S2E3: Megan McCormick
In this episode, Hayley and Amy speak with composer/lyricist, actor, educator, and circus artist Megan McCormick about balancing different hats as a multi-hyphenate, embracing radical self-acceptance and a growth mindset, increasing female and nonbinary representation, and claiming power that isn’t patriarchal. As a bonus, we celebrate Women’s History Month by spotlighting Hallie Flanagan Davis, the director of the Federal Theatre Project. Scroll down for episode notes and transcript!
Episode Notes
Guest: Megan McCormick
Hosts: Hayley Goldenberg and Amy Andrews
Music: Chloe Geller
Episode Resources:
Hallie Flanagan Davis and the Federal Theatre Project
Jane the Queen, book and lyrics by Nia Harvey
Musical Theatre Writers Collective
Guest Bio
Megan McCormick (she/they) is a composer, lyricist, singer, educator, and circus artist based out of Brooklyn, New York. As an educator, Megan holds the position of Assistant Director for the New York Youth Symphony’s Musical Theater Songwriting program, Assistant Director for Tufts University’s Creative Arts educational program, Teaching Artist for the Metropolitan Opera Guild, and staff for Trapeze School New York. Megan delights in performing and writing in many different genres with recent performing highlights including as a back up singer with Brooklyn-based rock band Geese on tour with Jack White, and the premiere of her original song and aerial straps act “Careful Lorelei” at the New England Center for Circus Arts. Recently, Megan has joined the Musical Theatre Writers Collective, where she is working on a full length musical about England’s first queens.
Find Megan Online:
Instagram: @megancaseysings
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Episode Transcript
(Music)
Hayley: Hello, beautiful people, and welcome to the Women & Theatre Podcast! We're your hosts, Hayley Goldenberg…
Amy: …and Amy Andrews. Grab a cup of coffee and join us as we explore the experiences of women and nonbinary people in the theatre industry.
Hayley: On the pod, we interview people from different backgrounds with varying levels of industry experience and professional roles.
Amy: Our goal is to build community, identify the unique benefits that women and nonbinary folks bring to theatrical spaces, and pool our collective wisdom to break down the barriers we continue to face.
(Music)
Hayley: It’s Women’s History Month! Each week this month, we’re spotlighting a woman in theatre history that you should know about.
Amy: This week, let’s talk about Hallie Flanagan Davis. Hallie Flanagan Davis was a theatrical producer, director, and playwright. In 1935, Flanagan was appointed director of the Federal Theatre Project, which was intended to provide jobs to unemployed actors and theatre craftspeople during the Great Depression. Her goal in leading this project was to bring high-quality theatre to the majority of the American public who had never experienced it. By 1936, Flanagan had hired 12,500 people across 28 states as part of the Federal Theatre Project. Since the plays were federally funded, tickets were sold at drastically reduced prices, which made productions accessible and inclusive for a wider audience.
Hayley: On today's episode, we sit down with Megan McCormick. Megan McCormick is a composer, lyricist, singer, educator, and circus artist based out of Brooklyn, New York. As an educator, Megan holds the position of assistant director for the New York Youth Symphony’s musical theatre songwriting program, assistant director for Tufts University's creative arts educational program, teaching artist for the Metropolitan Opera Guild, and staff for the Trapeze School New York. Megan delights in performing and writing in many different genres, with recent performing highlights including as a backup singer with Brooklyn-based rock band Geese on tour with Jack White and the premiere of her original song and aerial straps act, “Careful Lorelei,” at the New England Center for Circus Arts. Recently, Megan has joined the Musical Theatre Writers Collective, where she is working on a full-length musical about England's first queens.
Amy: We are here with the amazing Megan McCormick. Megan, would you please introduce yourself, share your pronouns, and tell us a bit about what you do in theatrical and creative spaces?
