Steven Sater is an American poet, playwright, lyricist, television writer and screenwriter. Him and Duncan Sheik worked together on Spring Awakening, a musical interpretation of German playwright Frank Wedekind's play of the same name. In 2007, Sater won two Tony Awards for his work on Spring Awakening. He won the Tony for Best Book and Best Musical Score, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Lyrics, and the Outer Critic Circle Award for Best Lyrics. The pair received the 2007 Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album and, in addition, The Dramatists Guild Hull-Warriner Award, the Outer Critics Circle Award, the Drama Desk, the Lucille Lortel, New York Drama Critics' Circle, the Drama League Award, and the 2008 London Critics' Circle and Laurence Olivier Awards for Best Musical.
Just wait until you hear some of the poetic truth bombs he drops about writing for the theater, about Spring and about living life in general. His story could be a musical itself, with the number of dragons he slayed in order to get where he is today. And we talk about everything, including:
- Publishing his first novel . . . at age five.
- How he turned an almost fatal accident into an opportunity to master ancient Greek.
- Why he prefers writing lyrics and book, rather than just the book . . . and why.
- Why he writes on yellow pads with a pencil rather than on a computer.
- Where he got the idea for Spring Awakening in the first place and what he thought when the curtain went up on the very first production.
Keep up with me: @KenDavenportBway