Five Questions with Vincent Lonergan

"Five Questions" is a SignalEnsemBlog project that will post short interviews of our ensemble members and artistic associates. General or artist-specific questions are submitted by members or friends of the company, and will be posted every couple of weeks. In addition, if you the reader have anything you'd like to know about a member of Signal Ensemble, or about the company in general, please leave your query in the comments section and we'll make sure it gets answered in this space.

Vincent Lonergan has been a Signal Ensemble member since 2003. He has appeared in Signal’s productions of Much Ado About Nothing, She Stoops to Conquer, Hamlet, Old Wicked Songs (Jeff Nomination, Best Actor), 1776 (Jeff Nomination, Best Supporting Actor – Musical), Six Degrees of Separation and The Ballad of the Sad Café, where he also served as Assistant Director. He has appeared with Porchlight, Vitalist, Quest, Pegasus Players and Bailiwick. Vincent is also a well-respected vocal coach, with a Masters in Music from Indiana University.

1.) You went to school for music and singing. What drew you to acting?

This is an interesting question, as my whole life I have had a dual path between music and theater. When I attended Indiana University I was a music major, but I would also go to the theater auditions and did Mame and Guys and Dolls with the theater department. My third year there I got cast in Man of La Mancha, and at the music school I was cast in a Mozart opera called The Abduction from the Seraglio. Much to my surprise they were in the same time slot. The dean of the music school called me into his office and told me that I needed to do the opera as, after all, I was a music major and I had a music scholarship. So from then on I did opera and of course went on to do my Masters. So, as you see I always had a bit of the theatre bug from the very start. The real change came after I moved to Chicago. At one point I lived near Center Theatre and I went and saw a couple of productions and I was bitten by the bug so to speak. As much as I loved music and opera I knew I could explore much more in straight theatre. There is more room to play when you don't have to stay within the structure of the music. Also for those who have done opera you know the conductor has total control and he or she is at every performance. In theater the director leaves you alone to continue your work as the performances go on. In the end I think that I will always have a place in my heart for music but I enjoy the process of theater more. In performance of straight theater I love to see the gentle discoveries I find right up to the last show. I think in some ways I was lucky to do the music thing first because it taught me good habits in discipline. Here in Chicago I have taken a number of acting classes and like the freedom that has given me and in a way I am glad that I don't have a degree in theatre. So in the end it has been a great journey and this dual path continues to amaze me.

2.) In your role as a vocal coach, you must teach breathing exercises. How do you find breath work differs between singing and speaking on the stage?

As most of you know I have been teaching vocal work for over twenty years now. This question comes up a lot. I could go on for hours but I will try to give you the simple version. I think what is most important in not to talk about how breathing is different for singing and stage work but to work from an angle of how to make all vocal work come from a natural approach. Think of a baby who can gently coo one minute and wail the next. Do you honestly feel that he thinks there is a different way to breath for these two experiences? In my teaching I always tell students that all vocal work is based on balance and hearing. I tell them these are sense memories that were developed in the womb before we even started to breathe. No one stands over the infant child and teaches them breathing exercises. So the real problem is as adults we have developed bad habits which always result in muscular tension. A simple way to try to breathe more naturally is what I always go for in teaching. Always start with balance and hearing then gently receive an aroma through the nose. This of course helps us with sense memories of smell and taste. This is a very Italian thing, but I believe in it. The Italians can make an art form out of any experience. So as you see I start by finding the common, natural approach to vocal work. It is always clear to me that bad habits in speech and singing are usually the same, it’s just that in singing you extend the habits for a longer duration and in speaking the habits are for a shorter duration. I always tell a student that vocal work is about having resonance. We are in a sense the instrument and we need to function in a complete way. There is of course the fear that it takes more to sing than to speak. This is true but you start with the whole recipe before you increase it, just like in cooking. We as Americans should take this more to heart. Acting is all about listening and natural vocal work. It is the same with singing, only for longer durations.

3.) Who is the person who has most influenced you as an artist?

This one is fairly easy for me to answer. However, since we have been talking about by dual path, I have a person for singing and a person for acting. The person in singing is a man by the name of Giovanni Battista Lamperti. He was a singing master who lived in the late 1800's. He wrote a little book called Vocal Wisdom which was translated by William Earl Brown. This is my bible of vocal production. I learned more from this little book about singing than I did from all my college teachers. It helped me become the teacher I am today.

