SOURCE: An interview with Emily Mann, in Interviews with Contemporary Women Playwrights, by Kathleen Betsko and Rachel Koenig, Beech Tree Books, 1987, pp. 274-87.

In the following conversation with Betsko and Koenig, Mann discusses her use of interviews and transcripts in the creation of Still Life, Execution of Justice, and Annulla Allen.

[Betsko and Koenig]: You often utilize performance elements in your plays: recorded dialogue, repetitions, slides.

[Mann]: I'm fascinated with live performance aspects of theater. It enables you to add another layer of perception to what you are presenting and gives you alternative ways to tell your story. You can stylize without being linear, without the traditional rising and falling action, where you watch one protagonist. The play can then be seen from different angles simultaneously. I did use some performance elements in the writing of Execution of Justice [which premiered at the Eureka Theatre in 1982], and I...