An Intimate Look at 12 Angry Men with Ned Averill-Snell

TTB: 12 ANGRY MEN was produced initially in the early 50s. Twelve white men decide the fate of a black male teen accused of murdering his abusive father. Given the history of public trials in this county and racial issues that still exist. Is there a message Stageworks hopes to express with this production?

Ned: Well, “12 Angry Men” kicks off a project at Stageworks called “The Right of the People,” about telling stories of courageous protest. At the start of the play, an injustice is about to be committed, or may be committed, and one juror out of 12 is all that stands in the way, at least at first. The message of the project is that when you see something that isn’t right, you have to do something, you have to say something, even when under pressure to do otherwise, which is exactly what Juror 8 does.

Interestingly, the play never specifies that the defendant is a young black man. He could be any minority, any outsider, anyone vulnerable to hasty condemnation based on prejudice and neglect of his rights and his humanity. And the play has traveled a rather unconventional path to the stage: It was a teleplay first, in 1954, then a movie in 1957, and then finally a stage play in 1964. The play is set in 1957, probably because even by 1964 the idea of an all-male, all-white jury in New York was beginning to become a little preposterous. But the ideas in the play are timeless. 

TTB: You are portraying Juror #8, considered the protagonist in the play. What characteristics do you feel are essential to focus on as an actor to help the audience engage with the story?

Ned: That’s an interesting question. One thing that’s been important to me in developing the character is steering clear of the sense that Juror 8 is all-knowing and more inherently noble than every other juror. He doesn’t have all the answers. At the top of the play the only immediate difference between him and the other guys is that he has a nagging doubt about the evidence, a doubt he can’t even quite articulate at first, and he’s committed to the idea that high-stakes decisions should not be made too quickly. With the help of a growing number of other jurors, he spends the play trying to figure out the facts, and as he works things out, he brings other jurors—and the audience—along. We all—Juror 8, other jurors, the audience—sort out the truth together, all at the same time.

If Juror 8 comes across as a saint or a superhero, the play loses something, because the audience should be able to see themselves in him. He’s just a man. He could be anybody, and I’m hoping I get that across in the way I play him. Everybody can be Juror 8, if they stand up for what they believe.

I’m also mindful that while Juror 8 is indeed the protagonist in that he pushes the story along, he’s maybe not as central a character as we sometimes think. I suspect we see Juror 8 the way we do because the top-billed star in the movie played Juror 8, but actually, “12 Angry Men” is the very definition of an ensemble piece. There are 12 very individual, very distinct, very interesting jurors, each with his own backstory and baggage and predispositions, and all are being brought to life beautifully by a solid cast. The story is not so much one guy against 11 as it is 12 tugboats, each very different from the others, each trying to nudge a tanker in a slightly different direction. It’s fascinating to watch and brought to life by a dozen sharp actors.

TTB: It is still a critical time for theaters to survive. Why should audiences return to attend live theater? Could you speak to the specific qualities that Stageworks has that make them essential for audiences to hear?

Ned: First off, Stageworks is doing all the right things to ensure patron safety: masks for all patrons and staff, temperature checks and much more—it’s all outlined on the Stageworks website. And yeah, it can be a pain, but I think we’re all getting used to the idea that this is how things have to be if we’re going to gather, and anyway it’s still less of a pain than parking is at most theatres. Humans gather around the fire and tell stories, it’s in our DNA, we need to do that, and when we can’t, we feel the loss. Who knows how long the pandemic will last, or when the next one will emerge? We need to be safe, but we also need to feed our souls and we need to share that experience in the same physical space with others, and so long as we can do that safely, it’s time to start doing it again.

That said, it’s also time to remember that the pandemic isn’t all that matters right now. Again and again, we see grave injustices in our culture, injustices that arise out of the longtime othering of people of color, of LGBTQ people, of women, of the disabled, of refugees…. Confident that the theatre has been made a safe space for patrons, we now need to step out and have that unsafe experience of exploring our failings, as individuals and as a culture. Stageworks is putting social justice front and center this season, and it’s the right message at the right time.

TTB: You have worked at every professional theater company in the Tampa Bay area for over 20 years. You are a longstanding member of our community. What are your hopes for our Theater Tampa Bay community?

Ned: What are my hopes? For the next few years, my hope is for stability, that our existing companies sort out their management and budgeting and fundraising and marketing and patron base to a point where each and every company can field a great season of theatre and cross the finish line without going into the poorhouse. Down the road, I hope for growth in professional opportunity. Given the size of the metropolitan area, we have surprisingly few full-time jobs for theatre artists; the majority of us still need day jobs. The need of a day job naturally limits what each of us can contribute individually, and so hampers in the aggregate what we create as a community. 

There are lots of reasons for our condition: Beyond the very successful Broadway tours hosted by the Straz, Mahaffey and Ruth Eckerd, we’re mostly a “small theatre” town. I love small theatre, I love its immediacy and intimacy, I have no desire to see our 99-seat companies become 300-seat companies; that gain would be a loss. But with more consistent patron support, corporate support and government support, I think our small theatres could do much better, and do much more, and that the entire region would benefit, both culturally and economically. 

Thirty years ago, the city of Orlando gave the new Orlando Shakespeare Festival free use of a park for its shows. Today Orlando Shakes has a multi-stage complex, a multimillion-dollar budget and dozens of full-time employees and draws thousands of tourists to Orlando’s hotels and restaurants, tourists who aren’t coming for the rollercoasters. That’s the kind of thing that can be accomplished when city government and the business community recognize the economic potential of the arts, and really step up to nurture them. 

We don’t have that yet in Tampa Bay, not quite, but we could, we could soon. Here’s hoping.