The person who most influenced my acting is Mary Ann Thebus. I have others that gave me things, but she changed me in a way that no one else had. Through working with her I realized acting was first about process and then product. She knew my bad habits and helped me become more natural in my work. Marry Ann is a rare person in that she is as gifted in teaching as she is in acting. She sets the bar for me in both areas.

4.) What is the most powerful theatrical experience you have had as a participant? As an observer?

The first part of this question is very easy for me to answer. I have been so blessed and have had many great theatrical experiences in which I have participated. The one that I am sure I will never forget was a production called Old Wicked Songs. This play was a chance for me to integrate so many parts of my life on stage that I could have done it forever. I cannot say that about any other production. It brought together for me my love of music, acting, and teaching in such a way that I felt completely alive and had no sense of time or space. Having Shawn (Pfautsch) as a partner in this production was a blessing. He brought magic to the stage every night. I must also thank Chris (Prentice) for his direction, and his vision allowed Shawn and I great freedom in performing this play. This theatrical experience will always hold a special place in my heart and soul.

As an observer I have had many great experiences as well. But the one that comes to the front of my mind is the Signal production of Waiting for Godot. I have seen other productions of this work and always found it interesting but what stood out for me in this production was that suddenly it was human and oh so visceral. I found myself laughing one moment and crying the next. Ronan (Marra)'s direction was physical and from the gut, and Aaron (Snook), Chris, Joe (Stearns) and all the others lived this direction throughout the production. It was a production that was simple and glorious all at once. I left the theater that night and knew why I loved theater so much.

5.) You are certainly most experienced member of Signal. What drew you to the company (i.e., how do you put up with these kids all the time)?

Again this one is easy to answer. First and foremost I am drawn to this theater company because this group of people have a passion for what they do. This group can bring passion to any experience whether it’s a production, a party, a play reading or a BBQ. Yes, I am the oldest and sometimes feel it but it is the Signal Ensemble that keeps me young at heart. This is actually the third time I have joined a company and for me the third time is the charm. I feel I have found my home. As a company we may be young but there is a soul to this ensemble that is old and wise. You know it’s not an accident that my most influential moments as a participant and as an observer in theater have come with Signal Ensemble. The other reason I am so drawn is because this company is, in truth, not just an ensemble in name. Signal gets what this word means. That is a great plus. So from my point of view I feel blessed that this younger group of talented people puts up with me and my crap. Signal Ensemble has been there for me in the most glorious moments of my life and in the most tragic. What is so clear to me is that I feel loved at all times. Viva La Signal.

Five Questions with Melania Lancy

"Five Questions" is a new SignalEnsemBlog project that will post brief interviews of our ensemble members and artistic associates. General or artist-specific questions are submitted by members or friends of the company, and will be posted every couple of weeks. In addition, if you the reader have anything you'd like to know about a member of Signal Ensemble, or about the company in general, please leave your query in the comments section and we'll make sure it gets answered in this space.

We kick off the series with ensemble member and resident scenic designer Melania Lancy. Since 2004's "Catch-22," Mel has designed the majority of Signal's sets: everything from a desolate beach in "Seascape," to a cozy pub in "The Weir" (for which she earned a Non-Equity Jeff Nomination) to the titular "character" in our current "The Ballad of the Sad Cafe," and many more. Mel recently received her second Jeff nomination (in the Equity category) for her work on Shattered Globes "The Little Foxes." Check out her website at www.melanialancy.com.

You graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design, focusing on architecture. How did you end up going into set design?

Originally I attended RISD as Architecture major, yet after the first two years it became clear to me that architecture was not versatile enough to satisfy all of my artistic inclinations. Wanting to be free of the conventions and limitations of the field, I switched my major to Illustration, where I hoped to express myself though paintings and drawings. However, I was quickly reminded that I am a three-dimensional thinker and that illustration would not allow me to work with the sculptural qualities I craved. Rather than switching majors or schools, I convinced my teachers to allow me to build my paintings. I began to create what I called immersive environments. The first project being a giant, tented egg that the viewer could pull open to step inside of and/or lay beneath to view the painted mandala representing the human psyche. Working on installations helped me to discover a unique blend between my illustrative and architectural passions.

