A.R. Gurney«Η σκέψη ότι δεν θα μπορέσω ποτέ ξανά να της γράψω, να επικοινωνήσω μαζί της, να πάρω κάποιο στίγμα από κείνη, με γεμίζει με ένα αίσθημα κενού που είναι δύσκολο να περιγράψω/Ελα τώρα Αντυ, σταμάτα.../Την αγάπησα από τη μέρα που τη γνώρισα, όταν μπήκε στην τάξη στη Δευτέρα δημοτικού και φαινόταν σαν τη χαμένη πριγκίπισσα του Οζ...».
Το έργο «Love Letters» του σύγχρονου Αμερικανού θεατρικού συγγραφέα A.R. Gurney (βραβευμένου με Πούλιτζερ) ανέβηκε για πρώτη φορά το 1989. Από τότε παίζεται με μεγάλη επιτυχία σε όλο τον κόσμο. Η σχέση ζωής δύο μεγαλοαστών Αμερικανών, του δικηγόρου Aντριου και της ζωγράφου Mελίσα, μέσα από την αλληλογραφία τους. Αύριο και μεθαύριο το βράδυ το έργο του Α. Ρ. Γκέρνι ανεβαίνει στο Κέντρο Τεχνών Χαλανδρίου από την καναδική ομάδα «Die is Cast». Η σκηνοθεσία είναι της διάσημης πρωταγωνίστριας του Royal Shakespeare Company Τζένι Κουέιλ. Στους κεντρικούς ρόλους η Κάθι Μίλαρντ και ο Ρ. Χ. Τόμσον... [Της Σαντρας Βουλγαρη, Η Καθημερινή, 19/4/2008]
Biographies: A.R. Gurney
“The theater, I think, is the best medium in which to approach the idea of changing, of throwing away your old assumptions and moving on, because it’s all about playing a part — it’s all about acting, all about masks and to what degree can you throw away the mask, right?
— A.R.Gurney, quoted by Laura Collins-Hughes, American Theatre, Vol. 23, December 2006
For nearly 20 years, a patrician duo sharing correspondence on a bare stage has enthralled audiences around the world. Critics have marveled at its utter simplicity, with actors and playwright conveying the fullness of a lifetime. Theatergoers from diverse generations and social backgrounds have wondered, “Can Andrew Makepeace Ladd III just throw away his pen and ‘be there’ for Melissa Gardner? Can he free himself through her while she stabilizes herself through him? Or must they pursue a zigzag dance that brings them close and pushes them apart?”
“I think we’ve all had similar relationships,” says Annie Potts, the Melissa Gardner of the DC Lansburgh production. “As often happens in life, you think you just were so close to the brass ring of love, and it just slipped through your fingers. You go around again, and you reach a little harder for love and understanding.”
This conflict between the heart’s desire and social destiny has been a familiar one for Albert Ramsdell Gurney. The playwright hails from the same blueblood WASP background as Andrew, Melissa and most of the main characters in his other plays.
“Obviously I try to do in my plays what I’m trying to live out in my own soul,” Gurney has told Valparaiso Professor Arvid F. Sponberg, editor of A.R. Gurney: A Casebook (Routledge; 2004). The playwright adds that he’s “trying to be real in a world where those values are under question.” Similarly, as he has questioned the “decline and decay of values” that were once instilled in him as important, he has experimented with theatrical forms.
“I have to explore the form even as I am exploring the values that I am trying to write about within the form,” says Gurney. The combination has created some of the most impressive plays in the contemporary American theater.
Gurney’s Journey
Born in Buffalo, New York on November 1, 1930, Gurney attended Williams College, where he was influenced by the creative musicals of fellow student (two years his senior) Stephen Sondheim. Gurney credits his collaboration with Sondheim for teaching him how to write scenes.
After a stint in the Navy, Gurney attended Yale School of Drama and then taught Humanities at MIT. Although he began writing plays while at MIT, his success with The Dining Room allowed him to devote himself full time to play writing. Called by critic John Simon “one of America’s most prolific, diverse and unpredictable playwrights,” Gurney has written more than 30 plays, including Sylvia and the Cocktail Hour. Among his many honors, his Indian Blood recently won the 2007 Outer Critics Circle Award for “Outstanding Off-Broadway Play.”
Love Letters began “accidentally” in the late 1980s when the playwright decided to switch from typewriter to computer. For his word processing exercises, he decided to write letters between two characters. As the duo took on a life of their own, their “epistolary exchange” evolved into a short story, then a play, opening off-Broadway and afterwards moving to Broadway in 1989. Performed in rotating casts by such theatrical luminaries as Stockard Channing, Jason Robards, Colleen Dewhurst, Cliff Roberston and Elaine Stritch, the play caught the eyes of Ted Weiant in LA. Over several years at Beverly Hills’ Canon Theater, Weiant directed some 200 stars, including Carol Burnett, Brian Dennehy, Mel Gibson, Sissy Spacek, Charlton Heston, Gena Rowlands, Ben Gazarra and Annie Potts, who performed with Tim Curry.
The part has become a favorite of Potts, who has played the role a number of times in recent years, including last January in the San Francisco Bay Area with present co-star James Hugh Taylor.
Taylor, an actor and script writer, was immediately impressed by the economy with which Gurney’s words convey not only individual emotions but decades of changing American life. Says Taylor, “Taken as a play, Love Letters is matchless. Gurney provides exactly the words you need for every stage in the constant change and transformation of two lives.”
Although the play’s depictions of lost opportunities vary from hilarious to poignant, Gurney feels that American optimism dominates his work. He says that “there is always either a lost city on a hill, a lost community that was once good, or a possibility of a better world that we should strive for.”
Potts finds this hopeful longing amidst the separation of the two characters in Love Letters. “Gurney’s gift to us,” she says, “is that we can change. We can recognize and acknowledge those rare people who have been there in the wings for us over the years.”
Love Letters runs August 24 and 25, 2007 at the Lansburgh Theatre in Washington, DC.
