Video: How to Spend a Theatre-Filled Day at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts

Welcome to Backstage with Richard Ridge

I am once again at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts

to introduce you to their new executive director. Please welcome, Roberta Pereira

Well, first of all, I'm thrilled to be sitting with you here in your brand new office here

I'm excited. Thank you so much for coming to visit us today. Okay, congratulations

and being the new executive director. How exciting is this? It is literally a dream come true

I'm a lifelong library fan and a lifelong performing arts fan. So to find a job that brings the two together

is wonderful. Because I would say this has to be the dream job

with the kind of career you had beforehand. Yeah, it really is

As I said, when I read this job description, when they were looking for the position

I looked at it and I texted a friend and I said, Did somebody write a job for me

Because this is it. This is it. And so, yeah, it felt very from the moment

I saw that. It felt like the right time and it felt like the right fit

Yeah. So I was to ask you, how did it all come about? They were doing the search for this position

And I at the time was executive director of the playwrights realm, which is an off-Broadway theater company and artist service organization here in New York

And I had been there for about eight years. So I was already thinking, I was very, very

happy at the realm, but I was thinking about what was next. What was the next step? And this job

description landed on my desk. And as I read it, I said, somebody wrote a job for me

And let's go through this process. And so it was a very long process. It was a four-month

search process, you know, through New York Public Library, interviews with a lot of the stakeholders

during the whole time. And then finally in October, I was announced as a new executive director

but I actually started only about a month ago. A lot of people don't know that

but I only started mid-January. So I've actually been doing this job for about five weeks now

It's got to be really exciting, just to throw yourself into the whole thing, right

It is because for so long, during the whole interview process, and then, you know, afterwards during the transition

I've been imagining it, right? I started a Google Doc that's like a Library for the Performing Arts ideas

and it's just have all these ideas. And now to be here and actually start seeing those things come to life

and learning more about the process, it is also my first time working at a library, right

And so although I have been an avid fan of libraries and have used New York Public Library for many years

this is the first time that I'm seeing all the rest of it, like how it really works, right

And also, we are also a museum, right? exhibitions as well. So also learning that part of it, which is very different from putting on

productions, which is what I've done for the past 15 years. So what's also been amazing, it's the

learning opportunities in this. And I love learning. So sometimes I'll just sit in meetings and I was

like, tell me more. How does this work? Right? And so getting that, the learning opportunities

with bringing all of my background that I have in publishing, in theater, in public

programming and bringing all of that here, it's been the perfect marriage

You know, researching your career, something you've always strive for is accessibility. And that's something the library has always

offered, right? Talk about accessibility. Yeah. So that was one of the things that

really attracted me about this job because one of the core principles of the

library is that the library is for all and that's accessible for all. So

looking at the library for the performing arts, we have these world-class exhibitions, all free. We have this, we have this

this incredible programming every day, sometimes more than one program in the day

Everything is free as well. And then you have our incredible research and archive collection

which anybody can access. All you need is a library card and you can make a reservation

You can go see a film at Toft, you know, which is the archive of a lot of like the

Broadway off-Broadway shows from a long time. Or you can also see a lot of the things we have in our

archive that will be pulled for you. And so for, for, For me, that was really exciting

That's a level of access that is exciting to me. And as a Latin ex-theater practitioner and as an immigrant as well, having that accessibility

was really important. Okay, speaking about this is the first time a Latino person has held this position, what

that means to personally and professionally? Well I think that that is one of the exciting things as well because I think that my lived the experience that I bring to the table will make the experience of the library richer right And so we doing a lot of exciting programs around that as well

Monday, for example, we have a Latinx spring preview for theater and we're partnering with some local theaters here in New York

Latinx theaters. There's some other projects that we're in the starting stages of planning as well

Because what's exciting about theater, actually all of the performing arts, what's exciting about the performing arts is that it's better when more people can participate

So for me, it's like how can we open that door, right? How can we reduce those barriers, whatever they are, and open the door so more people can participate in the performing arts

And this is what has been one of my core values as a performing arts practitioner

And this is a perfect marriage with what the library for the performing arts is about. Let's talk about the vast collection here

I mean, is it like 8 million items or something of that number

It's an incredible number, as you know, as a user of our collection. Yes

And what's great about is that there's a lot of different ways you can access it. So there's a lot of things that are digitized

You can go from home. You can find these incredible prints that you can download

You can even get a print, you know, sent to your home if you wanted to

And so there's a lot of that. Then they're obviously like special collection items

that you have to access in the building. But once again, you can make an appointment