Upon graduation, I explored the commercial scenic industry creating sculptures and scenery for zoos, theme parks, museums, etc. In 2004, I stumbled upon an ad for a scenic designer needed at a local college and decided that I'd like to try designing for theater. Again a transformation happened; I immediately recognized the value of the captive audience and how the design can affect them. As the lead scenic designer, I had control of the total environment in which I immersed the action, story and the audience. In addition, I really enjoyed collaborating with other artists to tell a story through a combination of visual expression and performance. Designing for theatre demands what I have grown to love: creating immersive environments, interesting storytelling, and has offered another stimulating way for me to express my talents.

Is there a designer or artist who has most influenced you the most?

Making art is a very personal journey that any artist must learn to allow to happen. As most experienced artists will tell you, a young artist must work towards stepping out of the way of their artistic insecurities and inhibitions to finally give the artistic self permission to create, to finally call oneself a true artist. The discipline needed comes in not only mastering the technique of the craft, but the desire and open commitment to it. Therefore, whether or not inspiration comes through words or in a dream, whether it be triggered by viewing fine art or just waiting for the bus, or whether or not the stimulus creates a positive or negative response, as artists we are constantly in a state of being creatively influenced in just carrying out our daily lives.

Having a visual art background rather than theater has altered my perspective of artisans who have influenced my work and makes it hard for me to pinpoint just one. There are so many fellow artists that have spoken about their work and why they do what it is that they do, whose intentions have inspired me along the way and pushed me to keep making art. Of course, I am always attracted to beautiful imagery; yet I am more moved by artistic courage, impeccable craftsmanship and strong conceptual development as a whole, more so than any one artist or designer. But if I had to list a few visual artists I greatly admire for the magic they have added to this world, I'd say... Antoni Gaudi for his play upon flowing shapes, geometry and scale; Lucian Freud for his expressive use of texture, color and evocative portraiture; Maxfield Parrish for his remarkable rending, brilliant colors, attention to detail and composition; Kelly Freas for his humor and versatility; and Walt Disney for his persistent drive, ambitious imagination and extensive influence; to name just a few.

Do you think you have a personal stamp or trademark to your designs, or do you let the content of each play reflect in your designs, giving each its own unique look?

There is no specific brand to the look of my designs; yet glancing back at my work over the years I do see that there is a certain character to the finished product that produces a unique imprint that seems to be mine alone.

As for my approach towards developing the design, I do have a method to my madness. First, I will read the script once through highlighting any notes specifically related to the setting and any oddities that may prove to be inspirational, but not focusing too much upon them. During the next read through, I begin to form more keen opinions about the set references in correlation to the story while jotting down notes of any essential scenic elements. Maybe even pausing as I read to sketch out very rudimentary ideas such as: rough drafts of floor plans, to giant chandeliers, to colors, as they come to mind. I try envisioning the space as I read while generally tracking the movement of the actors through the set. The set becomes a large puzzle made up of conceptual, theoretical and logistical elements. From here, I begin weighing the elements against each other and developing any strong ideas with research, brainstorming and sketching. It is process that can take weeks to hit its mark or mere days.

Theatre is not a solo enterprise, so phase two consists of sharing my drafts with my collaborators and developing a unified vision for the overall production. It can be an exciting time in which the various designers' and the director feed off of one another's ideas. The set may or may not go through some major changes during this process while I keep watch so that the integrity of the set's main design objectives remain intact.

One of your greatest gifts is, after the set is up and painted, you always spend a day or two on "finishing touches." For you this means a sort of free-flow improv that really makes your sets what they are -- no more drawings, no more planning -- just you and your set. Is this something you always mean to set aside time for, or does it just come to you project by project?

It is true that I always reserve time for final touches on each of my sets. It is an essential component for achieving the desired look and intention of each set I design. As an artist, there is a personal investment in my artwork and relationship with my designs that requires my attentive eye for the project as a whole. There is no amount of pre-planning that one can do in advance that can fully anticipate the effect of the actual built structure in the space and how the other design elements will interrelate with it. I use that time to interact with varying elements of the design and to make adjustments to what is working and what isn't. It is my last opportunity to directly connect with the work, get my hands dirty and refine the overall design.

What play, or style of play/project do you think would challenge you the most? And what type of show would you like to see Signal take on, that we haven't touched yet?

