DRAMA American Authors Challenge October 2019

This month we’re concentrating on a form rather than an author, opening up the very broad field of American Drama for discussion. This will be challenging in various ways, as a play is written primarily to be seen in action, and does not present at its best flat on the page. But many of the most familiar pieces have been filmed, and some are readily available on Netflix, Amazon or YouTube. (Don’t forget the video shelves of your favorite library.) And I see absolutely nothing wrong with satisfying this challenge by watching, rather than reading, a play of your choice. Or several. Most of us have probably seen some adaptation of Our Town, Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, one or more of Tennessee Williams’s plays, or Eugene O’Neill’s work. The recent powerful performances of Denzel Washington and Viola Davis in Fences made me an instant fan of August Wilson’s work. Rather than try to summarize American Drama for this introductory post, I will submit a list of some of my favorite plays and/or performances. Hopefully there will be some you haven’t seen or heard about, and something will spark your interest. If you have been lucky enough to see a fine live production of a favorite, (and I know there are theater goers among us) please share your experience with us.

Agnes of God by John Pielmier
Movie starring Jane Fonda, Meg Tilly and Anne Bancroft
Amazon and others



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The Fifth of July by Lanford Wilson
American Playhouse production starring Richard Thomas, Swoozie Kurtz, Jeff Daniels 1981 No streaming or rental options; pricey DVD; try the library!



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The Shadow Box by Michael Christofer
YouTube

True West by Sam Shepard
There’s an Audible version

The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams
Tough to choose between Kate Hepburn and Joanne Woodward as Amanda Wingfield.
Both available on YouTube

Glengarry Glen Ross by David Mamet
Movie starring Al Pacino, Jack Lemmon, Ed Harris
iTunes

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Doubt by John Patrick Shanley
Movie starring Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman
various outlets



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Brighton Beach Memoirs by Neil Simon
Movie from 1986 various outlets

Death of a Salesman
Dustin Hoffman version various outlets

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Our Town by Thornton Wilder
The Paul Newman PBS Masterpiece version is unsurpassed.
DVD available from Amazon and UK version can be purchased directly from PBS.org



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Notes From the Field
Anna Deveare Smith’s one-woman show streamable with an HBO subscription

I will try and pull something off the shelf. I just saw Until the Flood, a powerful series of monologues based on interviews after the shooting of Michael Brown in 2014. I may start with the playscript of that.

I just requested a collection of Oscar Wilde's plays, so I think I'll do some reading there in October. I've read only a few things BY Wilde and a few things ABOUT him (no plays) so I think that will fit the bill for me. I'll keep an eye out for what others are reading, too!

Karen O.

I think this is a great idea, Linda and you definitely got me with Our Town, with Paul Newman. He is, easily one of my very favorite actors. I requested the DVD from the library. I also love your inclusion of Glengarry Glen Ross. What a great film and wonderful cast.

Lets not forget about the great filmed versions of Arsenic and Old Lace, A Streetcar Named Desire and Cat on a Tin Roof.

It was really nice to revisit Grover's Corners tonight with Paul Newman - he, Marlon Brando, and Richard Burton...whew.

One of the best parts of Our Town is the letter that comes addressed, ending "...Solar System, The Universe."

>5 m.belljackson: I love the music by Aaron Copland for the film of Our Town. I've heard it several times on classical radio, and it always brings back the essence of the town and the film for me.

Our Town has been a favorite with me most of my life. I know it was one of the first plays I ever saw performed live, and a young man I cared a lot for when I was in high school played the stage manager in an amateur production. His soft North Carolina accent added something special to the role (at least I thought so at the time!). I liked Spalding Gray's interpretation later on, but once I saw Paul Newman do it, there was no one else. The heart-tugging sadness of that play is intensified for me now, as all three of those gentlemen have left us.

