In the first years of the decade, Steppling wrote and directed
The Thrill,
Standard of the Breed,
Theory of Miracles, and
The Sea of Cortez. Developed for the Los Angeles Theater Center,
Sea of Cortez, marked a turning point in Steppling's critical reception. Sylvie Drake, of the
Los Angeles Times, wrote that the play was “powerful yet difficult to embrace because it is so terminally despairing and virtually humorless.” Film director
Barbet Schroeder, helped finance the New York production of the award-winning
Teenage Wedding, in 1991 of
New York magazine. During this period, Steppling continued leading workshops. In 1990, actor-director Rick Dean revived Steppling's one-act,
Neck (1982) which was a critical success. It had an extended run at The Lost Studio, run by Cinda Jackson. The 1990s also saw Steppling undertaking film and television, including a staff position on
Cracker and wrote the screenplay for
Animal Factory, (2000) directed by
Steve Buscemi, based on the Edward Bunker novel. In the early nineteen nineties Steppling founded Circus Minimus with Mick Collins and Cinda Jackson. Workshops were conducted at Jackson's The Lost Studio. Steppling told Jan Breslauer, of the
Los Angeles Times, "This is about more than theater; it's about ideas, the nature of performing and the creative process" Circus Minimus folded and was followed by Empire Red Lip, whose core members included former Padua students. Based in
Silver Lake, Los Angeles. Empire Red Lip focused on collaborative projects, each stemming from intensive reading of a text:
The Conquest of the New World, for example, stemmed from the writing of
Bartolomé de las Casas;
Murdered Sleep and White Cold Virgin Snow were oblique commentaries on plays by
William Shakespeare. Steppling wrote the screen adaptation for Eddie Bunker's
Animal Factory, which was directed by Steve Buscemi and starred Willem DaFoe, Edward Furlong, and Mickey Rourke. He left the United States soon after completing the film. ==2000s==