Theater: Radical Takes on “Problem” Plays by O’Neill and Shakespeare

Strange Interlude (1928)

By Eugene O’Neill

David Greenspan, actor

Jack Cummings, III, Director

Irondale Theater, Brooklyn

October 27, 2017

Measure for Measure (1603)

By William Shakespeare

Elevator Repair Service

John Collins, Director

NY Public Theater

October 29, 2017

Even great artists create subpar works, as you can hear in Bach’s finale to Cantata 205, 

and Beethoven’sWellington’s Victory (a.k.a. “The Bear went over the Mountain”). Much of this is understandable, since great creators need to experiment and take risks, and sometimes work fast to make money. One of the great artistic periods of history, one that gave us both masterpieces and curious flops, came in the post WWI era, when Picasso painted in sequentially more daring styles (Blue Period, Cubism, masks) and Igor Stravinsky migrated from colorful post-romantic works (Firebird, Petroushka) to rhythmic revolution (Rite of Spring), then to neoclassical and serialist styles. Also from this period of virtuosic exploration came American playwright Eugene O’Neill. He was another fearless experimenter, writing in several styles, all designed to push the envelope of what theater could accomplish. These ranged from the terse visual expressionism of The Emperor Jones and The Hairy Ape to the great, extended psychoanalytic ensembles of Long Day’s Journey into Night and The Iceman Cometh. The O’Neill play that is perhaps most difficult to produce is Strange Interlude, written in 1928, after his expressionist experiments but before his extended masterworks. While his later plays incorporate psychoanalysis and the Freudian revolution as implicit background themes, Strange Interlude does so radically and explicitly, by having its characters speak both externally (to the other characters) and internally (from their own subconsciousness and emotions), alternating these in rapid succession, usually with no delimiting cues to the audience. The intent is similar to Joyce’s use of stream of consciousness in Ulysses, published 6 years earlier in 1922. Of course, Shakespeare also did this in his soliloquies, but these are infrequent extended set pieces, much like arias in an opera. In contrast, in Strange Interlude these internal monologues are continuous, short and often elide with spoken dialogue, much as we think unspoken thoughts as we talk with another person. Here, from Act 1, two characters talk about the protagonist Nina. Their “interior” thoughts are inset:

PROFESSOR LEEDS--Well, now she's gone to the opposite extreme! Sees everyone--bores, fools--as if she'd lost all discrimination or wish to discriminate. And she talks interminably, Charlie--intentional nonsense, one would say! Refuses to be serious! Jeers at everything!

MARSDEN--(consolingly) Oh, that's all undoubtedly part of the effort she's making to forget.

PROFESSOR LEEDS--(absent-mindedly) Yes. (arguing with himself)

Shall I tell him? … no … it might sound silly … but it's terrible to be so alone in this … if Nina's mother had lived … my wife … dead! … and for a time I actually felt released! … wife! … helpmeet! … now I need help! … no use! … she's gone! …

MARSDEN--(watching him--thinking with a condescending affection)

Good little man … he looks worried … always fussing about something … he must get on Nina's nerves. …

(reassuringly) No girl could forget Gordon in a hurry, especially after the shock of his tragic death.

PROFESSOR LEEDS--(irritably) I realize that. (thinking resentfully)

Gordon … always Gordon with everyone! …

The nine act, 5-6 hour play focuses on sociopathic Nina, who manipulates three disparate men to serve her own emotional needs. The melodramatic plot, replete with adultery, children born out of wedlock, and hidden family secrets, is here just a framework for O’Neill’s interest in psychology and internal monologue. He did this better 3 years later in the equally long Mourning Becomes Electra, in which a more conventional form (without the interior monologues) better maintains forward motion, while still using duration to be build overwhelming dramatic tension, much as Wagner does in his long operas.  In Strange Interlude O’Neill’s frequent interpolation of monologues often derails the dramatic buildup, and has historically made the play very difficult to act and direct. The tepid 1932 film version with Clark Gable and Norma Shearer used voice overs, not so convincingly. In contrast, a filmed stage version starring the excellent Glenda Jackson (Nina) and Edward Peterbridge (Charlie) shows how most productions work. In this excerpt, Nina tries to explain to Charlie why she became promiscuous after the death of her fiancée, who crashed in WWI dogfight. Charlie responds with interior, not exterior monologue. Notice how the subtle the transitions can be. 

