Seminars in theatre; Episode 9 of 31

This is seminars in theatre a series of discussions with leading members of the theatrical profession who comment on the problems and pleasures of life in the theatre. Here now is the host of seminars and theatre Richard Pyatt. Good evening and welcome to another seven hours in theatre. Tonight our discussion more or less concentrates on the one act play specifically the two plays. It's called the sugar plum and the Indian wants the Bronx. The currently running at the Astor Place Theater. And written by Israel Horowitz who is a member of our panel this evening Mr. Horowitz received rave notices earlier this season for line. A play directed by the current director of the two now showing James Hammerstein. Mr Horovitz was the first American to be chosen as playwright in residence with the Royal Shakespeare Company 965 and was a teaching fellow at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 1961 63 he's a member playwright of the Eugene O'Neill Memorial Theatre foundation where the

Indian wants the Bronx and it's called a sugarplum were both shown as a first draft stage readings. His first play the comeback was produced in Boston when Mr. Horowitz was 17 years old. Also On Our panel is the producer Ruth Newton. Miss Newton has been seen on the Broadway stage in Inherit the Wind with Paul Muni dark at the top of the stairs moon birds in a number of other shows. She also served as assistant to the producer Morton Gottlieb and her lapping in The Hollow Crown. And as assistant to Henry could tell on two hours of Camelot The Sound of Music and take her she's mine. She was also associated in the production of the off-Broadway James Joyce play exiles which won an Obie Award. It was Newton has directed packages of Camelot and the sound of music as well as Productions throughout the nation. We also have one of the actors. In the Indian wants the Bronx Matthew calls plays a part of joy and he was featured in the

title role of it would always play Malcolm And also Prince in King John of The New York Shakespeare Festival. And as Eric piece creeps all Broadway and he's a member of the studio the American Center for study Theatre Arts. Good evening all and the one act play. First of all a student what interested you in producing two one act plays instead of going for all three acts. First of all they were written and I found them and I thought they were excellent. And immediately made up my mind that I wanted to mount them and put them on what was so fascinating about the Indian wants the Bronx. Well. Both plays fascinated me India and fascinated me because it's a situation of violence but it's also i situation in which there is extraordinary comedy a great deal of laughter

and despite the fact the two hoodlums in the show do a certain amount of damage. To the Indian We were not particularly focusing on the violence of the play. And that was very important to me. You know of course Mr. Horowitz if you can chime in and answer if he feels that he should answer that question. Well let me clarify that a little bit more I didn't want to do apply about violence because I think violence has caused as just as. Any human emotion has caused it. And I felt that Israel got down to some of the causes behind the violence of the action of the two young boys in the shop. Just want to interrupt to introduce our third guest. JOHN ALI I think is that the right because of who plays the Indian in the play book.

This is the second play which Mr. Sawyer has been associated with Mr. Horowitz this past November he was featured in the production of line which we mentioned earlier which was. Produced at Capital mama. Mr. Purcel also appeared in the national company a cast of the side and Sidney Bruce Darren's window and he's been seen in numerous off and off off Broadway productions as well as various regional theatres around the country and the reason we like to run down the past history of our guests is because I think it makes them particularly. Apt and particularly good voices to talk about theatre and to talk about what we will be talking more about as we move on. And that is the condition of American did of going back to something you opened with the you say the Indian wants the Bronx appealed to you because of its violence and because of you know not because of its violence.

That's exactly what I didn't want to stand corrected and you know is a violent play but it is also an intensely funny play. And behind the island we had a script that supports the reasons for the island. Some of the reason for that in other words a play about violence I wouldn't be interested in violence for violences if I might. The premise that I use every playwright when he reaches a certain age I reach twenty eight. So yes I'm glad that about 25 finds an identity as a writer finds a style if you will or a form that he's most comfortable with following through with and the form that I discovered was not unlike a Marx Brothers movie in which somebody falls down the stairs and it creates a great deal of laughter except in my plays someone falls down the stairs the laughter is there and

then we expose the fact that he's flown down the stairs and broken his legs. A lot is cut off by the reality of the irony of the humor but throughout all of my plays the audiences laugh and laugh and laugh and then they stop laughing when we want them to stop laughing. And I I guess it grew from my directive from an agent I had in London who I fired subsequently who said stop writing heavy drama what's the matter with you Don't you know you have to write comedy will somewhere in between his idea of comedy and my idea of drama. I found that I could make the same points I was making in the drama. Using comedy as a vehicle but a special kind of comedy a black comedy if you will so that Israel and directing this question specifically to both of you because ultimately you are the responsible agents for the Indian wants the Bronx in terms of its dissemination to the public. How do you answer the criticism that is often heard about plays and specifically

