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Lars Jan on the making of Joan Didion's "The White Album"

Sylke Krell, Assistant Director, Marketing & Communications

Nov 01, 2018

Promotional image for Lars Jan & Early Morning Opera's production of Joan Didion's The White Album, showing police officers in riot gear bent to spell out the numbers 1968. Image courtesy of the artist

Created by director and visual artist Lars Jan and his company, Early Morning Opera, and co-comissioned by the Wexner Center for the Arts, Joan Didion's The White Album uses a modern-day house party as a living backdrop for Didion’s essay. Her seminal work bears witness to the end of the 1960s countercultural dream of peace and love—hijacked by violence and chaos just as the Beatles’ 1968 "White Album" was appropriated by Charles Manson and his murderous “family.”

In this conversation, facilitated by Wexner Performing Arts Director Lane Czaplinski, Lars talks about creating and staging a performance from Didion's iconic work, what his process entails, and what the future holds for him.