You come to our third floor. A librarian will sit with you

will help you sort through it, and everything. You know, we have films, we have clippings

we have photographs, we have digital, and so there's a little bit of everything

See, I was telling you before we started, I loved the clippings. Those incredible folders for all of you watching

who spent many, many times here researching, you would find the things two or three folders on these shows or stars and you'd lay it all out and you'd find all

these little treasures in there but even the creators forgot about you know so i just it's magical the

third floor here right every floor here is magical but the third floor is those magic doors you walk into

the the billy rose collection everything else now i learned from you earlier there's all magic here

speaking of magic yeah i mean i didn't even know that i thought i'd do everything here yeah and so this is

what's exciting every day is is is a new, I learned something new, right

And so for example, as you mentioned, part of our theater collection

we actually have quite a robust magic collection, and that includes letters, pamphlets

we have Houdini letters, I found out. And so some very exciting, we also have a lot of things on circus

And so all of these things are being discovered, and we're digitizing more and more every day

So it's also more has become available to the greatest number of people, which is our goal

See, I like that because now people can go on their iPhone or their computer or a tablet

and just type in the New York Public Library or the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Yeah

And all these beautiful digitized, is that the word? Yeah. Digitized. Digitized

Digitized. Photographs and all these incredible collections. You can just view at home and study

You've made it even more accessible now than just having to come in. You can do it at home

Absolutely. And there will be more and more of this as well. I think that, you know, the years that we have with COVID, it showed that

I think accessibility is, as I said, you have to think about all the barriers, right

So like price can be a barrier. Okay, we'll do everything for free

But also the ability to come here. You might physically not live in New York, right

You might not be able to come. Or you might also have a disability or something that makes it hard for you to leave your home

And so we want to try to think of different ways that we can make these things accessible

And it's something we're thinking also with our live programming and how, you know

and we already, we record a lot of things and make it available online as well

but we're thinking about doing more streaming and things like that. So, like, we're always thinking, like, what's next

How we can make it even more accessible to people. Yeah. And I'd love you just said earlier that all anybody really needs is a library card to come here

That's all you do, and you can get that very easy. Yes, and you don't need to be. In fact, you can get it here if you go to a circulating desk

We are also a circulating library, which a lot of people don't know, which means we have books that can be checked out

A lot of our books are based on the performing arts, of course

And so when you walk in through the Lincoln Center Plaza, that's our circulating desk

Our circulating staff is lovely, and they can help you get a library card

And with a library card, you can access the research collection as well online

Their instructions there you can email somebody here to make an appointment And it very easy We make it very easy Okay I want to go back to Playwright Realm which was the company that you worked for eight and a half years at by the time you left I love what you did with that company

When I was reading all about it, I was like, boy, you took this to someplace

Accessibility, what, you know, for caregiving. Talk about what you wanted to achieve when you were there and what you did

Yeah, I mean, as I said, it all connects, right? It's the same thing that I want to bring here as well

I just thought that the company had such great services, and I wanted more people to be able to use them, right

And so together with Catherine Covner, who's our founding artistic director, we really worked in a really close partnership

And once again, we looked at every single piece and we're like, this is a barrier

How can we make this easier, right? So you mentioned the caretaking. So we did this big project called the Radical Parent Inclusion Project

And the idea is that it is very hard to work in the performing arts

and be a caretaker, right? Either of a child or of a grown

it could be a parent or another adult in your family. And I know that very well as a solo mom of a six-year-old

And so, you know, so things, for example, to go to an audition cost money for somebody who's a caretaker

because they literally have to pay somebody to stay with their child or other dependent

while they go to this audition. So we really looked at ways we could, you know

reduce those barriers. We worked with PAL, Parents, Artists Advocacy League and Broadway

babysitters to do one of the first, even pre-pendemic, a child care matinee. So it meant that

we had a matinee of the show. And then in the same building, there was a child care room

It was free for parents. So you just had to sign up. And now we've been seeing more and more

of those popping up with a lot of other partners. We've seen them on Broadway. We've seen them off

Broadway too. And I think that that's the way forward and also giving stipends to artists who have

child care responsibilities. So really thinking once again about those barriers, right? And so with the

playwrights around, we were really focused on early career playwrights, right? And the idea was that we

wanted to jumpstart their career. And we have some amazing examples. We worked on The Play the Wolves

with Sarah DeLap, which was a huge hit, of course, and Sarah

when she started with us, she had never had a play produced, and by the time, you know, at the end of her time with us

she was a Pulitzer Prize finalist. So that's kind of what we were about

We were really looking at those artists and seeing what kind of help they need

but not just artistic help, right? It was also about the human help

So, like, we provided things like health insurance to artists. We provided them an office space

so they could have a professional space to have meetings. We provided them with their favorite snacks

because sometimes it's nice to have your favorite snacks in your office. So we really looked at all our writers, all our artists holistically, and we saw how we

could help them fully. I just love how she went from never having a play done when she started with you

to becoming a Pulitzer Prize finalist. That was a journey, and now this play's produced everywhere

People come up to me all the time and say, I did The Wolves because, you know, my name's still in

the program as being one of the originating producers. And so people come up to me all the time and talk

about this. That is great. You're also in 20, 2017, you co-founded the artist anti-racist coalition