Seeing as I am a fan of symbolism and the surrealism, I would welcome the opportunity to respond more fantastically to a script. Although Signal has chosen shows that allow for some stylized representation of a set, overall many of the plays Signal tends to mount are inclined to be set realistically. I am itching to create a more dream-like, irrational world, although not necessarily complimented by an Absurdist or Dadaist script.

Also Signal Ensemble has the ability to be very funny onstage (and off, I might add). I am very interested producing a few more full-on comedies that allow the set to play a role in the story. It's time to step away from some of the heavier dramas for the moment and just make the people laugh.

Lobby Display Material

Hello, dear readers. I've had quite a few requests for the material in the lobby display for "Ballad." So, I figured I'd just post it here and make it easier for everyone (re: me). For those that haven't dropped by to see our little show, perhaps this will inspire you to the box office. Buy your tickets now, folks, before it's too late!

Your humble dramaturg,

Snook.



ALBEE ON BALLAD

I have stayed out of contact with [McCullers] once the Ballad deal was set…for simple reasons that I cannot work when someone looks at every page, every day. It was enough to convince her that the piece should not be a musical…with chorus line and all.


[McCullers’ is] a curious magician. Examine this: she is both child and sage; pain and joy. She has mastered the card tricks of both art and life, and she has seen equally and clearly the sleight of hand of reality and the truth which resides in legerdemain. She is kind enough to call me her friend.


I wouldn’t like to have had [Carson] as an enemy. She could be vicious and terribly selfish, but she was very bright and a good friend. I enjoyed her company.


You’re good actors. Alan’s a good director. Ben’s built a nice set. So if the play’s lousy, it’s my fault. And that’s why the first day of rehearsal is depressing to me.

--to his actors on the first day of rehearsal


It will be a great shame when the play goes away, for I am as fond of it as you are, as fond as anyone can be of a lovely child who has leukemia, or something. Silly audiences, they should want to go to it. Their loss.

--to William Flanagan, composer of the score for Ballad


For the film to succeed to McCuller’s intentions it must bring a mythic quality to the relationship. It is not the story of a shy, sexually repressed woman set on by a brutish punk. It is the story of two people who however unclearly to themselves they may comprehend it, are engaged in a bizarre ‘grand passion’—the real one chance in their lives for something very special—the one opportunity for them both to fully realize themselves. It is this quality, this awareness which reaches towards the mythic, and makes what happens when Marvin Macy comes back so poignant, so inevitable, and the stuff of true tragedy.

--to Simon Callow, the director of the film version


...two reasons really…one of them is that I am interested in finding out what happens when people do adaptations of novels for the stage. Usually there is a tendency to cheapen—to lessen the work that’s adapted, but then again, I can’t think of very many good playwrights that have ever done adaptations. They’re usually second rate people who do adaptations. I’m not suggesting here that I’m a first-rate person, but I am interested in finding out if it’s possible to do an adaptation of somebody else’s work—to move it from the pages of the novel to the life of the stage—without cheapening or lessening the work. And then again, ten years ago—is it ten? Yes, probably eleven years now…when I first read ‘Ballad of the Sad Café,’ I said to myself, ‘If I ever start writing plays I’d have to make this into a play.’


My responsibility, of course, in putting Carson McCullers’ novel on the stage is to make it seem as if Carson McCullers had written it for the stage. So I must indeed become Carson McCullers. I must think like Carson McCullers. The novella ‘Ballad of the Sad Café’ had two lines of dialogue. That’s all in the entire one hundred and ten page book. A play must be mostly dialogue. It’s my intention (and I hope I succeed in doing it) to turn all of that narration into dialogue, which should sound as though it were written by Carson McCullers. That’s my particular function in that particular item. It’s involving to do that, but involving in a different way…but in doing an adaptation, I must think that things are moving, involving, funny or whatever on Carson McCullers’ terms. It is a rather eerie experience. I think that ‘eerie’ is the word that Carson would use.


I am using whatever craft I have to make the piece completely Carson McCullers. No one should realize where she stops and I begin.


I seem to lose my mind about every fifth play and do an adaptation.


I’m relieved it’s over. The show went well, the actors remembered their lines, and the scenery did not fall down. Carson was not amused when the play closed after some one hundred performances, but then, neither was I.



