Harrison Lewis and Emielyn Das

HARRISON: My parents met playing in bands together, so music was apart of my life for as long as I can remember. I always loved singing and playing instruments, but because I was extremely shy, I was at first reluctant to try theatre. Eventually family gave me a push, and in 5th grade I played Horton in a kids production of Seussical! I fell in love with playing pretend, and the rest is history!

EMIELYN: I discovered theater in middle school/early high school when I got to be a part of the world premiere of Mira Nair's Monsoon Wedding at Berkeley Repertory Theater. Watching a new musical take form with an all South Asian cast was truly revolutionary for me - I fell in love with performing such an important story and being a part of something so original. After that experience, I had officially caught the bug and was obsessed with all things theater.

HARRISON: After my freshman year of high school, I spent the summer in New York while my sister was acting in a new musical coming to Broadway. During that time, I watched a lot of different shows and developed an eye for what I thought was working emotionally and theatrically. I was deeply inspired by the writers of that show, Chris Miller and Nathan Tysen, and in getting to know them and seeing the production process play out, I began to see myself in that role. That next year in music theory, I began to compose for the first time, combining my experiences as an actor and musician to tell new stories!

EMIELYN: As I began to pursue my dreams of being a performer, I realized there weren't a ton of roles that I felt like I could see myself in and being excited to play. We desperately needed (and still do) more complex characters of color in our canon, so one day in undergrad, during a lecture I just couldn't bring myself to pay attention to (sorry Electrical Rhythms of the Brain!), I decided to start writing one. Despite having no prior experience in musical theater writing, I applied to BerkleeNYC's Writing & Production for Musical Theater Program, somehow got in, and Harrison & I began writing Seven Steps Around the Fire as our masters' thesis! I always knew that I would be a writer of some sort, but musical theater writing has become a love I didn't totally see coming!

HARRISON: My work tends to land somewhere at the intersection of culture, family, environmentalism, and/or queerness, with the aim of uncovering hidden truths about the human condition and speaking to the present moment. I have written in a variety of styles, including folk, pop, & jazz as well as contemporary musical theatre, but what unifies it all is a passion for getting to the core of every feeling and every moment and presenting that in the most innovative, engaging, and theatrical way imaginable.

EMIELYN: It's so hard to say. I'm inspired by so many things and am constantly pulled in opposing directions creatively, which I love! Conceptually, I tend to be drawn to things that stem from personal experience or my identity -- themes of family, queerness, coming-of-age, language and the art of translation (as a native Bengali & Assamese speaker), perception & consciousness, and religion. Sonically, I most naturally create in styles of pop, R&B, musical theater, and Indian classical. The thread that ties all my work together is the quest for understanding the human condition in all its contradictions & complexities.

HARRISON: To me, the entire process of creating is my way of enacting the change I want to see in the world. Whether that is holding a mirror to someone who hasn’t seen themselves reflected on stage, changing a heart or a mind, or simply creating a moment of joy where there wouldn’t otherwise be one — seeing that impact in real time on audiences has been the most rewarding part. It’s a thrill to tap in to the flow of energy that comes when I am doing my best work, and then to see that energy continue to flow into the hearts of the audience.

EMIELYN: When I create the thing that I so desperately needed to hear when I was younger!