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For Debbie Chinn, the arts industry has always been “the business of making goosebumps,” she said. And as TheatreWorks Silicon Valley’s new executive director, Chinn is largely responsible for the, well, business side of that business, overseeing the marketing, fundraising, facilities, external relations and more (alongside Artistic Director Tim Bond, who steers the company’s creative direction and programming).
Chinn said the arts are about far more than entertainment value in a recent interview with this news organization. Reflecting on TheatreWorks’ recent production of “Fannie,” a tribute to civil rights icon Fannie Lou Hamer, she spoke passionately about the role of the arts in preserving history, shining a light on relevant issues, challenging stereotypes, and fostering empathy, especially in the current political climate.
“I hope that we’ve gone past the narrative of ‘arts as a luxury.’ Arts is a necessity more than ever,” she said. “You can transform a human being through some compelling performances.”
As a longtime advocate, Chinn has testified nationwide about the importance of support for the arts.
“We’re the counter-narrative to censorship; we’re essential,” she said. “It’s the arts that’s going to save democracy.”
Chinn, who joined the company in November, comes to the role with high energy, enthusiasm, and the tireless track record to back it up, boasting a distinguished history of leadership.
Before coming to TheatreWorks, she worked as managing director for Anna Deavere Smith’s “Pipeline Projects,” and her long resume includes stints at California Shakespeare Theatre, Opera Parallele, the Carmel Bach Festival, San Francisco Symphony, Center Theatre Group and The Music Center of Los Angeles, to name but a few. She’s also served on the board or leadership council for many organizations including Theatre Bay Area, Association of California Symphony Orchestras, and the Chinese Cultural Center of San Francisco.
“Her experience in community building, as evidenced by her extensive work with the Carmel Bach Festival in expanding its reach into the nearby Salinas Valley, gives us confidence that she will provide the outreach we are looking for to further engage our entire Bay Area community,” TheatreWorks Board of Trustees Chair Holly Ward said in the press release announcing Chinn’s appointment.
After wrapping up her time with Smith, Chinn was pondering her next move while observing how devastating the COVID-19 pandemic has been for the theater world in particular.
“I asked myself, do I want to sit on the sidelines and watch or do I want to get in there and help?” she recalled. “I couldn’t imagine myself not jumping in and bringing to an organization anything I had of value.”
Chinn said she’d long admired the “top-notch” caliber of the Tony Award-winning theater company, particularly its annual New Works Festival.
“I’m so aligned with New Works because I think more than ever we need to encourage and coax forth stories from people who see the world very differently,” she said. “Our industry is crucial for bringing people together, for threading our communities a little tighter, for coming out of this with an understanding of cultures and voices that are not like our own.”
While TheatreWorks has had a “rousing start” to its season so far, Chinn said the industry is still struggling in the pandemic’s wake, and will continue to do so for some time.
“I’m really looking to move us toward recovery. We talk about pivoting – well, this great team of ours did a lot of pirouetting to keep audiences engaged, to keep entertaining,” she said. “We have a great staff, we just don’t have enough staff. I really want to work to getting this company the infrastructure it needs to get up on its feet again.”
In her view, “the most important stakeholders are the people who work for our organization. If we don’t take care of them, we don’t have a product.”
Chinn grew up in Long Island, New York and is the daughter of Chinese immigrants. Her parents owned a restaurant, which evolved into a Polynesian nightclub, and from a young age, Chinn was involved in the family business and “surrounded by music and culture” (including performing as a hula and sword dancer by the time she was in middle school).
The arts world, she said, “was always the place where I felt accepted as a person of color, growing up in a homogenized community. The groups I fit in were the choir and the drama club.”
Chinn headed out west for college, studying theater at the University of Southern California, where she became especially interested in stage management. Upon graduation, she worked in a department store coat department. That’s not the easiest sell in the warm Los Angeles climate, she said with a laugh, but by making friends with a few HVAC engineers, she was able to get the air conditioning turned up and thus make coats a bit more appealing to customers – an early lesson in the power of relationship building.
She worked other 9-5 jobs, at banks and insurance companies, all while spending her free time volunteering at “any theater company that would have me,” she said. Chinn built sets, poured coffee, helped with producing and eventually all that volunteering paid off when she was offered a job in special events and development at San Francisco’s American Conservatory Theater (A.C.T.).
“I said, ‘I don’t know what development is,'” she recalled, but was told it involved bringing people together, and that she’d been doing it naturally for years. She traveled north to the Bay Area, was hired on the spot and never looked back.
“I never sold coats again,” she noted, adding that all the skills she’d learned working in retail and offices have been invaluable in her subsequent roles. Her advice to those starting out in their career? “Always build up your networks. Always say yes to something,” she said.
Chinn published her first book “Dancing In Their Light: A Daughter’s Unfinished Memoir,” last year. It started out as a collection of entertaining memories of growing up “as a restaurant kid” in the 1960s and ’70s (Chinn’s first duty was selling cigarettes, at age 3). “It was like ‘Cheers,”’ she said, of the quirky characters who frequented her family’s House of Mah Jong. But in the aftermath of the 2016 presidential election and its anti-immigrant and racist rhetoric, and especially once the COVID-19 pandemic took hold, Chinn was horrified by the subsequent surge of hatred, abuse and violence against Asian Americans.
“Why are we the enemy?” she wondered, noting that her family had made many important contributions to society, in various fields, and were integral members of their communities.
“I was so undone by the hatred toward immigrants. I began to meld the immigrant story with the restaurant story, which became one book,” she said, chronicling her family’s history, work ethic and community spirit. Also an in-demand public speaker, Chinn has been gratified by reader response.
“I never meant to be an author! I’m so delighted that it’s found a readership that’s across the country and still has some staying power,” she said.
Chinn moved to the Peninsula when she started her job with TheatreWorks a few months ago, and said she’s looking forward to getting to know the local community better.
“I’m eager to find out what resonates,” she said. “We do shows, yes, but I want audiences to not just see a show. I want them to be inspired to do something when they get home,” she said. “It’s all about getting people in; the next step is getting them to take action.”
More information is available at debbiechinn.com and theatreworks.org.
Email Contributing Writer Karla Kane at karlajkane@gmail.com.
Email Contributing Writer Karla Kane at karlajkane@gmail.com.
Email Contributing Writer Karla Kane at karlajkane@gmail.com.