the Indian that why go see this kind of activity on stage when you can just walk around the corner and see the same thing. Why pay to see and hear that kind of diction that you hear on the stage when you can hear it around the corner again that matic corner where all this is going on. It could be a corner somewhere where someone's waiting for a bus. What is so so prevalent and what is so important about it to put it on stage in the form of a play. I deny that I say how do you respond to that kind of thing I'll take responsibility for answering it because I took that took the responsibility of writing the piece. I think the premise that you see this kind of play if you will on a street corner is completely untrue. You see these kind of boys on a street corner. You see this kind of situation on the street could immediately avoid it and presume that it is violence that something horrible is happening oh my god I'm frightened I'm going to get away from these

creatures. What I've what I've done and if I believe the critics successfully or better yet believe the box office successfully is really get you inside of these boys and realize that they're very funny very human very real people who are victims of circumstance but in goodness Yana right there's an incredible amount of comedy. John was out in the play of Lorraine Hansberry's last night I was talking to another director at her own We're talking about the mishap and the likeness has research first play raising in the sun and. I caught myself saying it was a very sort of Jewish situation comedy and I realized in retrospect that I had seen and have seen a lot of plays for instance about Negro families or black power of violence but that was one of the few plays its ever been created and I think it accounts for the success of the place where the playwright just simply put a family

Negro family on the stage develop a very family like problems and you walked away from the theater saying My God those people are exactly like I am there really is no difference between black and white. And in the Indian wants the Bronx the audience walks away with the same kind of feeling my god I was that kid. Maybe I didn't grow up on that street corner that event didn't happen in my life. Is that the way you feel Matthew that you were one of those kids that I was I myself was in my past life like this. Well did you get any sort of identification with what I had symbolically I would have to I mean really otherwise it's going to be an imitation. So you have to find what is real. You know this fellow knows and apply it but personally otherwise it's it can't be real. I want to mention by the way that the players received both players as really received. I guess you could call it a rave notices.

So much so that I read one review and one reviewer called it just quoting way out of context but characterized it as calling it an exercise an abstract beauty. The violence was so skillfully perpetrated I guess this was a point. But I wanted to bring that up because we're talking I'm talking and mentioning all the negative criticisms directed at plays and specifically the Indian ones the Brawns one of the other things mentioned was the incredibility of John Casals character the Indian. Is it possible that one who doesn't speak the language. And I think we should mention for those I'm saying that the Indian doesn't speak a word of English and presumably is completely in the dark regarding the actions going on about him. This character has been called incredible because. It's indicated that human instinct would

not react so stupidly so completely stupidly so completely naively. That's the whole point of the play for me dag. The lack of communication between and among human beings and I think a playwright must be given the way to stretch reality a bit in order to put across the point he's trying to make in a script or inversely the credibility that we find in it. I used analogy of another show a television show and that was the analogy of an American in Paris with Parisian is absolutely furious at the Americans and I guess we don't speak French because we don't speak French or. If you will a kinder play would have been to write a play about a Frenchman who didn't speak English in a New York taxi cab. I took a very extreme very exotic point of view when choosing an East Indian because

he's so completely foreign. Let me ask you what was there to communicate between the Indian. If there was anything to communicate between the Indian and these two boys. Well in life there's a great deal to communicate in the situation of the play it's a very simple it's simplicity itself. The premise is quite simply the Indians been in the city just one day he's trying to find his son who lives in the Bronx. He's somewhere between Kennedy Airport in the Bronx and he's simply trying to get directions on the first level on the second level two boys come along perform almost a ritual of the boys in the streets of New York a lot of horse play a lot of fun and a lot of rot. And he's curious. He wants to know if this is an American custom many wants as an American would act in Paris he doesn't want to be an Indian in New York he wants to be an American. Well Americans impose when they don't speak the language seemingly have a reputation for being crude not naive.

That's Americans Indians are seldom crew. I chose what I chose and in the end I think John Kasar can elaborate because because of the great deal of dignity that an East Indian would preserve in his. At all time. But another point I want to ask regarding this communication problem. People that speak the same language have the tremendous communication but I mean they don't even understand to Americans talking to each other do not understand each other. Here you have a very reasonable premise that a person is not expected to understand another person if he doesn't speak the language so the symbology of this seems to get lost in the pragmatic Avenue of the fact that he cannot speak. Yes but there's a pragmatic second level and reason for the construction of the play because the language of the boys is in fact a foreign language. They're speaking such in New York that unless you were born on that street corner say Broom Street whatever whatever street Matthew chose for the reality in