The Transport Group’s version that I saw downtown is radical in concept. Actor David Greenspan performs the uncut five+ hours solo, performing all the parts: major and minor, male and female, adult and child, relying on his skills to keep us engaged and aware. The nine acts were performed in three contiguous spaces with minimal sets in a spooky old Presbyterian church in Brooklyn; we stood up and moved after each act (good for both our circulation and our concentration!). Greenspan’s great challenge was to keep this all coherent, since the plot is melodramatic and long, and the audience now lacked costumes, gender, and faces to keep the four main and five subsidiary characters (including a 10-year-old boy and a dying grandmother) defined. All this is apart from the play’s normal challenge of clarifying when characters go back and forth into interior monologue. Greenspan did all this brilliantly, in one of the most impressive feats of acting I can imagine. He defined each character using different speech styles, physical gestures, and affects. In one amazing scene, he plays sociopathic Nina and the three disparate men she is manipulating while they all sit together in the same room. Greenspan shows us how she manipulates, and how each is manipulated by her. This scene is O’Neill at his most Freudian, and actor Greenspan makes it all clear. Greenspan, who began memorizing and preparing this interpretation four years ago, has made a specialty out of multicharacter monologues, simultaneously playing sixteen 1920’s senators in The Myopia (2003) and all the roles in the 1920’s comedy The Patsy in 2011. But Strange Interlude takes his talents to a new level. He identifies the internal monologues, sometimes only a sentence or two, other times almost Shakespearean in length, by a rapid cadence, logical since we think faster than we speak. His superb articulation allowed us to hear every word, even in an occasional resonant space. This allowed him to progress through scenes seamlessly, without pregnant pauses to identify when the monologues begin, and shortening the play’s overlong duration. From the start, I always knew who was who, and when they were taking to “others” and when ruminating to themselves. The rapid-fire alternation made for many comic moments, as O’Neill sometimes mocks his characters’ hypocrisy by juxtaposing contradictory inner and outer thoughts. Greenspan’s performance built several very convincing climaxes; after five cathartic hours I felt I knew each character and their motivations, just as O’Neill would have wanted, despite the fact that they were all played by a middle age guy in a blue suit. While Greenspan did not convince me that Strange Interlude was a great play, this daring production seemed right in keeping with the experimental nature of the play itself. I emerged from the spooky church rather dizzy, as if a subject of a draining psychological experiment. Maybe that is the real point of this play!

Sadly, the equally experimental Elevator Repair Service production of Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure was a failure in almost all regards. Like O’Neill, Shakespeare also had some experimental clunkers, but for different reasons. Shakespeare was, above all, a commercial writer who churned out plays frequently for a public insatiable for new works. So, while offering intermittent brilliance, the Henry VI plays, the lurid tragedy Titus Andronicus, and the juvenile comedy Two Gentlemen of Verona make for long evenings. Another example is Measure for Measure, with a plot that alternates between long stretches of mediocre comedy (e.g. pimps, brothels, and executioners) and a few profound interchanges about justice, morality and marriage. Like Strange Interlude, it is infrequently done and is a difficult play to stage. Enter the NYC Elevator Repair Service. This theater troupe, known for its radical retakes on familiar plays, went all in to set the play in the 1920’s, populate the stage with bizarre characters in mostly modern dress, project rapid text overlays of the play script scrolling up and down behind the actors, use frequent “phone calls” to communicate plot, and overlay a slapstick style, replete with plastic babies and plastic severed heads. All this mania would have been OK, but most lines were spoken so rapidly (rather like a Gilbert and Sullivan patter song) that it was impossible to follow most of the often-complex action. I struggled to keep up with the plot, and to appreciate the great poetic Shakespearean verse, no matter how infrequently this emerges in this lesser play. Slowing speech to a normal cadence was almost a special effect in this production, which clocked in at 2 hours 5 minutes without intermission. Rapid speech when well-articulated  and purposeful can be bracing (see Greenspan above). Not so here. If, like me, you were not very familiar with this play, the director’s choices undercut comprehension and enjoyment. Ironically, from his notes, the director sought to showcase “the kind of music in those sentences and a deeply felt poetry that pulses with emotional truth”; he did just the opposite. Edgy theater can be great, but overall I had not before been to a professional production so ill conceived, nor to one that left me so empty of praise or appreciation for a play.