ALBEE ON WRITING

It seems to me that a playwright has a responsibility in his society not to aid it, or comfort it, but to comment and criticize it. A playwright has the responsibility of artistic integrity.

--1962


I write for me. For the audience of me. If other people come along for the ride it’s great….but you have two alternatives; you either affect people or you leave them indifferent and I would loathe to leave an audience indifferent. I don’t care whether they love it or hate it, so long as they’re not indifferent.

--1963


…anybody that says that he can teach playwriting is either a charlatan, a liar or a fool…there is only one rule, which is: you can do anything in the world that you like as long as you make it work. There is only one length for a play and that is the play’s proper length. There are no rules except for the rule of a successful work of art.

--1963


I am suggesting that people write only through social maladjustment. They are not adjusted to society as it is. That is the only reason that people write—the predominate reason that people write.

--1963


When I was six year old I decided not that I was going to be a writer, but with my usual modesty, that I was a writer. So I started writing poetry when I was six and stopped when I was twenty-six because it was getting a little better, but not terribly much. When I was fifteen, I wrote seven hundred pages of an incredibly bad novel—it’s a very funny book that I still like a lot. Then, when I was nineteen I wrote a couple hundred pages of another novel, which wasn’t very good either. I was still determined to be a writer and since I was a writer, and here I was twenty-nine years old and I wasn’t a very good poet and I wasn’t a very good novelist, I thought I should try writing a play, which seems to have worked out a little better.

--1966

The responsibility of the writer is to be a sort of demonic critic—to present the world and people in it as he sees it and say ‘Do you like it? If you don’t like it, change it.’ Too many people go to the theatre wanting to be taken out of themselves, to be given an unreal experience. The theatre must always be entertaining, but I think that ‘Oedipus’ is entertaining.

--1963


If a play can be described in one sentence, that should be its length.

--1975


Usually the way I write is to sit down at the typewriter after a year or so of what passes for thinking, and I write a first draft quite rapidly. Read it over. Make a few pencil corrections, where I think I’ve got the rhythms wrong in the speeches, for example. And I retype the whole thing, and in the retyping, discover that maybe one or two more speeches will come in. One or two more things will happen, but not much. Usually, what I put down first is what we go into rehearsal with.

--1966


It’s like a dog before it craps, wanders around in circles—a piece of earth, an area of grass, circles it a long time before it squats. It’s like that—figuratively circling the typewriter, getting ready to write, and then finally one sits down.

--1966


Writing has got to be an act of discovery. To a certain extent, I imagine a play is completely finished in my mind without my knowing it, before I sit down to write. So in that sense, I suppose, writing a play is finding out what the play is.

--1966


A curious thing happens. Within a year after I write a play I forget the experience of having written it. And I couldn’t revise it or rewrite it if I wanted to.

--1966



ABLEE ON ALBEE

The women in my plays are stronger and more able to deal with life than the men are…the only people who have perpetuated this fiction about women in my plays being unpleasant are people who themselves can’t accept women as being strong and vital and vocal people.

--1975


I dismiss all labels. Theatre of the Absurd. Angry young man. Playwright of Protest. Labels are so facile, and they’re a substitute for conscientious analysis so much of the time. I’d like to think that my plays are out to change people, out to make them more aware of themselves and to point out misuse of consciousness, I suppose as much as anything.

--1979


I hope I put them in contact with areas of their feelings they may have gotten out of contact with. Or maybe make them see things from a different point of view. To think about things they haven’t thought about, think about them differently. Affect them in some way that they’ll have to react differently in the future to things.

--1979



ALBEE ON INFLUENCES

There are between five hundred and one thousand good plays and I’d have to go back to the Greeks and work my way right up. It’s been an assimilative process. Of my contemporaries, after Brecht, I admire Beckett, Jean Genet, Tennessee Williams and Harold Pinter.

--1963


I made a list about a year and a half ago, of the number of playwrights, according to the critics that I had been influenced by and it got to be a drag after I had listed twenty-six. And this list of twenty-six included three playwrights whom I had not read nor seen. So I made a point of reading these playwrights and found that I had indeed been influenced by them.

--1967


The one living playwright I admire without reservation whatsoever is Samuel Beckett. I have funny feelings about almost all the others.

--1966



ALBEE ON MUSIC

Plays are constructed rather the way music is, and also, there is usually, in a well written play, there is a kind of internal music that also relates to music as it goes along—rather the total form of a piece of music.

