A Post-Modern Play

Word to any future theatre-goers: if you see the name "Edward Albee" on a poster for an upcoming play, you probably aren't going to experience some sappy romantic comedy, journey through a super-human epic, or even find a particularly tangible plot line. Albee helps define a post-modern look at the theatre, where the action on the stage becomes secondary to the meaning conveyed by the text and by the actors.

While abroad last semester, I saw Albee's play The Lady from Dubuque in London. The play takes place in a living room and deals with the subject of death and the meaning of life. These themes are discussed through heated party language and the cries of pain from a cancer-ridden woman and her care-taking husband. It's powerful. At the intermission an elderly American couple stood up in front of me. The wife stretched her arms over her head and commented to her husband, "We should have gone to a musical."

Last weekend in Memphis, I went to see Albee's classic, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf at Circuit Playhouse. Much along the lines of Lady, the general action of this play comes secondary to the almost philosophical musings of the characters throughout the journey, as we deal with reality verses illusion, the dangers of lust for power, and the secrets hidden in every relationship. I thought the production was craftily done. The quiet intensity of some moments and the bawdy truthfulness of others aided in shortening what could have felt like a marathon of an evening (as the play is almost three hours in length).

My opinion differs greatly from that of Christopher Blank of the Memphis Commercial Appeal. I encourage you to read his review of this production. Maybe it is simply because this was my first experience seeing this play performed that Mr. Blank and I differ in our opinions. I can compliment him, however, on understanding Albee's overall message, helping to alert potential audiences of the thematic elements of the play so that they enter the space in an appropriate mindset to receive what the cast, directors, and crew have prepared to share with them. To put it more simply, the play is Who's Afraid of Viriginia Woolf, not The Three Little Pigs and the Big Bad Wolf.

Is it possible for the average audience member to attend a play like Albee's unawares of what they are about to participate in and leave feeling anything other than annoyance at how late it is? Are the emotions of the play enough to sustain the playgoer so that he reminds in the moment with the actors and not looking at his watch? This is possible even when the play is done well. And it is because of this that we must continue to educate our potential and current audiences, to promote questioning and yearning, to foster an attitude of seekership when coming to the theatre.

America the Theatrical

"There is no literary enjoyment more within the reach of the crowd than those one experiences in sight of the stage. Neither preparation nor study is necessary to feel them. They seize you in the midst of your preoccupations and your ignorance. When love of the pleasures of the mind, still half coarse, begins to penetrate a class of citizens, it immediately drives them toward the theater."
-Alexis de Tocqueville

In his defining work Democracy in America, there hardly appears to be any subject of American life that Alexis de Tocqueville does not address. After spending ample time on the subjects of government, the separation of powers, the capitalist economy, and American freedom and equality, Tocqueville addresses the arts in America. While he finds pleasure in all the forms of art- visual, musical, and theatrical- it is the realm of theatre that he finds most fitting for democratic peoples.

The quote to open this entry helps to explain this. Theatre in democratic nations is not so much an intellectual as an emotional endeavor. Because of this, it speaks more universally, from the most educated noble to the poor peasant. It is also the most democratic art form in that the playwright, actor, and directors cannot produce a play simply for one person, as can be done with particular musical and visual arts expressions. Plays must satisfy a large audience; theatre necessitates that audience or else it cannot exist. In this way, the people dictate what is performed for them.

Tocqueville later ponders, however, that despite an increase in the theatrical spectacles of American culture over the forty or so years since the ratification of the Constitution (Tocqueville was writing in 1830), "the population still indulges in this genre of amusement only with extreme restraint." He goes on to offer possible reasons for this including the Puritan heritage of early America, the lack of political catastrophes that inspire great theatrical rebellion, the working spirit of Americans whose only rest is on a day they spend worshiping God.

Let me jump to the present. I am a student at Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee and part of a program called the Center for Outreach in Development of the Arts. As a senior this year, I have been charged with creating a new program for the college or community that fits into the mission of CODA - to prepare undergraduate students in the principles of aesthetics, cultural policy and professional practice with which the arts invigorate culture and enlighten lives. CODA works creatively with Rhodes College faculty, staff, and its network of arts leaders throughout the region and beyond to translate the ideals embodied in the fine arts into an integral part of student learning and living.

Having read Tocqueville in the last five months, I felt as though his words on the theatre still resonate, at least on my small liberal arts campus, a place that prides itself on cultivating the "pleasures of the mind." We, of all places, should have a student body that is theatrically literate and supportive of our plays. It is my mission this year, therefore, to discover how we can broaden the theatrical perspective of our student body and create a campus climate where we seek "mind pleasures" as well as the "heart emotions." As this blog continues, I will chart my path through this journey, along with several detours about particular arts events and seminars in which I participate.

Join me, and together we'll seek those pleasures of the mind together.