The very busy and very brilliant Heidi Schreck took a moment to chat with us about her new play Grand Concourse, about five soup kitchen workers, and how she balances being a theater maverick. A playwright, actor, and TV writer, she tells us all about her love of Catholic women, cheating on acting, and the deep desire to do good. Though it is ending its New York run at Playwrights Horizons soon, Grand Concourse will open at Steppenwolf in the Spring. With plays like Grand Concourse, we have a feeling we’ll be seeing Ms. Schreck at every theater in the country.

How was Grand Concourse born?

You know I never know what I’m going to write when I start writing, so it’s tricky to say. But now that it’s finished, I think it was born out of a relationship with my family. I grew up working in soup kitchens with my parents. And my parents ran a house for homeless kids and very much devoted their lives to service. So I grew up working in a lot of non-profit service organizations and I think it came out of a desire to write about the complications of those kinds of places.

The need to be good plays pretty heavily in Grand Concourse. Can you speak to that drive in your work?

I think it’s a common thread in all of the plays and probably comes from my tremendous desire to do good. I’m constantly failing at it. I grew up believing in it, it was a big important value in my family. As I grew up, I realized how much harder it is. I realized that sometimes our motives for wanting to do good can actually be suspect and that’s something I learned about myself and was interested in when I wrote characters.

What was the rehearsal process like?

I have been working on the play for a couple years and we’ve done workshops of it. So Quincy [Tyler Bernstine], who plays Shelley had done several workshops of it. We did one in Cleveland and we did one at Playwrights so that was helpful in particular to have her at the center of that play because I very much had her in mind from the beginning. Well, I had myself in mind first because I’m an actor and so I’m always like who do I want to play me, who is the actor I most love and Quincy is just so miraculous. So I learned a lot from having her in the part early on.

From what I understand Dorothy Day was pivotal in Grand Concourse. How much of Shelley is based on Day? What fascinates you about Day?

What fascinates me about Day is that she had this very full life, she was an artist and an anarchist and she wrote scripts for Hollywood and she hung out with Eugene O’Neil. Then found early mid life her calling. I think I was just interested in her as a woman who lived a really multifarious life and then later decided to become a Catholic. I have always been really interested in Catholic women, from the middle ages on. And you know she’s a terrific writer. Honestly I think I got sucked into Dorothy Day by the skill of her writing and then fell in love with what she did with her vocation. I’m just so impressed by someone who could be that single minded in their devotion to other people. Shelley is more like I am, she’s inspired by Dorothy Day. I think Shelley is in the wrong vocation and only sort of realizing it as the play starts. I think she wants to be as passionate as Dorothy about something but maybe followed her into the wrong line of work.

I read Grand Concourse was three years in the making. They say a poem is never finished, only abandoned. How do you know when to let go?

In this case, I let go because the previews were starting. The play is happening at Steppenwolf in the spring. I’m very excited! I know I will do rewrites before it goes to Steppenwolf and probably at that point it will be published so I’ll let it go. But as long as people keep doing it, I’ll keep re-writing it.

You have a very extensive artistic life. You’re an actor, a TV writer, and a playwright. With so many projects happening simultaneously, how do you balance them all? And how do they bleed together?

I haven’t been doing a great job balancing lately, I’m totally exhausted. Doing Grand Concourse and Nurse Jackie at the same time was a little bit overwhelming. But definitely everything informs everything else. I feel like making plays, whether you are acting or writing is essentially the same creative act. I also feel like I’m learning more about storytelling from TV writing just because structure is so important. Some of it has taught me a lot about how to tell a story.

You ever feel like you are cheating on one, meaning when you are writing, do you feel like you're cheating on acting?

I don’t feel like I’m cheating, but every time I’m in the middle of the hard part of writing, I wish I were acting, it’s so much easier. And as soon as I’m acting, I wish I were writing because acting is so hard. In that way, it’s kind of like cheating.

Who are your Patron Saints of Theater?

My first is Maria Irene Fornes. I loved her since I was a teenager, I found some play of hers in my public library when I was in high school, maybe Fefu and Her Friends. It was kind of odd because I come from a very small town. I just fell in love with her plays, they’re so mysterious and beautiful. Chekhov obviously. I actually am a huge fan of Shaw. Those three are at the top of my little saint tribe.

What’s the best piece of advice you have heard in regards to writing? The worst?

Mac Wellman tells people when they are stuck to put your genius hat on and I really like that advice. There’s something really brilliant about that, mainly because he’s right, nobody else can really tell you how to write your own play. You have to put your own genius hat on and see what happens.

Honestly, the worst piece of advice for me is being told to think about what affect you want to have on that audience and maybe that comes a little bit from being an actor. I feel like you actually don’t have control over the audience so worrying too much about what affect you are having on them can get in the way.

What’s you guilty pleasure?

My guilty pleasure is gorging on television: I will watch several episodes of Last Tango in Halifax or It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia in a row. Once I stayed up all night watching Friday Night Lights and then took a short nap and kept going the rest of the next day. Also, I have eaten an entire pan of bread pudding in a sitting and would do it again.

What would you tell baby Heidi (about love, life, theater, etc.)?

I would tell baby Heidi that there is no way around all the stupid, painful stuff, so she may as well start facing it now.

What’s next?

I'm acting in workshops of new plays by Jenny Schwarz and Brendan Jacobs-Jenkins, two of my favorite playwrights. And then in January, I'm running away somewhere to write a new play.

Grand Concourse is playing at Playwrights Horizons through November 30.