Meet Natalie Scarlett | Writer & Director for Theater, Film, and Immersive Performance

We had the good fortune of connecting with Natalie Scarlett and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Natalie, can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.

I love making experiences, the more transporting the better. I mostly work in live performance and film now. I think of myself as a cipher decoding, recoding, deciphering, and translating from one medium of expression to another. I like to run the light of my ideas through several lens and colored gels to see something greater than the sum of its parts. Using my literary background and writing skills, I like to create a story or collection of themes that the rest of the performance connects to. 

Sometimes I start with a landmark, a historical site, a word, or a metaphor and extrapolate from there. I have written for all kinds of places, events, and audiences. I create weddings and custom performance pieces that express some of the deepest human feelings, but I also love to make absurdist clowney pieces and write for short animation. I have directed immersive dance pieces that happen in fields and forests, but I’ve also directed a highly technical multidimensional play produced in a 360 digital dome with original animation and score. I love Shakespeare reimagined but I also love documentary-style writing about personal experiences like pregnancy, birth, and other transformations. I love the poetry of the body and using physical gestures to express poetic ideas.

But I have never met a medium I didn’t like or want to try although my favorite is writing and directing for stage, screen, and any space where an audience and performers meet. Because I love interrogating the why of big ideas and big feelings, I’m particularly excited to do more weddings where I get to involve the couple in co-creating a set of performance pieces that tell their story through a driving metaphor for their love. I dream of one day running a workshop for writers, kind of like Sundance, where scripts are read and performed by actors so the writers can improve and showcase their work. 

I think what sets me apart from some others who fit in one of my many categories is that I embrace the gray areas between disciplines, I want to try everything, and I invite collaboration where other directors might be more committed to their singular vision. I also have the gumption to self-produce much of my work, which is no easy feat. Having the experience of doing all aspects of a performance from the ground up is truly a labor of love. I don’t sit around waiting to be picked to do a project. I simply get started. My day jobs, a high school English teacher and the head scriptwriter for a new language learning program from Mango Languages, complement what I do in my creative endeavors as well and so even when I’m teaching and writing as my livelihood I am working my creative muscles.

As a parent, what do you feel is the most meaningful thing you’ve done for them?
I include my children (2 and 5) in my artistic endeavors. Since my work is drawn from life and influenced by them, I bring them to rehearsal, carry them on my back at shoots, write with them playing under the writer’s table, and draw inspiration from their strange and wonderous take on the world. One of my favorite writing practices is to write down all the off-the-wall things they say as they begin to make sense of the world like, “Why is air?” and “Who had the idea for pie? ” They enrich my work and I think being a part of my artistic endeavors is a wonderful way for them to interact with the world. They have multiple caretakers on a film crew, a backstage team, or a group of performers. My children have many adults around who are showing them all the different ways to be, to invent, to express, and to create. They are being brought up to not bat an eye at a clown speaking in gibberish but to respond back in guttural kind. It seems perfectly normal to look up and see an aerial dancer hanging from the ceiling or participate in a sound check. The kids also are seeing their mother fulfilled and cooperating with folks who have other talents she lacks, which I think is a valuable lesson in a world (and field) where extreme individualism and independence is highlighted to everyone’s detriment.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
I would take you to The Lyric in Fort Collins, an arthouse movie theater and venue that functions like Alamo Drafthouse but looks like Meow Wolf meets Legends of the Hidden Temple. We would climb around on the outdoor art installation made by Ryan Guillaume and listen to some music from Cactus Cat before watching free cartoons and eating a bunch of sugary cereal. Then we’d go to the Larimer County Farmer’s Market in Old Town Fort Collins or look at rare books at Wolverine Farm. We’d grab a beer at Equinox Brewery or Purpose before our shift volunteering at food rescue Vindeket. We might take a hike at Gateway Natural Area, where I got married, or go feed the goats at Martinez Park farm. If we were feeling fancy we’d get oysters and fried chicken at The Regional or if we wanted to stay in we’d grab some Chinese food from Sally’s kitchen, a hidden gem of a Chinese restaurant in a gas station. For nightlife we’d probably head back to The Lyric for a movie, a show, or a music festival. Or perhaps we’d watch a Comedy Brewers or stand up show at The Comedy Fort. If IMPACT dance company had a show at The Lincoln Center I’d definitely take you to that.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
My friend and collaborator, Nick Holland, is a constant source of encouragement, criticism, and humor. When we met over five years ago and began working on theater and film projects together we both found a kindred spirit in each other. We’re both accidental autodidacts, avid readers, compulsive makers of art, and gregarious people who like knowing folks’ stories. Likewise, we’ve both been working in the arts for close to 20 years and have established a healthy, almost workmanlike attitude to producing work (film, art, writing, theater, performance) that meets our own standards. I think we not only share an understanding of those standards with each other, we’ve helped each other develop and uphold those personally meaningful standards over the last five years. We both are dedicated to our crafts as vocations, not necessarily big money-makers. Ironically, through the awakening to art as a practice rather than a product, we both found work as professional writers right around the same time. Self-effacing and generous, Nick is a voracious appreciator of the work of others and generously provides insightful feedback when it is requested. He is a mentor to many standup comedians, artists, writers, and actors in the community. Having a weekly coffee with him is a highlight for me because, whether we’re just gossiping about people we know, talking about our lives, or working out loud on a creative project, we have a camaraderie that’s goofy, intellectual, caring, and noncompetitive. We both subtly push each other to be more honest, more daring, and more creative. Since we moved from our starry-eyed and often disappointed twenties to our more grounded and productive thirties together I think we have many more years of co-creation and friendship ahead of us. My friendship with Nick has kept me going in the arts despite the chaos of two part-time jobs (teaching and writing), two kids, and community leadership, and I am forever grateful to him. Check out his art on instagram at kickholland_art

Website: http://www.nataliescarlett.com/

Instagram: natalie_r_scarlett

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/natalie-scarlett-56867748/

Other: https://www.huckleberryliterary.com/

Image Credits
Jennie Crate, Jesse Nyander, Tom McCarty, Kate Austin-Groen