--1962


I wanted to be a composer when I was around twelve and have absolutely no aptitude for it—but I’ve been rather closely involved with music for many years.

--1962


Musical composition should be studied by playwrights, I think, because I find play construction and musical composition enormously similar

--1962


Along with Beckett and Pinter, we are three playwrights who write, I think, with closest understanding of the relationship between the two structures. And some interesting experiments could be done here. Once should go so far as to listen to the works, examine the sound in relation to the silences, the specific rhythms, the speed of speeches, the fast and slow and the cyclic returning of themes. And you’ll find, I know in my own work, you’ll find a very profound relationship between dramatic structure and musical form.

--1984


...musical notation and play notation can and should be quite similar. a composer can notate, can take a note and equate that to a word...he has tempo markings he can put down--for a violinist he has bowing markings--a musician can be terribly precise just by little marks that he puts on a page of music and a playwright can be exactly that precise since it's an imperfect craft at best, since one must deal with actors and directors, who also pretend to be human beings...the playwright should be able to write a line and notate it in such a way that it's impossible for an actor to say the line incorrectly. It can be just as precise as musical notation. Look at Samuel Beckett for example.

--1963



ALBEE ON THEATRE

There’s something very nice about the magic and immediacy of theatre. It’s not passive the way a novel is; it’s not synthetic the way film is. There’s something very real and dangerous about the theatre that I like.

--1979


Reality isn’t as simple as it used to be and I suspect that the theatre, the adventurous, the new, if you will, the new theatre in the United States, is going to concern itself with the re-evaluation of the nature of reality and therefore, it’s going to move away from the naturalistic tradition.

--1963


We are the only animal who consciously creates art. We are the only animal who attempts metaphor. It is our distinguishing mark. If we turn out to be the kind of society that is unwilling to use the metaphor, unwilling to use art to instruct ourselves, then we are this curious kind of society which is on its way downhill without ever having reached the top. And indeed, if we are unwise enough not to be instructed by the arts, then perhaps we do lack the will and the wisdom—the courage—to support a free society.

-1980



MCCULLERS ON WRITING

Writing, for me, is a search for God.


The writer by nature of his profession is a dreamer and a conscious dreamer. He must imagine, and imagination takes humility, love and great courage. How can you create a character without love and the struggle that goes with love?


I live with the people I create and it has always made my essential loneliness less keen.


What are the sources of an illumination? To me, they come after hours of searching and keeping my soul ready. Yet they come in a flash, as a religious phenomenon.


This fear is one of the horrors of an author's life. Where does work come from? What chance, what small episode will start the chain of creation? I once wrote a story about a writer who could not write anymore, and my friend Tennessee Williams said, "How could you dare write that story, it's the most frightening work I have ever read.' I was pretty well sunk while I was writing it.


I want to be able to write whether in sickness or in health, for indeed, my health depends almost completely on my writing.



MCCULLERS ON INFLUENCES

...one of the strongest influences on my reading life is [Dostoevsky]--Tolstoy, of course, if at the top...Tolstoy is considered by almost everyone as the greatest novelist that ever lived, and I can only say, me too. From his first beautiful book on [war] and [Sebastopol,] all through his long and marvelously productive life he stands alone as a writer.


[Edwin Peacock and John Zeigler] insisted that I read a book called [Out of Africa] and since I thought it was about big game hunting, I insisted just as firmly I didn’t want to read it. In the end, they got their way, for when Reeves and I were in the car on our way to Fayetteville, they slipped two books in my lap; they were [Out of Africa] and [Seven Gothic Tales.] I started [Out of Africa] in the car and read until sundown. Never had I felt such enchantment. After years of reading this book , and I have read it many times, I still have a sense of both solace and freedom whenever I start it again.


Whenever I think of artists having a hard time I think of James Joyce. He had one hell of a time to earn a living for himself and his family.



MCCULLERS ON BALLAD

I believe this adaptation will be interesting and compelling and add a new and beautiful dimension to an already beautiful work.


It was at a bar in [Sand] Street, in the company of W.H. Auden and George Davis that I saw and was fascinated by a remarkable couple. Among the customers there was a woman who was tall and strong as a giantess, and at her heels she had a little hunchback. I just observed them once, and it was not until some weeks later that the illumination of ‘The Ballad of the Sad Café’ struck me.


