I had the pleasure of zooming in for Xander Browne’s lunch break, while he sat outside the Columbia campus on a day as sunny and clear as his disposition. Xander has a gracious and warm spirit that is palpable from the moment you meet him. He is a multifaceted talent and the work he creates is imbued with the sincerity, heart and joy that he effortlessly exudes! The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Photos by Kevin Russell Poole
Molly Van Der Molen: It’s such a beautiful day!
Xander Browne: Oh it’s perfect , it’s truly like the most beautiful day ever!
Molly: Ah, well I’m happy to be joining you on it!
Xander: Me too!
Molly: Okay, so for the sake of time, I’m just gonna dive into the questions. Is that okay?
Xander: Absolutely, I’m ready
Molly: I love it. First question: How do you identify as an artist?
Xander: I feel like, right now (it changes maybe on a month-to-month basis) but right now, I would identify as a - and in this order - I would identify as a writer, composer, director, musician, actor … and like the curve of that is very exponential, ya know, like, writer/composer, I do that a lot and then acting I do very little, but I do do. I’m about to be acting in something for a friend’s festival show, so I can’t say I’m not an actor.
Molly: What are you going to be doing in their show?
Xander: I’m going to be playing a goat that has sex with a man. It’s like a comedy about the kinds of plays where a goat has sex with a man - or! - a man has sex with a goat!
Molly: Yeah ... I was gonna say, I feel like it’s the man, I feel like it’s the other way around.
Xander: Yeah, the other way, that’s true I was ascribing agency to the wrong person in that situation!
Molly: (laughs)
Xander: But it’s supposed to be a play about plays in which bizarre plays happen … It’s very uh - what’s the word, reflexive and meta, but it’s good, it’s funny, it’s very funny.
Molly: That’s awesome! And I’m super excited for what you’re doing with Emily Bubeck’s project: we’re both collaborating with her!
Xander: Yeah! I’m so excited.
Molly: I’m really excited for whatever comes from it. You have really been lighting Emily’s life up with your music and it’s really so beautiful too! Like such a great job!
Xander: It’s so fun! I’m really enjoying, like, for that project, flexing, like, folklore, folk music vibes, like country vibes - ‘cause, I love country music; I love folk music. I just never really compose in that vein because no one really asks me to, but Emily did, and I was like YES I’m readdyyyy!!
Molly: I’m really, I’m so excited I hope that there’s some harmonica action, just selfishly … So, have you done a lot of composing?
Xander: No!
Molly: Is this the first project you’re working on in that capacity?
Xander: Kind of, so Antigonick, the show that we just finished was the first project where I formally was asked to compose. Before that, I had just written music for my acapella group. I did a couple of original songs for them, and little underscoring bits for little film projects that I’ve worked on or little sketch projects I’ve worked on. I’ve never done lyrics and music for a formal project, besides Antigonick! That was the first time I did it, and I really liked it, and when Emily asked me to do this one, I was like “AH, yes!” and so, I think I want to push more in that direction in general and write more music stuff.
Molly: That’s really exciting! So, okay cool, what are some of the formative projects that you’ve worked on that kind of lead you to these different mediums?
Xander: That’s a good question, um, the most formative thing I’ve ever worked on probably, was in college. There was this musical called X-MAS, and it was a very silly student written, student produced musical about Christmas and I acted in it my sophomore year and I was like, “Oh that was so much fun, I want to do more!” So the next year, I directed it but I hadn’t directed, or I hadn’t worked outside of acting or singing or you know, being on that side of the table ever, so I was like, I’m going to try directing. Tried directing, really enjoyed it, even though the project was incredibly hard to work on, it was like very taxing - I didn’t realize exactly how hard directing was um, especially like directing a whole team of 4 people that were trying to write like a musical from scratch like that was --
Molly: Yeah, that’s a lot!
Xander: Maybe too much, maybe too much for a first project! Uh, but it definitely convinced me that I would rather be behind the scenes, behind the camera, behind the, you know what I mean! Like on the production side of things, rather than acting or singing or being a musician. So yeah, that was formative for me just because it told me I wanted to do more leadership things and it’s kind of guided me since then. Most of what I do now is trying to make things happen, trying to make projects happen, or creating from scratch, ya know, writing from scratch.
Molly: That’s a great answer! This is non-theater-related, but what do you have for lunch?