Megan: My name is Megan McCormick. I use she/her or they/them pronouns, and I am a composer, lyricist, writer, educator, and circus artist based out of Brooklyn. I am so passionate about all of those things that I've listed, so my whole life is just trying to figure out how I can do all of them and still sleep.
Hayley: Megan, can you tell us a little bit about how you came to the many hats that you wear and creative work in general?
Megan: Totally. So I've always been a kid with a lot of energy and who gets really excited about things and who other kids called really weird. By the time I was like five, I embraced that identity. I didn't really come to theatre until high school. My family moved to Germany for a couple years. I was very, like... sports. My dad really wanted me to be an athlete. But I had a friend who was like, come audition for Oklahoma with me, and I went in and auditioned for the show. It was this place when I was on stage where they wanted you to have a lot of energy. They wanted you to be loud. They wanted you to be expressive. And so the stage, for me, became this one place where I felt really comfortable being myself.
And then when I went to college, did all the things - you know, tried music directing, directing, choreographing, writing music for stuff. And the theatre was just my home. And I knew that I wanted to keep doing it. When I graduated, I was working in admin and doing community theatre, which was great. Living in Boston. But then after a certain point, it was consuming my life, and I was like, I need to move to New York City and just do “artist” full-time, or as full-time as possible. And so I quit this job that had health insurance and salary and benefits and all this stuff. And I moved here to New York, and I got six months in New York before the pandemic hit.
And that kind of made a whole... challenge. But I came here really thinking that I was going to be a performer. And so I was auditioning and stuff, but auditions are just soul-sucking at times. I was always very insecure and didn't always have the most self-love and would connect my worth with how I believed people perceived my talent. Because it's so personal, you know, like, this is me, this is my energy, this is my voice.
Hayley: Mm-hmm.
Megan: And when people don't cast you, it feels very personal. So that was kind of taking a toll... but with the pandemic, there wasn't that much theatre happening, so I started writing. And I had also been insecure about my writing, just so afraid of what people will think of this expression of myself. What if people don't like it and they don't like me? It took me so long to like, separate myself from my work in such a way that it's like, this is still me, but also I'm a growing and evolving human and so my work can be growing and evolving too.
This year I'm a part of this program, the Musical Theatre Writers Collective, which has been so lovely. This has been the first time in my life where I'm like, "Okay, yeah. I would like to grow and evolve as a human. I would like my work to grow and evolve as art, and I can put it out there and not feel completely destroyed by getting feedback." Now I want it. I wanna grow. I want everything that I'm doing to grow.
Amy: Yes. What a journey.
Megan: Oh yeah, definitely.
Hayley: Yeah. Can you tell us a little bit about what you're working on creatively at the moment?
Megan: Yes. So Hayley and I are collaborating on a musical that does not yet have a title, but we call it Jane the Queen, which is a musical about Lady Jane Gray, who became the first queen of England. She was only queen for nine days before Mary Tudor took the throne from her and eventually killed her. So we are exploring this kind of family drama element of the first queens of England.
I'm writing the music for it, Hayley's directing, and the wonderful Nia Harvey is the lyricist and bookwriter. And it's just been such an amazing process to work on so far because - one of the things that has motivated me to become a writer is…I love musical theater, I love so many shows... and yet I also don't always see myself on stage. I don't see a lot of complex women. There aren't very many nonbinary characters in the canon. And so, part of why I really wanna write is I just want to represent those voices on stage. It's been so amazing to work with this strong female team putting these complex female characters on stage. It's been such a dream. This is my first time writing a full-length musical. So it's definitely gonna be a process. But I'm very excited for the challenge. I'm really excited about it.
Amy: Megan, you were talking about complex women characters and wanting to see them on stage, which is definitely a want that Hayley and I share with you. When you were speaking about that, it sounded like it might be part of a larger creative mission. Could you speak a bit about that?
