Sophie “Skip” Payeff Sindler, born in Aiken, South Carolina, in 1930, and her husband, Allan Sindler, born in Bishopville, South Carolina, in 1925, discuss their family histories. Skip’s parents met in Chicago after emigrating from Knyszyn, Poland. Skip recalls encounters with antisemitism while growing up in Aiken. She describes her brother Kivy Payeff’s service in the military in Germany during World War II, and the traditional nature of services at the Aiken synagogue, Adath Yeshurun. Allan’s father, Frank Sindler, a tailor, emigrated from the Lithuania-Latvia region and married Pauline Schwartzman, a native of Baltimore. They followed Pauline’s aunt and uncle, Louis and Mary Schwartzman Slesinger, to Bishopville, South Carolina, where, for decades, Frank ran a men’s clothing store. Allan describes growing up in Bishopville, his Jewish education, and the Bishopville Hebrew Congregation. Allan and Skip raised their family in Camden, South Carolina, about 25 miles from Allan’s hometown. Allan, a chemical engineer and award-winning sculptor, discusses some of his artwork. Other topics discussed include: Sumter’s Temple Sinai, changes in Jewish religious observance, and possible reasons for the decline of Jewish congregations in small Southern towns like Camden. The transcript includes comments inserted by Allan Sindler during proofreading.
Longtime jazz director for Spoleto Festival U.S.A., Michael Grofsorean talks about his history at the festival since 1980. He relates anecdotes about past performers, including Dizzy Gillespie, Dave Brubeck, Sarah Vaughan and Ray Charles and describes the process that goes into selecting the artists for each festival. He discusses festival founder Gian Carlo Menotti's distaste for jazz, the rocky years of festival finances, the NAACP boycott of South Carolina that nearly derailed the 2000 jazz program and describes why the city of Charleston is the perfect venue for the festival. Audio with transcript.
Marcus Overton is an actor, director, and coach whose career has encompassed theatre, opera, radio and television, and arts administration. He also conducts an award-winning show for South Carolina Public Radio, Spoleto Today. Overton was executive director and producing director of Spoleto Festival U.S.A. during the turbulent years of 1992-1994. Overton discusses the rift between ousted executive director Nigel Redden and Gian Carlo Menotti, Menotti's own eventual departure from Spoleto U.S.A., and the personnel changes and budget deficits that threatened the survival of the festival. Audio with transcript.
Carolyn Kostopoulos, owner of Carelli Costumes, Inc. in New York, has been the wardrobe director of Spoleto Festival U.S.A. since 1982. Kostopoulos discusses her costume work for the festival over the years, the process of designing and creating, and the difference between her work on Broadway and Spoleto. She discusses her relationships with the artists who wear her designs and details the various costume headquarters she has had in Charleston including the haunted old city jail. Audio with transcript.
Charles S. Way is a noted Charleston businessman and civic leader who has been involved with Spoleto Festival U.S.A. since 1978. He served as the organization's president in 1984, chairman of the board from 1985-1991, and has held the post of chairman emeritus since 1991. Way talks about the history of Spoleto Festival U.S.A., his relationships with Gian Carlo Menotti, Nigel Redden and others, how the festival piqued his interest in art, and his hope that Spoleto U.S.A. and the Festival dei Due Mondi in Spoleto, Italy, will one day be joined together again. Audio with transcript.
Renowned flutist Tara Helen O'Connor is a member of the woodwind quintet Windscape, founding member of New Millennium Ensemble and flute soloist of the Bach Aria Group. She has appeared in countless festivals and programs worldwide and has performed at Spoleto since 1994. O'Connor discusses her history with the festival, her longtime association with chamber music director Charles Wadsworth, her performances, her relationship with festival managers and artists, and the history and future of Spoleto Festival U.S.A. in Charleston, South Carolina. Audio with transcript.
Geoff Nuttall began performing yearly at Spoleto Festival U.S.A. in 1995 as first-violinist with his renowned St. Lawrence String Quartet. In 2008 he was named associate artistic director of the chamber music series and will assume leadership from longtime director Charles Wadsworth in 2010. Nuttall discusses the legacy of Wadsworth and chamber music, the logistics of selecting the performers and the repertoire, and the advantages of having Charleston as a venue for the festival. Audio with transcript.