Paul Newman had a real affinity for Tennessee Williams's plays. Besides Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, he also starred in Sweet Bird of Youth on both stage and screen (if you've seen the 1962 movie and decide to read the play, be prepared for some pretty grim stuff they left out) and directed Joanne Woodward in The Glass Menagerie.

I've narrowed my focus to Eugene O'Neill, Nobel laureate in 1936, four-time winner of the Pulitzer for drama. I have at least 9 of his plays on the TBR. Leading choice just now is The Emperor Jones.

But I have some other plays/scripts on the TBR, including a TV play by Gore Vidal (Visit to a Small Planet), Vonnegut's Happy Birthday, Wanda June, a couple of Tennessee Williams plays, Edward Albee, and, if it comes out of hiding, a Mamet.

> - 7 - Our Town and The Glass Menagerie were among the first plays I can remember studying in high school and I adored them both. I have seen several productions of both (school productions). I must look for the Paul Newman version. Hopefully, the library can find it for me.

Not sure I will find one for this month but I will try. I did read the play of Fences last year. Excellent though I would still love to see the film version at some point.

My daughter looked through the list of American plays and we chose "Inherit the Wind" to follow "Our Town".

Is a musical like "Guys and Dolls" also a play?

The first thing that came to my mind was finding a copy of Eugene O'Neill's 'The Iceman Cometh" When we were much younger my wife and I saw Jason Robards perform in it at The Lincoln Center in DC. Then I thought Arthur Miller. Hmmm Death of a Salesman? How about The Crucible? I have that and so I'm thinking of having a go at Arthur Miller's play The Crucible

>11 RBeffa: I think The Crucible is one of the most "readable" plays I've experienced on the page.

>10 m.belljackson: I'm inclined to say musicals are a class unto themselves, and not exactly what I mean when I say "drama", but perhaps what we should have called this month's subject is "American Theater", which would be more encompassing. By all means, share your thoughts on Guys and Dolls with us.

>9 jessibud2: I bought several of August Wilson's Pittsburgh cycle plays after seeing "Fences"...I read The Piano Lesson and will get to at least one more of them this month. I'm going to try to go through them in chronological order, which means starting with Gem of the Ocean.

>8 weird_O: O'Neill is a tough one for me...so far I haven't engaged very well with his work.

I finished The Emperor Jones yesterday and figured I should keep going and read The Hairy Ape as well. I'm reading a Modern Library collection of three O'Neill plays. The third play, Annie Christie, I read a couple of years ago. Coincidentally, TCM aired that third play, with Greta Garbo in the title role, just a few days ago. I missed it, sad to say.

I also started the short book with two David Mamet plays: Sexual Perversity in Chicago and The Duck Variations.

Thinking that reading a play with more than one act would be good. Got a few of those.

>12 laytonwoman3rd: My Penguin edition of the Crucible (2003 edition) has a nice long introduction of about 20 pages that I read last evening. It provides a lot of background from various sources about Miller's influences and about the witch trials, both in 1692 and the 1950's. I somehow had the idea that The Crucible was an actual historical "true history" capture of the events in play form but the intro discusses a few of that changes that Arthur Miller made to events and people. In other words even though he may use real peoples names his play can be considered as "inspired by the events of 1692" rather than a retelling of the events. I have not started the play itself yet but browsing it I can see that it is a very readable play.

>12 laytonwoman3rd:

We'll be with GUYS AND DOLLS as soon as Season 4 of OUTLANDER (daughter's current intrigue) has ended on Netflix.

Today's Final Jeopardy category was "American Playwrights". The clue was "In 1963 the Pulitzer Advisory Board vetoed his controversial play & gave no award; he would go on to win 3 Pulitzers"

Try your luck or knowledge...

The correct response: Who is Edward Albee?

