Donald Margulies’ Collected
Stories is a fascinating look into the creative process and the relationship
between writers, compellingly brought to life by Dramaworks. For more than two hours an intense emotional
struggle unfolds between two women, one ascending and the other descending,
leaving us to wonder who “owns” the stories of our life?
Paul Stancato’s PBD directorial debut is an auspicious endeavor, taking what is already an engaging play and transforming it into a mesmerizing evening. He not only had the Dramaworks’ extraordinary technical team to assist his efforts, but the notable debut of the two fine actors who inhabited their roles, Anne-Marie Cusson as Ruth Steiner, the mature writer and teacher, and Keira Keeley her star struck, initially compliant student, Lisa Morrison. From Stancato: “they taught me as much as I taught them.” Cusson and Morrison are the consummate actors in this production, connecting with one another to the point of perfection. Their bravura performances makes this the must see play in Palm Beach this season.
Paul Stancato’s PBD directorial debut is an auspicious endeavor, taking what is already an engaging play and transforming it into a mesmerizing evening. He not only had the Dramaworks’ extraordinary technical team to assist his efforts, but the notable debut of the two fine actors who inhabited their roles, Anne-Marie Cusson as Ruth Steiner, the mature writer and teacher, and Keira Keeley her star struck, initially compliant student, Lisa Morrison. From Stancato: “they taught me as much as I taught them.” Cusson and Morrison are the consummate actors in this production, connecting with one another to the point of perfection. Their bravura performances makes this the must see play in Palm Beach this season.
Although emotionally turbulent, there are many subtle
comic moments, not only in some of the dialogue, but pauses where even facial
expressions allow a twitter to ripple through the audience. These are welcome interludes, carefully
orchestrated by Stancato.
At the onset Lisa insinuates herself into Ruth’s well
ordered life. Ruth, an established
writer, has published numerous short stories, collected as well as
uncollected. Lisa, arriving at Ruth’s
apartment for her first out of the classroom session with her mentor, marvels
“What I'm trying to tell you, Ms. Steiner, in my very clumsy stupid way...
Being here?, studying with you ... ? It's like a religious experience for me. No,
really, it is. I mean, your voice has been inside my head for so long, living in this secret place,
having this secret dialogue with me for like years? I mean, ever since high
school when I had to read The Business of
Love ... ? I mean, from the opening lines of ‘Jerry, Darling,’ that was it
for me, I was hooked, you had me. I knew what I wanted to do, I knew what I
wanted to be.”
Keira Keeley, Anne-Marie Cusson; Photo by Alicia Donelan |
Lisa speaks in the vernacular of innocence and youth, one of the many layers in this play, the process of Lisa’s maturing and Ruth’s aging. This theme is as dominant as the teacher/student relationship and Margulies continuously weaves these leitmotifs. As with any great short story itself, Margulies moves the plot along within a structure which is ripe for complication, confrontation, and in this case an intentionally ambiguous resolution which is sure to keep the audience talking long after they have left the theatre.
Teaching writing is the ultimate paradox. As Ruth attempts to explain in her deprecating
way that it really can’t be taught: “Please. Never pay attention to what writers
have to say. Particularly writers who teach. They don’t have the answers, none
of us do.” Cusson infuses this role with
bravado, a self assuredness that comes from her many years of teaching experience
and professional success.
Photo by Robert Hagelstein |
The setting is Ruth’s Greenwich Village apartment. Scenic designer K. April Soroko has faithfully imagined an apartment filled with the very publications, relics, and books that define her life, the view from her window which changes with the seasons, the sacred place of her writing desk, her selection of music and the prominent placement of Matisse's The Dance.
Photo by Samantha Mighdoll |
LISA: You had all
that rich, wonderful, Jewish stuff to draw on.
RUTH: Why was that
luck? That was what I knew; I started out writing what I knew, just like you
and everybody else who writes.
LISA: Yeah, but that
culture!, that history! The first generation American experience and all that.