Megan: I see so much media in which you get these very complex male characters - and complex being, like, a range of interests, and also flaws. There are so many female characters in musical theatre specifically that often are the love interest. And so their main interest becomes... finding their partner. I see so many examples of shows where there's a larger social issue at play - I always think about Les Mis - there's this larger social issue that all the men are involved in, and then they have their romantic relationships. And then all of the women are just there… interested in their love interests, you know? And there's really not that much engagement with the wider social issues at play…
Hayley: Yeah, they're kind of like victims of that circumstance, but they're not participating in the thing itself.
Amy: Right! Or if there's an inkling that they might have political inclinations, they just die. Hello, Eponine.
Megan: Exactly. So I am looking for those characters who are struggling with things. A lot of times, when we think about the idea of a strong woman... sometimes that goes too far into making women into these unattainably heroic characters who are flawless. And that can be fun to see. But it can also be very challenging because I am not flawless, you know. I get scared of things, and I don't mean to be mean to people that I love, but sometimes it happens, you know? Because we're all dealing with traumas that affect us in different ways. And I think the more that we can see characters who are strong and courageous and also flawed or make mistakes and how they come back from that. I'm just so interested in putting more people who feel real on stage.
Hayley: I don't know a single strong woman who doesn't also have flaws and also have their moments of extreme vulnerability. Yeah, I'd rather see an empowered woman than one who's a victim. But why can't we have shades of gray and like–
Amy: Right, like real women!
Hayley: …nuance.
Megan: Yeah. It's been so amazing to talk to other female artists who have shared insecurities that they have being in the room too. People that I've looked up to for years who are saying like, "Oh yeah, I struggle with this." Just to acknowledge those feelings that I feel too. It's like, okay, I don't have to not feel that to succeed.
(Music)
Hayley: We were talking a little bit about this idea of womanhood... How do you see womanhood as fitting into your identity? If at all…
Megan: I've been going through this journey of figuring out my gender identity, and it's really been something that I've been thinking about a lot within the last two years as I go to therapy, as I work through my traumas…where I'm trying to figure out my connection to my younger self. One of the things that I think about when I look back at young Megan, one of the things that I feel really connected to them about is this feeling like I didn't fit within my gender. And I expressed that pretty strongly as a kid. I was not interested in traditionally feminine things. I didn't really wanna be thought of as like, a girl or a boy. I just wanted to kind of be in this genderless void. I was born in the 90s, went to elementary school in the 90s and early 2000s. You know, we weren't talking about gender identity when I was a kid. That just wasn't a conversation that was happening at all.
And once I started hearing that vocabulary more as an adult, it was like, "Oh my god, that's what I was feeling throughout my whole childhood." But then, something that I've been kind of wrestling with too... I was afraid that I was letting the patriarchal views of femininity influence my perception of womanhood and femininity. I didn't want the reason for my rejection of femininity to be this idea that like, "Women can't be ____." Like when I was a kid, I remember my cousin telling me, "Oh, you can't play soccer as well as me because I'm a boy and you're a girl." And I was like, "No, fuck that." You know, wanted to fight him, because I was like, “I'm just as strong as a boy,” you know?
There's so much of this placing emphasis on what power is around strength, around aggression and charisma, in a way that's very traditionally male. And this is something that Hayley and I have talked a lot about also in the context of our musical, because it's the first time that a woman becomes the leader of England. And we've been talking about like, how much do these characters subscribe to what has been this very traditional, patriarchal way of claiming power? I can't help but think that there must be other ways to claim power other than just a traditionally masculine way.
I've been coming to terms with this idea that like, yes, I identify as gender-queer, as nonbinary, but I don't want to reject womanhood or the feminine sides of myself too. I've been growing out my hair and feeling like that's a really powerful thing to do. Gender shouldn't necessarily connect to like, the length of your hair or whether you wear makeup.
Amy: Right.
Megan: So yeah, it's been a really interesting journey. And I think that my feelings about it are continuing to grow and evolve as I explore what this identity means to me now. I understand how it shaped my childhood and now, through everything that I've learned and all the things that I'm thinking about... how does it continue to evolve in the world now?