Leslee Newcomb has been a wig and make-up designer for Spoleto since 1978. She discusses the intimacy of wig and make-up design and her interaction with performers and details the changes she's seen in Charleston since her first Spoleto Festival U.S.A. Audio with transcript.
Joe Hall (pronouns: He/Him/His), living in Washington, DC, after years of international work for the National Democratic Institute (NDI), discuses growing up gay in Greenville and Bennettsville, SC, overcoming alcoholism and leading an early AIDS service agency in Charleston, SC. With an accepting family, he embraced his sexuality; he describes gay life in Atlanta, after high school, describes a gay bar in Florence, SC, mentions living in New York, and Washington, DC before settling in Charleston where he got sober. He enrolled at a program at Fenwick Hall in 1983 and later at the Palmetto Center in Florence. He describes bars in Charleston and the founding of its gay Alcoholics Anonymous group. After being counselor in a treatment center, he became involved with the Palmetto AIDS Life Support Services (PALSS) agency, founded in Columbia by Bill Edens. He details the organization’s evolution, mentions the earlier group Helping Hands, and names leaders and supporters in HIV education and response, while discussing issues facing those with HIV. He speaks of being “defiantly” gay, coming out on local TV, and the difficulty of separating the Lowcountry PALSS organization from its Columbia base, it becoming a separate entity (later renamed Lowcountry AIDS Services), and the impact it had on his friendship with Bill Edens and others. He recounts the growth of the organization, services provided, and challenges faced, catering to various constituencies, including elite gay white men and African American religious groups, among others, while emphasizing the major contributions of lesbians. He gives vignettes of certain actions, including a demonstration by ACTUP in Columbia, SC, coordinating with the SC Department of Health and Environmental Control (DHEC), protesting the policies of Governor Caroll Campbell, and the successful fundraising program Dining with Friends. He lists those who gave of their money, time, and services, and addresses the work’s impact on LGBTQ visibility as well as on his personal life. After working for another AIDS agency in another state, he travelled the world, eventually working for NDI in places such as Palestine, Azerbaijan, Sierra Leone, and Beirut, where he met his husband, André Saade. He and Hall moved to Washington, DC in 2012 and married. Saade became an American citizen in 2017 and Hall was working with an organization focused on international security when he died suddenly of an asthma attack during the COVID pandemic in 2020.
Colleen Condon (pronouns: She/Hers/They/Theirs) and Nichols Bleckley Condon (she/hers), the first same sex couple to receive a marriage license in South Carolina, discuss their personal lives, their courtship, and suing for (and winning) marriage equality in the state. Colleen Condon speaks of her extended family and her Catholic upbringing in Charleston, noting she was so concerned with family and societal expectations that she never considered being lesbian. She married and had a son before coming out. Growing up in the upstate, Nichols Condon was not so religiously oriented. She attended Winthrop University, and also married. Both speak to their sadness in having divorces possibly sever larger familial networks. Each describe their coming out process, explaining it is not a one-time event and expressing fears of losing more conservative siblings, with Colleen Condon’s experience being more public, due to her serving on Charleston County Council and eventually as head of the County’s Democratic Party. After they met, their relationship grew quickly, with Colleen Condon humorously describing her proposal of marriage. They eventually decided to defer marriage until it became legal in South Carolina. They note the difference in LGBTQ acceptability between Charleston and Greenville, SC, mention their devotion to pets, how femme presenting lesbians are often assumed heterosexual, and other topics. When a ruling in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld same-sex marriage in its jurisdiction (including SC), the couple became involved, due to attorney Colleen Condon’s ongoing work on such issues, coordinating with Nekki Shutt, Malissa Burnett, Lambda Legal, the ACLU and South Carolina Equality. Nichols and Colleen describe swiftly escalating events, as their request for a marriage license to Charleston County Probate Judge, Irv Condon, a distant relation of Colleen’s, was accepted, but then was delayed. They gained national and international attention as they became the test case for same sex marriage in SC. Both describe the backlash and some of their fears, as Colleen Condon details the intricacies of the various cases, noting how their 2014 lawsuit against SC was part of the 2015 Supreme Court decision Obergefell v Hodges legalizing same sex marriage. They married in 2015 and both, reflecting on the ordeal, conclude it was worth it. The interview ends with Colleen Condon speaking on work that still needs to be done in SC, specifically on transgender and gender confirmation issues.
