From planning performances that will never be seen again to building partnerships that will last, Emily Comisar is getting ready to create something new at Oklahoma City Repertory Theater.
The native Texan has been named the executive artistic director of the award-winning regional theater, following the recent announcement that Artistic Director Kelly Kerwin is stepping down after three seasons.
“We are fortunate to have Emily take this leadership role," said Oklahoma City Repertory Theater Board President Clifford Hudson in a statement. “She is a very capable executive with lots of creative talent and has been a pleasure to work with since she joined OKC Rep.”
Comisar will step into a new position that combines her current job of managing director with the role of artistic director.
"Since I finished my MFA in theater management and producing, my day job has been in the fundraising and business operations of nonprofit arts organizations. But in my personal life, I have been doing a lot of artistic work. I've been a playwright for a very long time. I was doing a lot of independent producing, working with friends and colleagues who are writers developing their plays," Comisar told The Oklahoman.
"It is very rare for someone who spends their daytime doing things like fundraising and financial management to even have the opportunity to move into a position that is considered an artistic one. And I'm really excited to be able to combine what have been very different aspects of my life into one job."
How will Oklahoma City Repertory Theater handle its leadership transition?
In May, Kerwin announced her plans to leave OKC Rep to be closer to family in New York. Selected through a nationwide search, she came on as just the second artistic director in Oklahoma City Repertory Theater's 25-year history.
Originally from Springfield, Missouri, Kerwin started at OKC Rep in summer 2021. She moved to Oklahoma City from New York City after working as a producer at The Public Theater and the Under the Radar Festival.
She ushered the OKC nonprofit professional theater through a time of great transition: She succeeded Founding Artistic Director Donald Jordan, who announced his retirement in fall 2020, and guided OKC Rep out of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Under Kerwin's tenure, OKC Rep has produced 13 shows, including works by acclaimed multidisciplinary artists like Roger Guenvuer Smith, Inua Ellams and . Under her leadership, the theater also produced six original productions of contemporary plays, including the regional premieres of "The Great Leap," "The Brothers Size" and the 2023-2024 season finale "Vietgone."
After Kerwin's exit from OKC Rep at the end of June, Comisar will take up her new role in July.
"It was a privilege to work alongside Emily these past two years. She was an insightful ... partner during my time as artistic director, and she deeply believes in OKC Rep’s mission, vision and values," Kerwin said in a statement.
"I have no doubt that she will step into this newly formed role with her signature fervor and fearlessness. I am heartened to leave OKC Rep knowing the theater is in great hands!"
Who is Emily Comisar, the new executive artistic director of OKC Rep?
Hailing from Dallas, Comisar earned her bachelor of arts in performance studies at Northwestern University near Chicago. She finished her master's degree in Italian language and media at Middlebury College in Vermont "basically days before the market crash of 2008."
"Then, the Great Recession started, and no one in the arts was hiring. So, I have taken a little bit of a roundabout path to where I am now. I ended up working in the Jewish communal service sector for many years before getting my MFA and getting back into the theater," said Comisar, who is Jewish.
She earned her master of fine arts from Columbia University in New York.
After 12 years in NYC, Comisar relocted to OKC in 2020 with her partner, David Pilchman, who was born and raised in Oklahoma. Pilchman initially returned to the Sooner State to take a job with Oklahoma Contemporary Arts Center, but he now is OKC Rep's production manager.
Comisar initially joined the OKC Rep staff in 2022 as development director. She was appointed managing director in July 2023. She's also on the faculty for the University of Oklahoma Online MA in Arts Management program.
What's next for OKC Repertory Theater with its new director?
Ahead of taking over the role of executive artistic director, Comisar spoke with The Oklahoman about her hopes and plans for OKC Rep, which already has revealed the shows for its 2024-2025 season that will start in fall.
Q: Were you part of determining the lineup for the upcoming season?
Yes, the artistic vision of everything that we did this year was definitely driven by Kelly. But a lot of the show selections were made in conversation between her and myself. ... But that is more reflective of our partnership as artistic director and managing director than it is reflective of there being a passing of the baton.
Q: How will your job at OKC Rep change with this new position?
It's really going to meld a lot of the things that Kelly and I were doing together, but apart, over the past year. I'm still going to have some business oversight of the company, even as I will be moving into more making artistic decisions, hiring artists, working more closely on the artistic side of production.
Q: How are you preparing for this change?
Kelly and I have been having lots of conversations about what this will look like and what her job has entailed over the last few years, just to make sure that the standards that we have set continue to be the standards that we uphold.
We're going to be hiring a general manager very soon. And the plan is to bring our production manager on full time year round, so that there will be some senior level staff working with me.
Q: How do you feel like your previous experiences have prepared you to take on this dual role?
As someone who's kind of equal parts left-brained and right-brained, the artistic and creative stuff lights my brain up just as much as Excel spreadsheets light my brain up. I think that has put me in a unique position throughout my life and throughout my career. ... I am really excited for the opportunity to bring those two sides together.
Q: What are some of your goals for the theater?
We've done a lot of growing in the last couple of years, and the community has really come along with us. ... The role that OKC Rep has to play in the community is a really exciting, really interesting one. I think that the group of people who have come to be a part of this company — as artists, as regulars in the audience, people who are on the board, people who are donors — are just really excited, I think, for something new, to have arts experiences that are full experiences. They're not just about coming to the theater and sitting in a dark room silently together. They're about really coming together as a community.
And I think the more that we realized that, the more we've been able to lean into it and create things like Rep Rallies, for example, that started this season. ... We described them as a pre-show ritual, and what happens is, before every single performance, we bring in a local artist. ... Some of them are singers, some of them are dancers, we've had poets, we've had folks who do fight choreography, we've had drag artists, we've had all kinds of people.
And the purpose is really twofold: The first one is to showcase some local talents, and the second one is to give people an experience that they'll never get again. So, it usually happens in the two minutes before the doors open to the theater right before showtime when everyone is up in the lobby spaces created on the third floor of Oklahoma Contemporary. ...
All four of our shows next season will be produced in association with Oklahoma Contemporary in their Te Ata Theater, and that has been a really, really productive and fruitful relationship. ... But I will say that I am interested and hopeful that we'll be able to do a lot more partnering, in general, with other organizations in the community.
This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Longtime OKC theater's new director relishes creating unique experiences