Hayley: That's so great to hear you talking through what your process has been. And also to remind people who are going through it that it's ever-evolving, and that's cool too. Like, you're on your journey finding it.
Amy: A thing that I really like about how we're starting to talk about gender as a society these days is that it doesn't have to be these rigidly defined boxes. You can say, “This is who I am, this is what my gender is, it's not that simple as just saying woman.” And also, I can like having long hair. I can like getting dolled up sometimes. My gender identity and my gender expression can both be what I want it to be, and they don't have to match up in a way that makes other people comfortable.
Hayley: Mm-hmm.
Megan: Exactly. Yeah. I love that.
Amy: I would love to hear from you, Megan, are there ways that you see your gender and your identity benefiting you as an artist? And then are there limitations that you've run up against because of your gender?
Megan: Hmm, that's such a good question. The way that I've been feeling and the confidence that I've had to express my gender have been kind of two different journeys. I spent a long time going through the work internally and just feeling afraid to tell even the people who I was the closest with. I just had this fear that - it was an imposter syndrome but with gender - this idea that it was going to be rejected by people. And that has so not been the case, which has been so wonderful. But, you know, it took me a really long time before I felt comfortable sharing. Using my pronouns has been somewhat recent. Really over the last six months, I've started sharing that more .
And also in the last six months, I've started to put myself more into the theatre world and the arts world. I was also kind of afraid to do that before. So I feel like my gender identity and my theatre identity are kind of emerging at the same time. I feel like I am now coming into the theatre in New York scene as myself, which is really exciting. As I am emerging into my identity, I am also just able to say, like, “This is me.” And so I’ve felt really lucky to be so accepted for myself in the spaces that I put myself in. The Musical Theatre Writers Collective has been so incredibly welcoming to me. And I'm so grateful for people like Hayley and for everyone else in the program for letting my voice just be my voice. And for me to be able to come into class and just be who I am, that has been everything to me. I don't know where the journey's going to take me, but I'm so lucky to have made this emergence into this community of young writers and mentors who are really interested in hearing what I have to say and in making my voice sing.
Amy: That's beautiful. You're gonna make Hayley cry. Hayley is crying.
(Music)
Amy: Megan, as you're at the beginning of this fabulous journey of becoming more yourself as a person and as an artist, what are your big dreams for success in your work, in your life? What do you dream of?
Megan: The absolute dream is that I just get to do the things that I love to do. I had spent so long defining success by milestones. And recently, I have been so delighting in the process of things – like the journey of it. Right now in my life, I'm just so grateful that I get to be writing with people who are so supportive. I get to be circusing every day in these fabulous communities. And so my dream is to continue to write, and if I could share work that resonates with people and bring characters to life that I've had in my brain and have those characters speak to somebody or make somebody feel more seen - that would be everything. I would love to see other people singing my work and delighting in work that I've written. I wanna be able to sing. I love new works. I would love to work on readings and perform other people's work. I'm so excited about all the amazing stuff that's being written. One of my fantasies is, there's this Cirque Du Soleil act from the show Luzia. And it's a straps act. I don't think it's ever been performed by a female person. So I wanna be the first female straps artist to perform that straps act.
Amy: So, Megan, I wanna hear about your circus work. Can you please tell us about it?
Megan: Yes. I get so happy when I think about circus. I've talked about kind of this journey, this evolution of coming to terms with myself and my art – knowing that I and my art are constantly evolving – and that mindset has come from the circus for me. Circus embodies growth mindset. I had just graduated from college in 2017 and I was working my admin jobs, teaching jobs. I was working so much, and I was working remotely before that was like, even really a thing. My friend posted this video of her doing aerial silks and I texted her, I was like, “That looks really cool.” And she was like, “You should take a class with me.” And I was like, "Cool, yeah, let's go." So I went. And I started going once a week and then twice a week, and five years later - it's been five years since I started the circus. I go every day. I love it with my whole heart.