Tell me about that organization. Yeah, so this was a grassroots organization

and it was the idea of starting to discuss anti-racist principles within specifically like the theater

the off-Broadway theater community. So it was a group of us that started, it was four of us

and then we brought a lot of colleagues together, and this is both black indigenous people of color

and white colleagues as well, white allies, and sort of learning together

And so we did some trainings. We had some specific trainings that we did

But it was also just about what kind of advocacy we could find we could do within ourselves

and within our groups. And very exciting, like for many years, like this group was still meeting

and there's still a lot of projects that are happening today that came from that

So I also very much believe in grassroots organizing. And I think sometimes, you know

when people are seeing a lot of adversity, is easy to say, well, I don't have any power. I can't do anything to change it. But I believe that we all have power

to change things. So we have to look at where we sit. We have to look at all the levers we can

pull to produce change. And it doesn't need to be the entire thing. You don't need to change the whole

system, but maybe you can change a piece of it. Right. So for me, I believe in that. I believe that we are

all change makers and we have to take that on Beautiful I glad you did that Going back to you know with the state and city budgets being cut one of the first things is always gets cuts are the arts and libraries So how do you deal with all of that and how can

people who come here want to donate? Yeah. How can they help the library? Absolutely. Thank you for

asking that. Yeah, that is very tough because, you know, I am used to it from the arts world

Because as you said, like the arts is one of the first big cuts, but then also with the libraries

I feel like a lot of times the libraries are almost used as a pawn, right

And they're cut because people know there will be an outcry and then they can be reversed and they can use that and cut other things

So there's all of these political things. But at the end of the day, they're real people that are not having these services that they need

Right. And in terms of like how people can help, first of all, there's a lot of advocacy that's done around, you know

if you don't follow New York Public Library and a lot of social media and also the Library for the Performer

There's a lot of things that we will share in terms of actions, things that people can sign and all of that

But also, donations help immensely. And we have a great program called Friends of the Library for the Performing Arts

And it's basically you will donate to become a member of this kind of society of our closest friends

And what's great about that is that this goes directly to the Library of the Performing Arts, so it helps us continuing doing our programs

But also, we have some very exciting things. that we are planning for our members

So since I started here, I'm very interested because in a way, these are our closest supporters, right

And a lot of the members are even volunteers with the library. They interact with us in many ways

So we are planning a lot of very exciting things that I can't talk about yet

But if you join and you become a member of the Library for the Performing Arts

a friend of the Library for the Performing Arts, you will be invited to these special things

that we are cooking up. I love that. Yeah. What is one of your biggest goals now

that you're at the library for the performing arts? Well, my staff will laugh at this

because I talk about this all the time. So pre-pendemic, we used to have a cafe upstairs

and it has closed and we've had trouble bringing it back. But my biggest goal for my first year

is to bring back the cafe because food and coffee brings people together

And this is an area that is, that is very expensive. So to have a place where you can grab a coffee

you can sit down, you can bring your laptop, you know, like I look at library as community spaces, right

So I look at libraries as places that are active, that are vibrant. And so I think that this, as silly as it sounds

you know, it's not just about the cafe, I think the cafe means something

Like I want to activate the space in a different way. So this is the first part of it

I love that. Yeah. So there are some very exciting theater exhibits coming up here

Tell us about some of them. Absolutely. So what a lot of people don't know is that we actually have the archives

for some of the main photographers that photographed Broadway for a very long time

So we're actually having two exciting theater exhibits this spring. And one of them, we are actually showing a lot of the Friedman-Abel's pictures

that photographed everything from West Side Story to Bye By Birdie. We also have some surprises

the way we're showing these pictures, so you have to come up and check it in person

And then the other very exciting exhibition we have is an exhibition of images from Joan Marcus and Carol Roseg

who, as you know, are two of the great photographers of Broadway as well

And they never have an exhibition just really highlighting their work. So we're showing a lot of, like, some key moments from their career

their long careers. And then we are also showing there's some videos

highlighting other things. So they're very exciting exhibitions that we have here this spring

You can come and see both of them in one day. So I really encourage it for a must-see for any theater fan

I just love that there's always something going on here. There's always a program and people can just go online

and see what's happening here, right? Absolutely. And what I would encourage is like

if you really want to make a day of it, you know, come see one of the exhibitions, go to the third floor

check out something up there, and then maybe see a program at our Bruno Walter

our auditorium. You know, you could spend literally the whole day here and not pay anything

which is something very rare in New York. It's all free. It's all free. All it takes is a library

card. All it takes is a library card, which you can sign up for it right here as well

Well, I want to thank you for sitting with me today at Broadway World. And for everybody watching

come here, discover the treasures that you will find only here at the New York Public Library

for the Performing Arts. Thank you. Thank you