I was still working on ‘Member of the Wedding’ when with a sudden voltage I remembered the hunchback and the giantess. There was a strong impulse to write that story, suspending ‘Member of the Wedding,’ so I went back to Georgia to write ‘The Ballad of the Sad Café.’ It was a torrid summer and I remember the sweat pouring off my face as I typed, worried that I’d broken faith with ‘Member of the Wedding,’ to write this short novel. When I finished the story I jerked it out of the typewriter and handed it to my parents. I walked for several miles while they read, and when I’d come back I could see from their faces that they’d liked it. It was always my father’s favorite work.


Darling, ‘The Ballad of the Sad Café’ is for you.

--to David Diamond, the third person in her and her husband’s love triangle


This play, as luminous as its stars, is about the destruction of a dream. It has the passion of a Greek drama although the setting is in an eastern town. It shows malicious humiliation and love and tenderness and bitterness. It has in it compassion, the wildest humor and the dark brilliance that to me, is peculiar to the genius of Edward Albee.


Thank you for the sun, the hay, the suntan, not to mention the Virginia Woffe (sic) and all the fun, Happy Days, and our Ballad.

--in a letter to Albee after spending part of the summer together, which included evening readings of Beckett and ‘Ballad’


Edward Albee was very young when he came to me to ask permission to adapt my ‘Ballad of the Sad Cafe.’ He rented a small cabin with no electricity on Water Island and I sat up all night on the beach while he read it to me. However, when I saw it on Broadway I was disappointed. Edward has his own genius and I thought he was just cooling his heels working on something of mine. He should’ve been working on his own plays. There was no dialogue and no action in my novella and I told him it could not be done. I don’t know how he feels but I still think I was right.

What's Next?

Our “Ballad” is open, the reviews are coming in (a couple of our faves are here and here) and we are primed and ready for a great run (get your tickets here). The show runs through September 12th.

So what else is going on?

This is an unusual season for us, as we are only doing two shows as opposed to our standard three. There is a very good and very exciting reason for this that will be made clear sooner rather than later, so stay tuned for that.

There will be a formal press release in the coming week or so, but we would like to make mention here that we have three new ensemble members: Melania Lancy, Jon Steinhagen and Bries Vannon. Mel and Bries had been with us as Artistic Associates last season (a sort of part-time designation), but the full-time involvement they were putting in led to their title changes. Mel has been designing our worlds since "Catch-22" in 2004, and Bries has worked as actor or assistant director for several of our shows. Their talent is on full display in “Ballad,” with Mel’s gorgeously run-down general store setting the tone and Bries’ Crazy Merlie Ryan gettin’ his crazy on all over the place.

Jon has appeared in our productions of "1776" and "Six Degrees of Separation." He has also been a very active participant in our monthly Second Sundays reading series, and he may have written a play for a specific company that said specific company is pretty excited about. He is our first “brand new” member since bringing Simone on board over a year ago, and we feel extremely fortunate that he accepted our offer. He brings a ton of experience in multiple disciplines. Plus, we love him.

But when’s the next show? Well, Snook isn’t growing his hair long for nothing. We open "Aftermath" in May at the Raven Theatre. The Brian Jones semi-bio-play-semi-musical will begin light music rehearsals in the coming weeks as the latest draft is turned in and casting is complete. Joe is getting his rhythm guitar on as he preps to play Keith Richards, and we are very excited to report that Nick Vidal has agreed to do his best Jagger for us. The aforementioned Mr. Steinhagen is going to help us put all of the musical pieces together, and I’ll be overseeing the entire matter once I’m finished sweating the script out.

As for a sneak peak, here’s a tidbit with the soft spoken Jones. As is the plays primary purpose to reveal, he was one of music’s true little known geniuses. Just don’t ask him to define Surrealism.

Cheers,

Ronan

Why Writers Write

One more time into the dramaturgical pool we go, dear readers. My services will no longer be needed at this fair blog as the show is opening on Sunday (get your tickets now!). For this last entry, I want to return to our two authors and pose them each the question: “Why do you write?”

