I love film scores and opera, and I wanted to work in those forms. But theater was more accessible. And no one was doing this in the late 1970s, when I began working in the theater. So, I have written scores for thirteen plays, which are not musicals, but straight plays.

I always thought the story [Anthem] would work in three dimensions - and studying that cut material was very useful.

Ayn Rand called her novella Anthem a "hymn to man's ego." My approach to Anthem the play was to provide the story a further dimension through music and sound. The work is now larger than a hymn. It's really "spoken opera."

Typically, among the audience members joining the actors, the director, Ann Ciccolella and myself, about half of these theater goers have read the novel [Anthem], and half have not read it. That is interesting.

Each day, I read the New York Times before leaving for the theater. And I have this standing assignment: connect the world of Anthem to the late breaking events of the day.

Most of Ayn Rand's major characters are already formed at the start of the stories.

Sometimes, I stood at the front of the E train, watching the tunnel ahead, imagining what Anthem would look like on stage.