I met Robert Redford at his work cabin in Sundance, Utah, on a crisp fall day in 1996. His assistant had advised me to bring along a book to read because her boss could run notoriously late. Ninety minutes after the hour of my scheduled appointment, he emerged from his office, saw me at a distance, and yelled out, “You must be Phil. So sorry. I promise to be with you soon.” Inexplicably, my first words to the legendary star were, “No worries. As long as it’s before Shavuot.” Why I uttered a phrase that might have been snatched from the screenplay of The Way We Were, I leave unexplored. A bit later I was sitting across from him discussing acupuncture.

Though I had begun my career at Playwrights Horizons in 1975 when I was barely 22, in 1985 my professional life had careened into the world of Eastern medicine just as the AIDS epidemic had emerged. For more than a decade I was a doctor, treating very sick young men before there were promises of any effective therapeutic treatments. Bob and I spoke for two hours about the very real influence of nature on artists and art making, about being surrounded by these elements on his exquisite mountain, where film and theatre labs had been in session for at least a decade. We spoke of the alignment of Chinese medicine with the seasons, about the transformative power of story, of how the heart of dramaturgy and healing were both rooted in deep listening. He then invited me to lead his theatre program. That encounter essentially defined Mr. Redford.

For more than 24 years, he gave me a wide berth to reimagine how plays could be developed, and his trust was unwavering. I discovered that as a man of the theatre, he reveled in the world of live performance and had profound respect—awe, even—for the collaboration of playwrights and composers, stage directors, and actors.

He gave me permission to forge new partnerships: White Oak; Mass MoCA, where we focused on ensembles and musicals; Ucross in Wyoming, where we established the first residency for emerging and established playwrights and composers; the first stage directors lab in Arles; and a dynamic international program that included 10 years in East Africa and another decade identifying and supporting Arab-language theatre artists.

The roster of theatre artists who benefited from his dedication included Lisa Kron, Lynn Nottage, Michael R. Jackson, Dael Orlandersmith, Mona Mansour, Taylor Mac, Michael Korie and Scott Frankel, Jeanine Tesori, Adam Guettel, Lemon Andersen, Brandon Jacobs-Jenkins, Tanya Saracho, Quiara Alegría Hudes, The Debate Society, Moisés Kauffman, Lee Breuer, Bruce Norris, Sarah Treem, Radha Blank, David Adjmi, Dennis O’Hare, Lisa Peterson, Michael John LaChuisa, Sarah Tsing Loh, The Civilians, Hansol Jung, Diana Son, Theresa Rebeck, JoAnne Akalaitis, Antoinette Nwandu. The list is almost endless, and would also include dozens of art makers from five nations in East Africa and as many countries across North Africa and the Levant.

One day I was informed that Bob was becoming nervous about the geographic dispersal of the Sundance brand and adamant that Sundance, Utah, remain the beating heart of his vision. For the next board meeting, I prepared a video in the hopes of assuring him that, while the center of our universe was indeed Sundance Mountain, we could embrace other geographic vectors of artistic activity and still maintain our sense of home. In my video I presented our lab activities on Lamu Island in Kenya and our work with Arab-language playwrights from the Middle East. I ended my presentation with the iconic scene from the film of The Wizard of Oz when Dorothy awakens in her Kansas farmhouse and says: “Oh, Auntie Em, there’s no place like home!”

When the short video was over, there was silence in the board room, until my colleague John Cooper, who oversaw the Sundance Film Festival, uttered, “That was the gayest thing I’ve ever seen.” To which Bob replied, “Well, I am not gay, and I loved it!” Without a pause, I came back with, “You’re not gay?!” The end resut: Bob enthusiastically embraced my taking the Sundance “ethos” not only across the American landscape but across the globe.

Escorting Bob and his wife Sibylle to many plays in New York was my great pleasure. I recall the night we attended a performance at St. Ann’s Warehouse of Lolita Chakrabarti’s Red Velvet, directed by Indhu Rubasingam, and how excited he was to meet the cast. He spoke to each one of them about how they approached their roles. On the ride back to Manhattan, he turned to me and said, “Phil, how I wish I had returned to the stage when I was younger.”

At a Sundance benefit at New York Theatre Workshop of Denis O’Hare and Lisa Peterson’s An Iliad, I introduced Bob to the audience as “the only person in the universe who called me Phil.” He took the microphone from my hands, and, as I exited into the audience I heard him yell out, “Hey, thank you, whoever you are.” He was astonished by the play.

Bob did not see the theatre program at Sundance as a variation on his film labs, but in fact, as a kind of pilot light for Sundance—an energy source that generated a range of truly risk-taking storytelling which also benefited the film industry he loved so dearly. Some of our stage fellows would return to Sundance to adapt their plays into films, including Moisés Kaufman (The Laramie Project) and Stew (Passing Strange).

Perhaps Bob’s attachment to theatre carried some nostalgia, a road not taken, but in the best of ways. To this day, I believe Robert Redford perceived the Sundance Theatre Program as a deep and soulful part of his institute. His vision gifted hundreds of stage artists time and space to bring their visions forward to production, and for this we are all forever grateful.

Philip Himberg was artistic director of the Sundance Institute Theatre Program from 1996 until 2019.