We’ll start with Carson McCullers since this journey began with her. Like many writers, her first passion was actually music. She took piano lessons at an early age and showed quite a proficiency, which led her parents to push her down that career path. At the age of 17 she left her middle class home in Georgia to study piano at the Julliard School of Music in New York City--at least, that’s what she told her parents. During her last years in Georgia, however, there was a slow growing fire burning inside her to tell stories through prose and she saw New York City as the only way to feed this desire. She never made it to Julliard, but instead worked odd jobs while studying creative writing under Dorothy Scarborough at Columbia College. Her first piece, “Wunderkind,” was published in Story magazine in 1935 and her career was off and running.

The above is a happy, tidy little story of success, but her life was far from a fairy tale and her work would reflect this. Her health was always an issue, having battled rheumatic fever as a young girl and living through a series of strokes throughout her life that left her left side paralyzed by age 31. She also battled alcoholism and a brutal marriage to Reeves McCullers (see previous blog). All of this--her poor health, heartbreak and addiction--seemed to contribute to her art. As she said herself, “I want to be able to write whether in sickness or in health, for indeed, my health depends almost completely on my writing.”

Then there is her obsession with love, both good and bad. Tennessee Williams, a close friend of hers in her later years wrote, “Carson’s heart was often lonely and it was a tireless hunter for those to whom she could offer it, but it was a heart that was graced with light that eclipsed its shadows.” This is, I think, where it all begins and ends. Once again, I defer to McCullers, as she says it much better that I ever could:

The writer by nature of his profession is a dreamer and a conscious dreamer. He must imagine, and imagination takes humility, love and great courage. How can you create a character without love and the struggle that goes with love?

Now, on to the mysterious Mr. Albee. His childhood couldn’t be any more different than that of his partner in crime. The adopted son of a wealthy couple, he was pushed at a young age towards a conventional and professional life. This clearly did not work out. As he said later in life: “I never felt comfortable with adoptive parents. I don’t think they knew how to be parents. I probably didn’t know how to be a son, either.” He left home before his twentieth birthday and headed for Greenwich Village. Like McCullers, he took on an assortment of odd jobs while he toiled away at the typewriter. Where did this obsession with words come from? It’s quite simple, as he tells it:

When I was six years old I decided not that I was going to be a writer, but with my usual modesty, that I was a writer. So I started writing poetry when I was six and stopped when I was twenty-six because it was getting a little better, but not terribly much. When I was fifteen, I wrote seven hundred pages of an incredibly bad novel—it’s a very funny book that I still like a lot. Then, when I was nineteen I wrote a couple hundred pages of another novel, which wasn’t very good either. I was still determined to be a writer and since I was a writer, and here I was twenty-nine years old and I wasn’t a very good poet and I wasn’t a very good novelist, I thought I should try writing a play, which seems to have worked out a little better.

So, it was merely a process of elimination with Albee, which meant that, unlike McCullers, it took quite a while to gain the recognition. As soon as he had it figured out, though, it happened very quickly. At the age of thirty, Albee sat down at the typewriter and banged out “Zoo Story” in a flurry of creativity. His first play equalled his first success and the rest, my friends, is theatre history.

For those that are yearning for more info, a bibliography is below and there will be even more tidbits in the lobby display. Thanks for reading and I hope to see you at the show!

Your humble dramaturg,

Snook.




Bottoms, Stephen, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Edward Albee. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005.

Burch, Ron. “The Real McCoy.” Southern Reader. 2005. 6 July 2009.

Carr, Virginia Spencer. The Lonely Hunter: A Biography of Carson McCullers. Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 2003.

Dews, Carlos L., ed. Illumination and Night Glare: The Unfinished Autobiography of Carson McCullers. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1999.

Gussow, Mel. Edward Albee: A Singular Journey. New York: Applause, 2001.

Infoplease. 2009. Pearson Education. 28 July 2009.

Kolin, Philip C., ed. Conversations with Edward Albee. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1988.

Rosenberg, Jennifer. “1930s Timeline.” About.com. 28 July 2009.

Rosenberg, Jennifer. “1910s Timeline.” About.com. 28 July 2009.

Taylor, Col. Samuel. “Depression and War.” Our Georgia History. 19 July 2009.

The New Georgia Encyclopedia. 6 April 2005. University of Georgia. 6 July 2009.

Thompson, Neal. Driving With the Devil. New York: Crown Publishing, 2006.

Wikipedia. 2009. Wikipedia Foundation. 1 July-28 July 2009.