Hailed in NYC, Ganesh Versus the Third Reich tells of the Hindu deity’s trip to reclaim the Sanskrit symbol of the swastika from the Nazis. Performed by actors with “intellectual disabilities,” it “never lets you settle into passive acceptance of anything it does.”

In an interview with Eric Dyer, theater collective Rude Mechs discusses onstage sex in Dionysus in 69, their collaboration with Radiohole (who performed at Out There 2010), and the autobiographical nature of The Method Gun (which launches Out There 25 Jan. 10-12).

The best performance work, says PS122’s founding director Mark Russell, comes from crossing and combining genres or disciplines: “Those were the cracks where the light gets in.” In conversation with the Walker’s Philip Bither, Russell reflects on punk, performance, and the legacy of the Walker’s Out There festival at the quarter-century mark.

The Guardian’s list of 2012’s top performances has Back to Back Theatre’s Ganesh versus the Third Reich—part of next month’s Out There festival—at no. 7, dubbing it “the most challenging and subversive” piece at the London International Festival of Theatre.

Frederick Neumann, an actor and mainstay of the experimental theater company Mabou Mines, passed away in late November at 86. The company has visited the Walker many times, including in 2005, for its presentation of DollHouse.

Co-commissioned by the Walker, Elevator Repair Service’s 6-1/2 hour GATZ opens a nine-show run in LA Wednesday night. Dubbing the text indispensable, ERS decided to read every word of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby—aloud and on-stage.

“Part of the rap against activists is they’re railing against something,” says Marc Bamuthi Joesph, whose Walker-co-commission red, black & GREEN: a blues opens at BAM this week. “I want to make something. I want to make the world I want to see. It’s not just pretty art.”

Students in Wesleyan’s Institute for Curatorial Practice in Performance are adding context to the RoseLee Goldberg–curated Performance Now show. Online reflections include the Walker’s Michèle Steinwald on Jérôme Bel and Abigail Sebaly on Jesper Just.

Amid the clamor of Super PAC–powered politicians duking it out on a whole new level this election season, Laurie Anderson’s Dirtday! offers a timely, quietly powerful rejoinder. An artist who normally steers clear of directly addressing politics in her work, she recently discussed her motivations in applying the “sharp tools” of her art to the topics of peace, politics, and never-ending war.