Nothing in my experience could possibly approach that. What do I have? WASP
culture. Which is no culture at all.
RUTH: Oh, really?
Tell that to Cheever and Updike.
LISA: Oh, God, I've
got to write a novel, don't you think? Isn’t that what they want?
RUTH: Who?
LISA: Isn't that
what they expect? The literary establishment. I mean, in order for me to be
taken seriously?
RUTH: Why? I never
did.
And there is the crux of it all. All writers draw from experience in some way.
Short story writers aspire to the holy
grail of novelist, something never achieved by Ruth. The line between fiction and memoir can be
hair-thin. Philip Roth once said “I
wouldn’t want to live with a novelist. Writers are highly voyeuristic and
indiscreet.” Ruth, as Lisa’s mentor and
teacher, urges her to not censor herself: “You can’t censor your creative impulses
because of the danger of hurting someone’s feelings…If you have a story to
tell, tell it. Zero in on it and don’t
flinch, just do it.”
Photo by Alicia Donelan |
The play moves to the next level. Lisa has had a short story published. They
are now colleagues. Ruth, the teacher,
had given Lisa a story of hers to
critique. Lisa recognizes one of the
characters, Emily, as resembling herself. In fact, this heartfelt moment in the play is
almost a play within itself, the story line about a mother and a daughter
without a clear resolution. Ruth defends
the latter to Lisa saying: “But that’s life, isn’t it? What relationship is
ever truly resolved? People, perfectly
likable people, inexplicable, inconveniently, behave badly, or take a wrong
turn…it happens.” This conceit is not
lost on the audience, foreshadowing their own relationship. After hearing Lisa’s criticisms of the story,
Ruth has a sad epiphany: “I’m jealous that you have all of life ahead of
you. I can’t sit back and watch you do
the dance that I danced long ago and not think about time. I can’t….That’s
what it’s about. Don’t you see? Time.”
One could see where this remarkable play is taking us. The
last scene in the second act is explosive, raw, and Cusson and Keeley plumb the
depths of their characters at the climatic denouement. By then the scales have tipped the other way,
Lisa appropriating the essence of the Delmore Schwartz story for her first
novel, one she claims was written as a tribute to Ruth (was it or wasn’t it?,
the audience must decide for itself), but a story Ruth feels was purloined from
her (contradicting her earlier advice that Lisa must write whatever story
without regard for hurting anyone). Where
does the moral compass point? Whose literary life is it anyway?
The costume design by award-winning Brian O'Keefe
captures the passage of the six years beginning in the 1990s as well as the
maturation of Lisa from girl student to published author in her stunning black outfit of the last scene. As this is not a
period piece and the passage of time allows for only subtle changes in dress, O'Keefe’s
costumes appear to be designed more for the emotional moment.
Time passage was clearly the focus of lighting designer
Ron Burns, both the realism of the time of day and the surrealistic feeling of its
passage over years. The latter in
particular was the fulcrum for sound designer Matt Corey, jazz interpretations
of classics such as “Guess I’ll Hang my Tears Out to Dry” and “In a Sentimental
Mood” playing as seasons roll by. Music
also distinguishes Ruth’s listening habits which reflect the jazz of the 50s
and 60s while Lisa listens to the urban rock of the time.
Regret and loss permeate the play; loss of time, loss of
friendship, loss of loves. Yet there was
real love between these two women. Ruth transitions
from self assured, in control, to friend, and ultimately to feeling utterly betrayed
by Lisa, who in essence has now become her mortal enemy. Margulies has created an extremely thought
provoking, powerful story and the Dramaworks ensemble delivers it with high-intensity
and top notch acting power. The play and
the performance are true to the epigraphs cited by Margulies in the printed
edition of the play:
Influence is simply
transference of personality, a nod of giving away what is most precious to
one’s self, and its exercise produces a sense, and, it may be, a reality of
loss. Every disciple takes away
something from the master.
-- Oscar Wilde
Time is the school in which we learn,
Time is the fire in which we burn.