NEW YORK, N.Y. () — Growing up in South Carolina, Abby Rosebrock never imagined how her early years would shape her career as a dramatist.
“When I began crafting plays, I initially focused on stories that felt closely tied to my own experiences. I tried writing about actors in Brooklyn, but I quickly realized that the region I truly understand, despite not living there for 20 years, is undeniably the Southeast.”
Now residing in New York with several theatrical works to her credit, she frequently draws inspiration from her Southern upbringing. One of her early works, “Blue Ridge,” is based in a halfway house in the Appalachian Mountains. The dialogue, while sharp and straightforward, is crafted to capture the relaxed Southern speech. Nevertheless, Rosebrock’s characters, particularly the women, defy simple Southern stereotypes.
Rosebrock is an actor as well as a writer. When she began writing plays, she discovered her female characters were often forces to be reckoned with. “That’s how I started. I really just wanted better material to perform in scene study classes. Dialog just sort of comes naturally to me. It’s sort of how I make sense of the world. I come from a family of very talkative women so I’m sort of obsessed with human speech and the poetry of the way people talk to each other day to day.”
Rosebrock has a fondness for her male characters as well. “I’d like to think my male characters, especially in more recent years, are a little more rounded than maybe they used to be. Theater is where human beings can sort of work out their demons and in community with other human beings. And that’s what’s fun and exciting about it.”
The visceral response theater gives an audience is important to her too. “I think we spend most of our days hiding from each other, especially in workplace settings. Americans work way too much and expect way too much of themselves in service of terrible corporations. And in order to fit into that structure, we’re just constantly suppressing what’s truest and most authentic about our experiences. With live theater, when you throw hundreds of people into a room to watch other human beings behaving authentically, people are sort of reminded of what life could be like if we weren’t so enslaved to the systems that run most of our lives.”
Rosebrock’s newest play, “Lowcountry,” will make its world premiere in New York this month. It centers around an out-of-work actress who returns to her rural hometown and makes a tenuous connection with a disgraced high school teacher. It shines a light on how people connect in the digital age. “I wrote it after the pandemic, after I’d spent a really long time, more or less alone in my apartment. But I think I was coming out of a time that felt very sterile and hopeless and devoid of resources.”
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Rehearsals for Abby Rosebrock’s new play, Lowcountry. -
Photo gallery: rehearsals for Abby Rosebrock’s newest play, Lowcountry, at The Atlantic Theater in New York.
“A really great thing about working on a brand-new play that’s never been performed before is it’s extremely collaborative. So your words are being shaped not just by your own instincts, but by actors who are telling you, ‘I don’t feel truthful when I’m saying this line’ or ‘I feel like my character might be dealing with this other thing that’s not even being acknowledged right now.’ And then you have a director who’s guiding that entire process and sort of moderating conversations, not just with actors, but with the designers too. So it just feels like the most exciting thing in the world to have world-class actors weighing in on your script as it’s sort of taking its initial shape.”
“Lowcountry” is Rosebrock’s second work that has debuted at The Atlantic Theater Company. Founded by an ensemble of artists in 1965, it is known for fostering upcoming talent both on the stage and behind the scenes. “It’s a dream. It’s definitely my artistic home and I feel totally overcome with emotion every time I come here to work because the energy is so special. The artistic director of the Atlantic has really believed in me and championed my work for several years now, and the first play I did here, “Blue Ridge,” was just a wonderful experience from start to finish. It happened right after Covid and I wondered, ‘Will I ever experience something that great again?'” She says The Atlantic is a space to experiment, “to have bad ideas and to try your wildest visions to see if they work and get eyes on it from some of the best people in the business.”
“Lowcountry,” Abby Rosebrock’s latest work, premieres at The Atlantic Theater in New York on June 5. It runs through July 13. Get your tickets here.
