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Maya, what have you found gets your generation to stop scrolling and do something?<\/strong><\/p>\n MP:<\/strong> I have always been a solutions-focused activist. I\u2019m not going to be someone who tells you, \u201cThis is the problem, something needs to be done about it,\u201d and then gives no further explanation. I am one of those people who has always centered what can be done, what\u2019s already being<\/em> done, because something else that happens is you don\u2019t actually see the hard work and incredible impact that so many changemakers are having. You don\u2019t get to hear a lot of those stories: the ocean that gets cleaned, the terrifying bill that does actually get blocked. This is why Dear Everything<\/em> is super powerful, because the show itself is not prescriptive, it\u2019s about getting you reconnected, resensitized, and energized to do something. And then through V-Day<\/a> and the Youth Council, we center the people in real life who are doing this amazing work: Here are the young people on the front lines who are really helping us to fight for a livable future, and here\u2019s how we\u2019re supporting them.<\/em><\/p>\n V, you told American Theatre<\/em><\/a> that when the show was put into a musical format, it became very twee. Can you talk a little bit about boiling it down to its essence?<\/strong><\/p>\n V:<\/strong> It\u2019s very strange with pop music, because pop often tells you a lot of things in a way that musical theater doesn\u2019t. We were trying to fit it into scenes, but pop demands something else\u2014more Brechtian, more forward-facing, much more rabble-rousing. Once we understood that, the form shifted. It became a narrated kind of concert-storytelling-happening thing. The minute we found that, everything began to work. I think we were really experimenting with the musical theater form, which has never been my forte. I like things that feel revolutionary and radical and just kind of come at you. One of the composers said the best time this ever worked was when I narrated the story and we played all the songs. So we tried that and it was like, Oh, here it is<\/em>. Sometimes it\u2019s right in front of you.<\/p>\n Jane, I feel you don\u2019t lend your name to just anything. What was it about this that felt particularly true to you?<\/strong><\/p>\n JF:<\/strong> It takes the notion that we\u2019re part of nature, we can\u2019t allow ourselves to be cut off or exploited. It\u2019s part of us, if we want to survive on any level. This is my deepest belief about where we\u2019ve gone wrong. So for one of my best friends to have written a play that reveals this in a very inspiring way, you bet I\u2019m going to sign on. But I sign on to things [all the time]. I just signed on to [executive produce] Steal This Story, Please!<\/em><\/a> [a documentary about independent journalist Amy Goodman].<\/p>\n