Xander: It's a halal, chicken over rice!
Molly: Mmm, great choice!
Xander: Good shit, good shit!
Molly: Yeah, don’t hesitate to eat it. Please enjoy - this doesn’t have to be like -
Xander: I’ll try, I’ll be very respectful with my bites so that you don’t get grossed out by the sound of me chewing.
Molly: Okay! (laughs)
Xander: That’s what I would want.
Molly: I appreciate that! Let me think! I have a list of questions but … Oh! Do you have a dream project that you’d love to work on?
Xander: I have one, really big dream project that I tweeted about one time, nobody gave a fuck, well I mean a couple of people gave a fuck, but it’s not like I’m big on twitter. But it’s this idea that I got from a dream that I had and it’s called “Space Cajuns” or maybe not Cajuns cause I’m not sure what about the term Cajuns is right or wrong, but the idea is it’s like a sci-fi either series or ya know, a big weirdly intense play, but basically it would be about, ya know, like hundreds of years in the future when everything is really high tech and space aged whatever. There’s a group of people who are left behind in society’s ramping-up technological innovations. There’s a group of people who are left behind with no devices and who still are using like 1960’s space tech, so like the idea, aesthetically, is you have this, like, incredibly advanced space technology next to these pirates (who are like space pirates) but they use like apollo 11 stuff, ya know, like really bulky space suits and like really old, old old, technology -
Molly: Right
Xander: - and that’s like the core of it just sort of trying to get at like you know -
Molly: - like, survival of the fittest, but in space!
Xander: Survival of the fittest! And it’s like space pirates, space inequality. I think right now the weirdest thing about the world we live in is how we’re so committed to this neoliberal idea of like advancement and progress, when like, a lot of people are still living very, very non technological lives, like most people are still living lives that have not been impacted by any of the advances that have been made. So it’s like what do we, what ARE we doing? That’s like a big dream project, Space Cajuns, the other thing would be like that they’re all form like Louisiana and they’re all Cajun and the other thing is that they would have to have alligators, space alligators, SPACE ROBOT ALLIGATORS and a fan boat in space. It would just be very wacky and dumb and that’s my vision.
Molly: That is really original. I haven’t heard anyone propose an idea like that! Especially for a theatre piece, I’m assuming this is a live performance piece, yeah?
Xander: I would love that! I think it would be so funny, and so bizarre, you know?
Molly: Yes! And really interesting for people to help conceive with you.
Xander: I think aesthetically it would be so much fun!
Molly: Oh my god, that too, yeah, sign me up! Tickets for the front row, baby! I’m sorry it didn’t get the response on twitter that you were hoping for!
Xander: It’s like really had to encapsulate that, that weirdness in one sentence, but --
Molly: That's fair. Maybe someone, somewhere was like “oh my gosh, this speaks to my soul” who knows! Are you a sci-fi fan in your life, like outside of what you do artistically, are you into the sci-fi stuff?
Xander: Mhmm! I LOVE sci-fi, I love anything that’s like you know, other world, any futuristic stuff, love it.
Molly: Nice! Do you have a secret obsession or a guilty pleasure that you’re like, I don’t know, maybe has to do with the sci-fi stuff but something you’re like, “not a lot of people know this but I am… so infatuated with...” I don’t know, American Idol, Season 3?
Xander: Good season, I mean I’m very infatuated with, there’s three things that I’m like really obsessed with this year (not this year, but always). One of them is related to sci-fi, NK Jemmison’s season, the fifth season, or the fifth season trilogy, it’s called The Broken Earth Trilogy.
Molly: It's reading? It’s books?
Xander: Mhmm! It’s books, it’s reading. I like, was not into reading when this year started, but I found these books and I got so into reading
Molly: Awesome, that is exciting.
Xander: It’s really cool, it’s about these like people, you know, on Earth 30 billion years in the future, and there’s this race of people that can like control rocks and stuff like earth benders but they’re subjugated people and it’s supposed to be like this analogy to blackness in America, it’s really cool.
Molly: Wow.
Xander: - but I’m obsessed with that, and then I’m also obsessed with Joni Mitchell ...
Molly: Yes!
Xander: ...as a concept
Molly: as a concept? Expand on that.
