NMH Magazine : Spring 2003

Dan Hurlin '73

Dan Hurlin was the first boy at NMH to take a dance class. Now he's an internationally known performance artist whose pieces scrape the surface of history away to reveal its hidden stories. His latest production, which comes to the stage next January, tells the tale of the Hiroshima Maidens, Japanese survivors of the atomic bomb, who came to the United States after World War II for reconstructive surgery and a series of largely forgotten encounters with the American public. 

Dan won the prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship in 2002, based on his Hiroshima Maidens. The award validated a career that's been in steady ascendancy for 25 years. His many awards include a 2001 New York Dance and Performance Award for a suite of puppet pieces; in 1990 his solo adaption–he played 60 parts–of Nathanael West's A Cool Million won a Village Voice OBIE Award. He's been on the faculties of Bowdoin, Bennington, Barnard, and Princeton, and currently teaches both dance and puppetry at Sarah Lawrence. 

In the theatre world, Dan's work is considered avant-garde–yet among the avant-garde, he's considered more traditional. Always looking for fresh inspiration, he recently went to Japan to study Bunraku, the indigenous puppetry form. And now? He has periodic fantasies of an almost-conventional next step: going to art school.

Describe what your college experience was like.

I came out at Sarah Lawrence. Back in the '70s it was extremely dangerous. At NMH, I knew there was something different about me, but I didn't know how to put words to it. There were no "out" gay students when I was there. You just didn't do it. But Sarah Lawrence had such a progressive environment that I would say I was gay and people would go, "Yeah, so?" It was very liberating, very exciting. 

How did you become a performance artist?

At NMH I knew I'd do something in the arts. In college I wanted to be a director. When I left I didn't have any money to pay actors, so I said, "I guess I'll do it." As I continued, I couldn't take myself out of it anymore.

Do your pieces have a common theme?

All of them deal with disenfranchisement, though not overtly. I did one piece on the Dionne quintuplets, who were completely disenfranchised. And the Hiroshima survivors: the State Department didn't want them here. They thought seeing these people with huge keloid scars would be too upsetting to the American public.

You were single for years. How was that?

I was a completely lonely workaholic. I didn't know at the time whether I dove into work as a response to being a lonely man or if I was a lonely man because I worked so hard. 

How was turning 40?

It was the worst experience of my life. I was directing a children's theatre in New Hampshire and was incredibly overworked. I'd just lost my best friend to AIDS. I'd commissioned him to write a musical and he died before he could finish it, so while I was directing I had to write for him. I'd just broken up with someone. I plummeted into clinical depression. I knew I'd sacrificed my personal life to my career, and I didn't want to do that anymore.

What have been your other low points?

My sister was killed by a drunk driver when she was a teenager. The whole time I was grieving I knew the depth of my grief wasn't even a fraction of what my parents were feeling. But her death strengthened the bonds between myself and my family. It strengthened the zest with which I wanted to live my own life. A number of things came out of my friend dying: a closeness to the community in which I was working, and it sobered me. It was the first AIDS death of someone I was close to that I'd experienced. It was nerve-wracking. It also sparked in me a desire for activism.

What's been a high point?

Meeting my partner, Kazu. We've been together for seven years. He's a devout Buddhist, and his calmness has influenced me. I take more comfort in routine now; we lead a really boring life and it's great. One of the frustrations of being a gay couple, however, is that we can't get married so Kazu–who's Japanese–can have his green card. 

How do you feel about having children?

I don't want any, period. I was the artistic director of a children's theatre in New Hampshire for 15 years. I often feel like I've fathered every child in southern New Hampshire.

Do you fear aging?

I don't fear it–I just loathe it. Having been a dancer, I'm appalled by what's happening to my body as I age.

What advice would you give to a recent NMH graduate?

Go far away from your hometown and your family, no matter how happy and supportive or unhappy and dysfunctional. You can always go back later if you want to.