Covid 19?

I do.  As a culture we are really re-evaluating what we thought was important. People are going back to basics – the post apocalyptic films and movies. We’re not in a post apocalyptic time, but we are in a very weird and challenging world now. People are looting the world, they’re re-discovering baking and knitting.

I knit and I needed some new supplies, so I went down and there was a line up right outside The Knit Shop. What?????  What is happening? People are re-discovering. As cliched as this sounds, people are re-discovering family, they’re re-realizing how much they miss community and gathering. We’ve spent decades cocooning further and further into our homes by choice.

New forms of connection are coming out and that’s really cool. People are using the internet and social media in creative ways that nobody thought about. A year ago, it would have been unheard of to wonder about these amazing things that are coming out.

I think we’re really going to see some brilliant show up once we get out of this.

Do you think Covid 19 will have some lasting impact on the Toronto/Canadian/North American performing arts scene?

The ‘when’ is a medical question. I’ve no fricking clue and I don’t pretend to know. In terms of what’s going to happen, the horror stories I’m hearing don’t exist.

The Globe in England may be closing. Okay, what does that mean? It means the financial institution involved is experiencing difficulties but that doesn’t mean the actors are leaving anytime.  Things will all get re-grouped again. IT HAS TO.

We’re going to see a big resurgence in small and mid size theatres. The Stratford, Broadways, West Ends will see a revival as people are desperate to get back. I know artists are desperate to get back as well as audiences are desperate to re-engage.  The smaller theatres are going to make more theatre just as there is the making of more bread when needed.

That need to make something doesn’t go away. It never has. There is nothing that is thrown at humanity that the world has never been able to get rid of that.

Some artists have turned to You Tube and online streaming to showcase their work. What are your comments and thoughts about streaming? Is this something that the actor/theatre may have to utilize going forward into the unknown?

I think this addresses a bigger issue with the actor unions. Union members are going to have to figure out how to make the unions serve the members in this new real world. This is all going to have to be re-thought with a new relationship.

Despite all this fraught tension and confusion of this time, what is it about the art of performance that Covid will never destroy for you?

We are creators. And I don’t mean artists. People are creators. Accountants are going back to knitting and baking because in times of stress we don’t go to our violent sides, we’re discovering that. I’m not undercutting depression and really serious issues people are dealing with.

But the ‘go to’ in our culture are the baking and the knitting, gardening and home renovations that when we get stressed as humans we need to create.  I think we are going to realize above everything else that when the Greeks made the god of healing also the god of theatre, they knew what they’re doing. The Greeks got it. Things were stressful enough for them.

We go to creating stuff. It’s healing and Covid will never take that away or destroy that for me.

Rob Corbett’s headshot by Tracey Nolan.