plain a place unless unless you were born in exactly in that neighborhood they are speaking a foreign language and as well. Part of our audience tonight who haven't seen the play are at a disadvantage those who see that have seen the play will understand that in about six places during the hour. Five minutes or whatever the running time to play is the language of the boys begins to break down and it's as much gibberish as the Hindi of the Indian so that the audience is left with nothing but intonation and emotion and it's sort of their marvelous moments for me as they are this in the back of the House and the audience will be laughing along laughing when suddenly I understand anything at all. There's no language being spoken and no subtitles. I think one thing that is crystal clear as you watched it was the gratuitous attack and then the resulting frustration is similar to a dog who plays with an animate rabbit keeps provoking it and it can't get any response and consequently it wants to

destroy it because he's so frustrated by the lack of communication. This is what came to me from watching this. Let me have it in my head this is rather exciting because there's another point of you know some people it depends on the person who saw the price. Some people immediately get right inside the shoes if you will. And the Indian. And realize that the Indian becomes outraged as well he got furious as an American does in Paris again I go to the analogy why don't these fools speak English here I am in Paris. I'm American. I'm on my vacation. Why are you guys are all fighting and making my language and prime good his his son in the Bronx you know is his son in the Bronx he's an American he has every right to be here. And I maybe John can elaborate on that because throughout the play he doesn't say anything I think we'd like to hear more of it. Yeah I said one man to ask what what is the nature of the incredibility that you mentioned. Well my knowledge of the nature of it as I walked away from it was that it

was basically I mean notwithstanding the fact that a person cannot speak the language here is a human being a human being that has. That is made up of blood and muscle and mind and everything else that other human beings are made of. And violence is not necessarily verbal. And I think that if one is provoked by violence one does not necessarily have to know how to speak the language either to fight back runaway or respond in some other usual human way. I think the play got Nori acting isn't right if you were in the initial If analysis is reaction I am reacting but I am reacting to what I saw and I found incredible in terms of character motivation perhaps. There is a reason why he did not run away. He wasn't frightened already that there is there is violence in his violence there is a violence before he meets the boy through the violence of

being lost in the strangeness of New York City there's another thing there John and that's dick in the audience. You speak English so that you know what the boys are saying you know what they're leading up to. Really good to doesn't speak a word of English actually. We had this is considered what happens later on when it isn't a question of verbal communication anymore. Sure well the Quine thing that whole I thing about the game is that I do play on an intimate level with up to here and there are there are times when I do communicate with him I tell him I tell him the fact that I'm I have. A physical desire for murderous mother. You know what I wouldn't I never told anybody this before. It's like it's almost like going to confession. You know there are times when there is a positive communication with the coin the coin sequence to heal. This is done for him you know. Right. You're trying to communicate pleasantly to assure one and tell me about India you know there's an approval of it which we can communicate on.

So this is just sort of shocked as it is and from just you know in in the construction of the play though it might not seem that way and seen the pope because it is it's an emotional experience certainly a trying one that finally ultimately but from from group to from the Indians point of view. If the plane runs an hour for 15 minutes. 50 minutes five six play if you will. He seeing nothing but smiles and a lot of horseplay. Yeah these are nice guys these are kids they're young people he can identify with them because certainly in Indian kids in Calcutta horse play the same way. And he feels the same desire to communicate there. The boys are as exotic to him as he is to the boys. There's really quite a humorous present premise. It's only the on we and the situation of the boredom and finally the ultimate frustration that causes the violence it really is the accident of a phone call I don't want to give away the

player who also has or the performances are excellent for the most part which is I think a great help to that play. Additionally there's we go back to the Indian was a Bronx remark but let's go to Ali before we leave it I'd like to add just one more thing. There's another lack of communication through communication and that is the one that exists between the two boys. Yes I cannot really communicate directly with each other they can communicate only by hitting each other. Horseplay I might have. But here are two people who speak exactly the same on the same street language but they don't really communicate with each other. I think that's because they both. They both use the other one as a defense. Yes homes are like that. They're never really friends they're always using the other one is a shield. That's what I really mean I don't do you know much of the humor of the place I construct

it comes from the lack of communication which would be negative evoke a negative reaction normally but I've created two characters who are quite real I believe in the voice of God because they cannot communicate in any intellectual really on any level or found a level of reality for themselves called entertainment. So they really they really do schtick if you will for each other constantly. And most of the laughter in the place because they do a fairly good schtick they've been together for so long they've rehearsed it so well. If you remember the Xerox machine there Chris Yes Carita they do incredibly funny business for each other constantly testing each other but they never really can talk to each other and ultimately Joey has to talk to the Indian because he can't tell me right away. John gets out did you find the job particularly difficult as an actor to be almost speechless and yet have to communicate in some second level way with what

was going on on the stage and at the same time perform a non-communicative act with the two boys. Well I think the attempt to communicate is of course the essential thing. Whether the attempts are successful and varies from play to play it's often the attempt rather than the success which makes the drama in any play now. And there's certainly no lack of opportunity to try to sing and for that reason I didn't feel that this was. I usual in terms of the role that I have among others that I've played you know as a matter of fact I think it's immensely rich considering the roles I've played. One of the richest that I have ever played in here the business of dialogue of lines of understandable words that an audience can understand their own language. In this case English is in most cases window trimming.