I have now read August Wilson's Gem of the Ocean. It turned out to make yet another connection to Ceremony, as there is something of a purifying ritual involved. Citizen Barlowe, a very troubled young man with a guilty conscience, seeks help from Aunt Ester Tyler, an ancient woman gifted with the wisdom of the ages. She sets him a task, and then takes him on a spiritual journey to the "City of Bones" where he atones for his sin and learns to "be right with himself". I enjoyed reading this play, but have trouble imagining it on the stage. There is little action, and not a lot of dialog. Mainly, various characters deliver longish speeches--Aunt Ester and Solly tell stories, Caesar rants. I think I would have appreciated it better in the form of a short story. Still, powerful voices speaking here.

>16 laytonwoman3rd: - I thought of you (and this category) while watching last night. I got the wrong answer, myself, guessing Arthur Miller.

>17 jessibud2: Yeah, my daughter and I both said Arthur Miller. My brilliant husband, however, guessed it right.

That was Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?. Too much cussing for those moguls entrusted with the reins of Columbia University, and therefore the final decisions on Pulitzer Prizes. They screwed Hemingway, Pynchon, JCO, Elizabeth Spencer, and others that I'm forgetting.

I do have the Albee play in question on my bedside table, whilst I try to make up my damn mind about reading it or some other. Maybe this reminder will be a tipper.

Oh, and how about those Swedish Academy literarians? Awarding the prize to an apologist for Slobodan Milosevic.

>19 weird_O: Yeah, that Nobel decision is causing a lot of stir. "It is not in the Academy’s mandate to balance literary quality against political considerations.” Really? I kinda thought it was.

I recently listened to Sorry, Wrong Number by Lucille Fletcher. It's a one-act audio drama in which an invalid woman accidentally overhears a telephone call plotting the murder of a woman and then slowly realizes that the woman is her. A very quick listen (under half an hour) that does a decent job of building suspense even if the main character is pretty insufferable.

While I don't have the attention span for audiobooks, I find audio dramas work better for me since everything is dialogue driven and there's a full cast (making it easier to distinguish characters). Most libraries have a healthy collection of productions from L.A. TheatreWorks (also the BBC although fewer of those will match the challenge criteria) if you want to tackle drama in a slightly different format.

>21 MickyFine: Thanks so much, Micky. Radio drama is a rich vein I hadn't even thought about for this challenge. I'll be looking into the options now.

The Paul Newman version of Our Town is on its way to my library for me! Finally

>23 jessibud2: Yay! (Get in a stock of tissues.)

I read 3 works for this challenge:
--Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters, 1915. Technically not a play, but a series of poetic monologues, often performed like a drama. Set in a small town cemetery in turn of the century Illinois, the deceased speak their poetic epitaphs.
--Inherit the Wind by Jerome Lawrence and Robert Lee, 1955. Loosely based on the Scopes trial of 1925.
--Brighton Beach Memoirs by Neil Simon, 1984. Loosely based on Simon's youth; set in 1937.

All three were well-done with totally different moods. All three were reflecting back in time to an earlier American generation from the perspectives of a family (Simon); a community (Masters); and a nation (Lawrence & Lee).

>25 kac522: Three favorites of mine, Kathy. I was introduced to Spoon River Anthology by my high school English teacher; we read a lot of it aloud in class, with parts assigned. It felt very avant garde to a 16-year-old country kid in the 1960's...and I didn't even know what avant garde meant! That teacher was also the director of our Senior Class play...I think she sneaked off to NYC (about 2 hours away) to see live theater frequently.

Hooray, for Grover's Corners! Okay, it is not a book, but I did watch the PBS version of Our Town, with the amazing Paul Newman as the stage manager. Sadly, I have never read the play, by Thorton Wilder. I will have to get to it. This filmed "play" version is a delight. Nearly perfect in every way, with an excellent cast. I have been a fan of Newman's for 50 years and his later work, easily stands up with his vintage early films. His wife, the great Joanne Woodward produced this gem. I want to thank Linda for making this wonderful recommendation. If you have not seen it, please give it a go. I found my copy at the library. Like, duh!!

