Rajiv Joseph is one of the most acclaimed playwrights of his generation, with works including Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo (a Pulitzer Prize finalist starring Robin Williams on Broadway), Guards at the Taj, Gruesome Playground Injuries, and Animals Out of Paper. He's also written for Showtime's Nurse Jackie, but as you'll hear, theater is where his heart has always been.

There was something oddly comforting about this conversation. Maybe it's because Rajiv and I both grew up in Ohio. Maybe it's because we're both storytellers who obsess over completely different things. Or maybe it's because we accidentally spent two hours bouncing between Robin Williams, Chipotle orders, Breaking Bad, NFL trivia from the late '80s, Senegal, the Browns, and why The Shining somehow keeps getting better every time you watch it.

Somewhere in the middle of all that, Rajiv casually drops some of the best advice I've heard about creativity. Not in a "here's my TED Talk" kind of way. Just in the way someone who's spent years wrestling with stories talks about his craft. We get into why finishing something mediocre is better than never finishing something great, why limitations can actually make you more creative, and how he finds himself writing about worlds he knows almost nothing about.

I also loved hearing him talk about success without pretending he's ever "arrived." Even after Broadway and television, there's still that quiet anxiety every artist understands: now you have to do it again. It's an honest conversation with someone who's thoughtful, funny, and refreshingly uninterested in pretending to have all the answers. I walked away wanting to read more plays... and maybe order Chipotle.

Read a recent article from Playbill with Rajiv Joseph

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