You know it's not what makes drama certainly what makes drama is it's people and what goes on between people which is not necessarily verbal. You have witnessed the beginning middle of the play where where the young boy Joey says things probably for the first time in his life you think that he's never said before in his life. Why. Because the person he's talking to doesn't know what he's saying. If you're free to be able to say these things nobody sees the emotional event. You know there is true communication for the maybe for the first and you know and ironically because because they got caught in a verbal way not much I might point out that for my money John is one of the junkies so I was on the finest we have in this country he just finished playing a baggy pants comedian for me and why is that. That would be an interesting thing to sin I know. I had a conversation with one of the New York Daily critics after the opening of Ind. and John had walked away with this fellow's review as well as twice in a row he walked

away with the reviews of mine as well. And he said My God because I was incredible he's grown three inches in two months. What do you mean you know he's taller and he's all that thinking makes it so yeah. Well it's called the Sugar Plum is part of the package there. Another one I play which has a humor on an entirely different level although it's bizarre. I thought I mean I look at it as just as a bizarre situation almost the response to this play has been less by the critics generally it seems to me Israel has been less responsive than the Indian wants the Bronx. And yet I think the Sugarplum is. The level of simple enjoyment is a thoroughly delightful vignette more or less I don't mind the term vignette But this you you're sort of caught I'm caught up into the humor of this

sugar plum like black humor. Well if it's funny I don't care if it's blue green orange. I think Sugar Plum. Now that the magazine the newspapers The Daily newspaper reaction favored Indian favor the evening obviously were favored in the Indian wants the Bronx as a play over sugar plum. I think there's always a danger in typing the evening using the same title as one of the plays. Also the Indian wants the Bronx being the second player on the program and being a far more emotional dramatic experience with sugarplum is much more with it and it's a it's a it's a smaller situation if you will ultimately. It's tricky here it's a trickier place a more conversational play. I have more fun with the words with English words in sugar plum in India you know because a sugar plum has been called a college play by

critics and by those who feel that this is a good thing to see in a college production. Yet it really shouldn't be particularly mounted off Broadway or Broadway. I didn't see that review. It's a place set in a college is that I saw. Well just the outline of that situation the theme of the play is that we have a frame of reference for what we're talking about is the fact that one of the college students I'm not giving anything away talking about this I don't think no one has that right half a well-hidden accidentally. Well why don't you just give us the opposite of this it was ours is quite simple a boy has it's a boy meets girl plays a very simple play and the boy unfortunately has run down and killed the fiance or fraternity fiance of the girl and the boy who the deceased was riding a skateboard in Harvard Square at

three o'clock in the morning and slipped under the wheels of a passing car and driven by Wallace Zuckerman who's constantly called Zakouma. And during the hour of the play the confrontation of murder and widow if you will they fall in love. It's quite simple. She's been one of the lines from the play she says You think I go around fall and you think I fall in love every day Frank and I with him for five months five whole months of my life snuffed out in this play I'm getting much more specific in a sense and I than I do with Indian which is a far more symbolic piece. This is a this is an actual situation comedy black is it may be. And it again is a play about communication about two people constantly taking center stage and ultimately that you call from the play The girl's tears in the boy's

embarrassment and guilt. Really breakdown into searching through the morning newspaper to see who has the bigger picture related to the accident. I saw the UK as a very vicious place but it never right reaches the level of violence of course that in the end does and I think because the magazine critics It was curious what you thought of in the New Yorker came out of the race for both players and preferred sugarplum to Indian and some of the other magazines have as well I think the critics who had time to create a rush home rushed immediately to the newspapers and make a 20 minute deadline of whatever which still stunned some evenings after in the end there's a full count of two minutes before there's any applause and so frightening I think those critics were stunned by the power the dramatic power that in the end and it just sort of wiped out Europe on the critics who have little time to think. Remember the play a little more and started to quote from it and laugh about it and I know one magazine critic told me that she acted

it out with her editor and this I think in the beginning I was dejected because I well I love both plays out of whack and I was dejected to see all of the rave notices going to the one plant in fact I felt terribly sorry for the performers in John Tesh and Marsha Mason and Jimmy Harrison the director who did a lot of work on sugarplum and it was sort of getting skipped over and they said the critics by my side it's a very funny curtain raiser and I will get to the real play.