>26 laytonwoman3rd: Linda, I have to say that Spoon River was the one which I least understood--I could have used a professor to explain the poetic lines. I maybe understood about half of it. It also seemed cynical, but maybe I wasn't reading the lines as they were meant to be delivered. I need to get a filmed version (like Mark with Our Town) to perhaps get more out of it.

I laughed a lot reading Brighton Beach Memoirs, but felt that Inherit the Wind was the most powerful and still seems relevant these many years later. I'm sure I saw the movie zillions of years ago, but now want to see it again.

>27 msf59: Mark, that Newman performance is outstanding. But I also enjoyed the 1940 film version with William Holden. Although not as intense, it was very atmospheric, and although a bit sentimental, I though it was well done. Also the ending was slightly changed in the 1940 film, with Wilder's approval and input.

When I was in school in the 60's we watched a film of Our Town. Saw it several times but I recall it as a play and not a movie, but after all these years my memory may be false. It was b/w and may have been the 1940 film.

>29 RBeffa: It has a wonderful score by Aaron Copland.

>30 kac522: Thank you for mentioning that. I checked my Copland CD's and did not find it but luckily there is youtube. Here's an example https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwqIgm9w-hk I will be on the watch for the 1940 film. Our library system has the more recent Newman version that has been praised.

>31 RBeffa: It has a wonderful small-town feel to the music, doesn't it? Pretty good depiction of rural America by a Jewish kid from Brooklyn. I love Copland.

I'm going to have to watch the 1940 film. The thing I love about the stage play (and this is preserved in the Newman, Spalding Gray and Hal Holbrook versions, all of which were filmings of the play, not movies) is that there are no props, and the scenery is minimal. The actors must mime preparing a meal, making and drinking a concoction at the soda fountain, delivering bottles of milk, etc. This strikes me as one of the most masterful touches in Wilder's work. The Holden version is a movie, with full sets and lots of props, which I can see from a quick look at the Youtube link. If that's all you've seen, please get your hands on one of the stage productions. Holbrook and Gray can be had on the same DVD from Amazon, but it's spendy. I think I will ask Santa to see what he can do.

>32 kac522: An excellent piece of music. The Copland on Copland version followed the one on the link so I got a double play. The 1940 film is on youtube I discovered, although I only watched about 10 minutes of it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sCzytzemfI I'm pretty sure I have seen this film before, long ago. It isn't the play version I remember from high school.

Thought this piece from Book Riot might be relevant to the interests of many here.

>35 lycomayflower: Oh...thank you. 'Night, Mother was filmed in 1986 starring Sissy Spacek and Anne Bancroft, and it was devastatingly good. (You, lycomayflower, want to avoid it at all costs.) It is available from the big "A" either on DVD or through Prime rental. If you can take the subject matter, I highly recommend it, as the acting is unsurpassed.

I just finished Arthur Miller's adaptation of Henrik Ibsen's An Enemy of the People. Miller took what he suggests was a damned awful translation of the original, and reworked it into decent English, also changing 5 acts into 3, and making the scene changes less pronounced. Miller put his version out there in the midst of the McCarthy madness, when he himself was being denounced. The protagonist, Dr. Stockman, has discovered that the water supply in his hometown is being contaminated by an industry upstream, and despite the fact that he has previously promoted the town's springs as a tonic, he insists that they must be closed down until the water supply system can be modified to keep the poisons out of it. Financial and social pressures from the authorities and his own family nearly bring him down. Today, we'd call him a whistle-blower, and sadly this story is just as topical as it was in the 1950's. Unfortunately, there is little drama in it, as it is miserably clear from the start how this upright, slightly naive man will be treated when he tries to do the right thing.

If you're ready to move on to W. E. B. Du Bois, the November thread is live.

>33 laytonwoman3rd: My brilliant--and thoughtful--husband gave me the 2 DVD set of the Holbrook and Gray performances for my birthday. I wonder where he got that idea?