Xander: She is like, I just love the idea of her as a person, I love all of her music, I love her story, I love what she stands for, I just love everything she does. I could talk about her for literal years. And I don’t know if that qualifies it as like a guilty pleasure, because I’m not guilty about it, but other people WANT me to feel guilty about it.
Molly: No, there’s nothing to be guilty about when it comes to Joni Mitchell. She very literally changed the landscape of American music, let alone women in American music
Xander: Period.
Molly: - and she’s like a queer icon too.
Xander: - and song writing? She like, she mothered all the songwriters of today.
Molly: Yes.
Xander: There would be none of, there would be no Kacey Musgraves, there would be no Lana Del Ray, oh my god … But yeah, so Joni Mitchell, those Broken Earth books and also Carrie: the Musical, that’s also another dream project.
Molly: Me Too! ME TOO! I LOVE that show, that is one of my DREAM projects to direct. UGH!
Xander: It’s just so good!
Molly: It’s SO good, also Carrie is just an unsung character, I feel like everyone you know kind of looks at the camp of it all and also the show’s lack of success and just like the Stephen King book, like the concept of Carrie is, it’s a struggle but I do think that she really, really, I don’t know I think that she is misunderstood.
Xander: It has such a heart to it
Molly: YES
Xander: - and all the failure that it has endured over the decades ...
Molly: And yet people still do it!
Xander: People still do it.
Molly: So wait, I’m sorry, I really stole the moment there, tell me about why Carrie: the Musical is your third obsession
Xander: The music is SO fun, like I honestly think, like, it is the best star vehicle for an older woman, and for any up and coming, I think it’s beautiful to pair those two rather than two women of the same age. I think it’s really cool to have like an older woman role with incredible vocal intensity, like that is so fun to me, and also just musically, the songs are so like all over the place. You’re not just in one genre the whole time, you’re kind of like doing these very old gospel hymn, fire-and-brimstone kind of things and then you’re doing like a nice 80’s pop-ballad.
Molly: And a classic ensemble showtune.
Xander: Yeah, and it just, it takes you all over the place! And I appreciate that. And I also just appreciate like any musical that deals with like, more bizarre - I think the destruction at the end, like the aesthetic challenge of that design is -
Molly: It’s so fun.
Xander: - would just be so much fun!
Molly: It's limitless!
Xander: Limitless! But yeah, I love Carrie.
Molly: Well hey, if you’re looking for a Carrie collaborator I’d be down because -
Xander: I feel like it would be fun to do a staged reading to start off, like get some good actors, remind people of the beauty of Carrie and generate excitement.
Molly: Okay, so I have only 8 minutes left, but I think I can ask you a couple more questions. What kind of theater excites you?
Xander: The kind of theater that excites me is … hmm.. ooh, that’s a hard question. I think the kind of theater that excites me is the kind that is, I mean the words that come to mind are honest and fun. Like, not that it needs to be a comedy, I feel like you could like always tell when the actors or the team has had a good time putting on a production, even if it’s a drama or something really sad, um so fun, and then honesty, like anything that is authentic to an experience. Like it could be a sci-if weirdo play as long as there is some core honest exploration of a human idea. That is the shit I love to watch so much
Molly: Awesome, that is such a great, great answer. Um, what is something we wouldn’t know about you just by looking at you?
Xander: oooo, um, oh that’s a good question … something ... you wouldn't know… just by looking at me… ummm. My abiding love for country music and Kacey Musgraves. … You probably wouldn’t know I’m from New Hampshire. A lot of people are surprised that I’m from rural New Hampshire and that’s probably it. I have a big weird family! … I feel like, for the most part, I’m a pretty open book, ya know? I don’t keep a lot of secrets. I feel like most people can tell most of my life by looking at me
Molly: Last question: what is a theme/topic/image/motif/any of the above that you find yourself contemplating most often either in the work that you create or that you are drawn to creating?
Xander: I think I find myself, this is so specific, but the image of somebody looking up. Like not just, like, looking up, but full head tilt chin facing forward. Like eyes to the sky and the exact opposite head all the way down eyes to the floor. I love that image. I love seeing that and I just, I don’t know it ends up in everything that I work on - it has such cosmic implications. Staring at the stars or just staring up, and like physically, it’s incredibly disorienting and makes you feel like you’re gonna fall, so I don’t know! I just love that! I feel like it’s one of those visceral things that just connects to people. I don’t know!