Ideas

This week's blog post is a little different. 

I'm not going to write about a play, because I haven't been reading a play. I've been reading Jon Jory's Tips: Ideas for the actor (and not for the first time).

It's a great book. It's a series of pieces of advice for actors. It covers everything. It's not intended to be read straight through, really, but to be flipped through. It's meant to give the reader reminders and jolts of inspiration. And it works. The advice is spot on. Everything Jon Jory wrote in there was great.

But that's not what I've been reading it for. I've been reading it, really, for the other words written there in the margins. Words written by many very important people to me. People who knew me and believed in me. Words like that have meant a lot to me when I believed in myself a lot less. And when I was waiting to find out whether strangers with the power to change my future believed in me.

And the people who wrote those words, I don't think they'd be surprised by my acceptances. And I may have been just a little bit less so because of them.

So I want to salute the books that hold memories in a way that nothing else can. I'm very, very grateful for all that we can get out reading--sometimes very literally--between the lines.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Me)

I was pretty freaked out by Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, by Edward Albee. My initial reaction after reading the play was Oh my God... these people...

The play tells the story of one night--one very long night--that an old married couple spends "entertaining" a younger married couple in their home. Over the course of the night, all of the problems in both marriages (and there are many) are brought to the surface, and the audience watches as their relationships collapse. It's sad, yes, but even more so, it's disturbing. The hosts, George and Martha, are vicious people. Their guests, Nick and Honey, have their issues, too, but they're nowhere near as cruel. George and Martha try incessantly to hurt each other in any way they can. They will use anyone and anything against each other, no matter what it costs them (or anyone else who happens to get caught in their crossfire). They are deeply, deeply damaged people who are clearly bad for each other, but, it seems, stuck together forever.

The structure of the play is excellent. It builds and shifts, so that despite the fact that it's a lot more talking than action, the audience doesn't get bored. The characters change their tactics constantly--some of the exchanges between George and Martha are like watching a sword fight. The slow reveal of information keeps the audience engaged as well. George and Martha's mysterious "son" is mentioned at the beginning of the show, and as it progresses, the information the audience learns becomes more complex and intriguing. And by the end, the refrain is eerie enough to send shivers down your spine: "Who's afraid of  Virginia Woolf, Virginia Woolf, Virginia Woolf..."

The play is great. But it's not the kind of play that will restore your faith in humanity or make you feel better about the world. It may make you feel better about your life--by comparison. It's It's tragic and sickening and unresolved--as Martha puts it, "what a dump."

This Is Our Youth

"teenagers have so much more depth of experience than their parents think and so much less than they think," --Kenneth Lonergan

As I was skimming a play anthology called Under Thirty in search of plays that might contain good college audition monologues, I was surprised to see a title I recognized: This Is Our Youth, by Kenneth Lonergan. I was lucky to get a chance to see the show at Steppenwolf this past summer, performed by Michael Cera, Kieran Culkin, and Tavi Gevinson. I decided to read it--it's a great play, and I was interested in seeing how different my experiences watching it and reading it would be. I've read plays and then seen them before, but never the reverse, expect for a few Shakespeare shows I saw when I was too young to remember much about them.

I was shocked. It was almost like reading a different play. I remembered the plot, of course, but a lot of other things seemed very different. For one thing, the character descriptions of some of the characters differed greatly from what I saw onstage. For one thing, Cera's and Culkin's characters are written as being nineteen and twenty-one years old (respectively), which changes the way you register their words and actions a great deal. Also, Gevinson's character was much closer to her real age. She was playing a nineteen-year-old, so that affected the relationship dynamics between her and the other two as well.

But what stood out to me even more was the way that the actor's interpretations affected how I saw the story. Michael Cera brought an authentic sweetness to the character of Warren that didn't come across to me as I read the script, and Culkin's Dennis seemed even more manipulative and in-control than the one in the text. The ending felt different to me, too. In the script, it felt like sort of a resolution. When I saw it, it seemed to cut off very abruptly, unfinished. It's very cool to compare the two--the more I read and watch plays, I'm astounded by how varied different interpretations of the same play can vary. I guess that's the result of creating an entire world out of dialogue: there are lots, and lots, and lots of choices.

The reason This Is Our Youth is included in a play anthology called Under Thirty is that it's about young people. The characters are teenagers, and they're thinking and talking and wondering about it means to be a teenager--and to become an adult. But it's no coming of age story. It's about the real fear and vulnerability involved in not understanding your identity and coming to terms with death. I dug up my program from the show, and found within it and interview with Kenneth Lonergan. He says, "teenagers have so much more depth of experience than their parents think and so much less than they think," and to me this rings very true. I would highly recommend This Is Our Youth. There's sex and a huge plate of drugs that flips over and three very real, lost people trying to find themselves and each other. It's great.