- When did you first discover theater/what was your first experience?
SHEELA: My 6th grade class did a musical revue featuring songs from Hair and Tommy. ALLISON: I was the Narrator of MacBeth in our third grade version of the play. I wanted to be Lady MacBeth but Maggie Cantor got the part.
- When/how did you become a writer? Is there a writer, show, or text that particularly inspired you?
SHEELA: I started composing as a child, but only as an adult--after toggling lives as a classical musician and anti-child-trafficking lawyer--did I start to think I might actually have something to say. ALLISON: I had been a poet since childhood, but seeing Vagina Monologues in 2001 rocked my world and made me want to write plays.
- How do you describe your style/work?
SHEELA: I aspire to create music that encompasses stories, sounds, and people that have been silenced or siloed by society, and that challenges expectations about who “belongs” in what kinds of music. ALLISON: My background is in poetry, so...language? And a passionate relationship with feminism.
- What is most rewarding to you about writing music?
SHEELA: Noodling at the piano is fun, but what I really love is hearing performers interpret what I've written and surprise me in their performances with something more interesting than I realized was there. ALLISON: I don't write music; I revere people who can do that.