You go in and you learn so quickly that everybody's bodies are different. Everybody has things that are gonna come really easily... and then some things that are gonna be much more challenging, and that's just different for everybody. So you can't compare yourself to the person next to you, the only person you can compare yourself to is yourself. I found that the more I went and trained, the better I got at the skills. Which is such an obvious thing, you know? Like, you work hard at something and you get better. But when it comes to like, singing and writing, I had internalized this idea of inherent talent. I am just the singer that I am, like that is my voice, or the writer, like what I produce is the thing, you know? But in circus, it was like, the more pull-ups I do, the more pull-ups I can do, you know? Because I am growing and competing against myself.
I had a coach who would always say, “Show me easy.” When you watch circus, it's so beautiful, it looks so effortless, but people have trained for years to make that happen. So you're just making something extremely difficult look easy and look effortless…And I'd always looked at people making things look easy. And then when I tried it myself, I was like, “This is really hard. Why is this so hard? I just must not be good at that thing,” you know? But hearing that - "Show easy" - that idea, you can just apply to everything, which was something that I just had never thought of. And so that training and that work that I put in for circus, I started using that mentality for my voice and for writing. The more I write, the more I do the things, the easier it's going to look and the easier it's gonna get. And you know, progress is nonlinear too. One day you might be feeling really strong, and the next day you might be really sore and you can't do anything. And that's okay, because in a week it's gonna even out.
Hayley: But it trends upwards.
Megan: Exactly.
Amy: It's funny, I hear what you're saying with writing and with singing, just expecting of yourself and other people expecting of you like, oh, either you're talented or you're not. But no one expects you to be amazing at circus stuff when you first start. No one has those skills innate from birth. That's not a thing.
Megan: Yeah.
Amy: It's about developing the strength in your body and the skills. So I love taking that growth mindset and then applying it to all the other things. What a great lesson to have learned.
Megan: Yeah. And about consistency, you know, the more you do the thing, the better it's gonna get.
Amy: Well, and it's so easy to just be like, "Ugh, this is just a thing I'm bad at." It's a lot harder to take that accountability and be like, there is space for me to get better at this. I need to put in the work and then I'll get better.
Megan: Totally.
Amy: I know what work I have to do, so I just gotta do it.
Megan: Totally. My friend recently was talking about getting feedback as a writer. And she said that in life you have to practice both radical self-acceptance and radical willingness to grow, which I just thought was so beautifully put. Because those things seem like they're in opposition, but actually you have to be able to hold both of them together. Bringing your work to class and being like, I'm a valuable artist who produces great work and I'm proud of the work that I've done. And also I am excited to take it forward. Having that balance is so hard, but you know, that's a reminder that I have in everything. I accept where I am today, and also, I am looking forward to growing.
Hayley: Yeah, I love that. Megan, we've touched on lots of things that you want to see shift in this industry and this business. I'm curious about anything else that you would name of changes that you'd like to see in this industry.
Megan: The way that we create spaces. I think we put so much pressure on artists. And I think if we could have supportive environments that still allow for really beautiful creation of work, but rather than making people feel like there is a way to make money in the business or a way to create art that is going to be the most accessible or the most effective, broadening that horizon. And giving audiences more credit to take in new work too. I think there's this thought about like, what will audiences be able to handle? What do they want to see? And I think we don't actually totally know the answer until we put stuff out and take risks on new artists and new ideas. I just love what everybody's coming up with in their brains, and I hope that that can be shown the same kind of value as some of the bigger budget shows that are happening. Yeah.
Kindness and acceptance and support for each other. I think that it's trending that way. I've heard from people who have been in the industry for a long time about that kind of evolution. It's not about who's the most talented person? There's a lot of like, who's good to work with? I think that that as a trend is so important. Who's willing to put in the work? Like, who's willing to grow, you know? I just hope that we continue in that direction and support young people and women and nonbinary folks and people of color, people who haven't had their voices as represented in our industry.
