Reflections on Edward Albee

A few months after the morning when two passenger planes were crashed into the World Trade Center in downtown New York City, another plane was flown into the Pentagon in Washington, DC, and yet another into a field in Shankesville, Pennsylvania, I went to a public lecture by Edward Albee. I sat in the mezzanine in a grand building with tall doors on a landscaped college campus. Mr. Albee was telling some stories about his growing up – he spoke about being dismissed from the Lawrenceville School. And he sharply criticized the direction that Broadway was going and seemed pretty disapproving of the whole theater scene in New York. And someone from the audience asked him how he thought the recent terrorist attacks would affect theater. And he answered that it would affect theater indirectly and over time – that anything that came out immediately would be insignificant – that the effect would be seen on the time scale of years as the event was internalized and allowed to affect and shape our culture. I liked this answer. I didn’t know boo about Edward Albee. But he seemed like a very down to earth, tangible guy. Nothing showy. A mustache. Straight hair. A jacket and shirt, no tie. Tall thin physique. Liked him enough to go out and purchase a copy of “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” at Micawber Books and thought the characters were mysterious – I could never really figure out why George and Martha had to play this game of high-stakes chess with their emotions and memories. Why did they want to hurt each other so? I don’t think I understood the play very well – but it affected me – it seeped in and planted questions. Who was the child? Why did they slash at each other? Did they really just love each other? Is that how love and married life is for most people? It creeped me out, and I was happy to finish reading it because the tensions and emotional stridency of those characters were out of my head for a while. So I added Edward Albee to Tom Stoppard on my short list of nameable living playwrights. And a few months after the lecture I got really excited to see that “The Goat or Who is Silvia?” was coming out on Broadway. I looked for tickets. When I found them, they were 115 dollars, each. For someone who would pop into the little theaters on east 4th street as a poor college student because the plays were 12 dollars and were, well, plays, with real people, real human beings up there on stage fusing themselves with words, 115 dollars was a knife in the back. Fast forward five years. I’m sitting in Bryant Park by myself. I started kibitzing with the older woman next to me. She hadn’t missed a single free outdoor movie night for the past 13 years. She was very proud of that. I went back to being by myself with the new awkwardness that comes after acknowledging that icebreaking chit-chat is over, likely indefinitely. I was early for the movie, 2 hours early. Assured of my seat. Available. Waiting. Stewing. Wondering if I should stop playing the flute because I’m rhythmically challenged and apparently tone deaf. (Can you compare the placement of a finger to the velocity, force, and shape of a column of air that comes from your lips? No, I think not. But I digress, sorry.) I was ready though. I was cleansed of illusion, hurt at the prospect of abdicating my passion. I had bags full of my own disappointment. I was ready to see George and Martha do battle on the big screen. I became their marriage counselor. Tried to patch it up. If only … wha? … No, how can you? … Just listen … I listened to both sides, tried to sort out the facts that kept changing, failed miserably, and meandered off into the streets to sniff gasoline.