Hayley/Amy: Yeah.
(Music)
Hayley: Megan, since you have so many interests and things that you like to do, how do you think about balancing all of the different aspects of your life?
Megan: It is so hard. If anybody knows the answer, call me. I have struggled with that. My partner is so supportive of me and all the work that I do…and I know that it can be hard when he's like, "Oh, when are you coming home today?" And I'm like, "Midnight. I'll see you tomorrow." You know? And sometimes I can go very into the work that I'm doing to the detriment of, you know, just not getting to see people that I love as much and not making as much time as I want to. But then, then it'll go too far the other way and I'm like, "Oh God, I haven't written in a week," you know?
I've always done this in my life, just been crazy busy. I think one of the things that helps is that I'm so grateful that in my work - in the circus, I'm grateful for the Musical Theatre Writers Collective - that I'm doing that with people that I value so highly. So, coming to work, it's social as well, where I get to be with people who I am so excited to be with. The other thing I struggle with is trying to keep everything in my head. And then I agree to too many things, and I forget about things, and that's just a hard moment because I want to honor my commitments and the things that I'm doing. So, I don't know, I haven't figured out how to balance it yet.
Amy: Sounds like a really good opportunity for radical self-acceptance and growth mindset.
Megan: Yep. Definitely. Both of those things. I'm trying to piece together the life that I want, and it's an experiment, always.
Amy: Yeah. Yeah. I have also done the life of working a “real people” job and then deciding to leave the comfy salary and benefits to pursue artistic dreams. It's really hard when you decide to play by your own rules and not to play by the world's rules. I get to do whatever I want with my time and also then I need to like, figure that out.
Megan: Yeah, I was somebody who thrived in a school setting ‘cause it was like, here's the rubric of things, and I was like, “Oh, I know how to meet expectations and also exceed them.” But then it took me a long time after graduating to be like, "How do you get A’s in life?" There just is not that structure. You have to create your life syllabus for yourself. It's another journey of self-growth, "How do I define success and set my schedule of life?"
(Music)
Amy: Megan, what are you most proud of in your life and in your work?
Megan: Oh, wow. I'm really proud of all the love and gratitude that I have. I have tried over the last couple of years to get better at telling people exactly how I feel about them when I feel really positively towards them. Telling my friends all the reasons why I love and appreciate them. And in the places that I go to that I love, expressing that love and that passion. Cause I just feel it so deeply, and that's one of the things that I really like about myself. I like how much I love the things that I love.
And in my work, I think I am most proud of the fact that I now sit down and write and I don't judge myself. Well, there's an asterisk by that. I work really hard not to judge myself. And to just give space for creation without judgment as I am working on things. I am so grateful to myself for giving me that space, because it's something that took me a really, really long time to be able to do. And now I am making things in a way that I just felt like I couldn't for so long. And it's taken me a long time to feel like I can call myself a composer, because I was just keeping everything so locked up inside of me. And so I'm proud that I'm starting to let it out and to see where that goes.
Amy: Yay.
Hayley: That's beautiful. And that's a beautiful way to end this interview.
Amy: Can you please tell our listeners where they can find you on the internet, the social media?
Megan: I am primarily on Instagram. My handle is @megancaseysings, and yeah, it's mostly just me doing circus. If you wanna watch me do circus.
Hayley: Thank you so much, Megan.
Amy: Thank you so much, Megan.
Megan: Thank you guys so much.
(Music)
Hayley: Thank you for listening to the Women & Theatre Podcast. We’re your hosts, Hayley Goldenberg…
Amy: And Amy Andrews. If you like what you heard, subscribe and give us a 5-star review wherever you listen.
Hayley: You can also follow us on social @womenandtheatreproject to make sure you never miss an episode.
Amy: The music for this show is written by talented Women & Theatre community member Chloe Geller.
Hayley: Thanks for listening, everyone. See you next time!
Amy: Bye!
