The Crown (TV show)

John Lithgow (right) as Winston Churchill in "The Crown"

The problem with using the stage to make direct and obvious political statement is that the message can be misinterpreted, casually dismissed, or in the case of most local productions, singing to the choir or more often ignored entirely.

The first year of Guerrilla Theater Company our more obvious agitprop was leavened with playful absurdity, but as our more pointed statements we from time to time dismissed out of hand or criticized, we bent the rules of inclusion to force each of the performer-writers to defend the point of each brief vignette. In short order the creators of some of our most popular pieces decided to move on and our audiences dwindled.

When a company decides to present a classic piece of political theater, the language and situation would most likely not most obviously resemble contemporary concerns. When Ensemble Theatre presented Waiting For Lefty six years ago (to take one example) they strove for period accuracy in production in costume and design, but their video projections reflected the very recent Occupy Wall Street uprisings. And yet, the Great Recession was not the Great Depression and the pictures did nothing to change Odets' clumsy words. In spite of using David Bowie in the soundtrack, it was still more museum piece than think piece.

Timing is also important. Bad Epitaph produced Lysistrata in 2000, which was enjoyed as an absurd sex comedy, but as we were not currently engaged in an wars (at least not any we could see) the playwright’s original political intent was beside the point. We came a bit closer to the mark in 2004 when we produced Kirk Wood Bromley’s The American Revolution.

True, we made no obvious references to the present geopolitical situation, the early years of Bush’s war in Iraq, and the Colonial version of occupier and freedom-fighter, but just putting it out there seemed to make its own statement. As Plain Dealer critic Tony Brown put it, we didn’t need to be “ponderously obvious” about it, as that was his job.

“One imagines that if the revolutionaries were to say and do now some of things they said and did then, John Ashcroft probably would have them locked up without lawyers in the prison at Guantanamo Bay on terrorism charges,” said Brown.

Ladies and gentlemen, ponderously obvious.

The Trump era has invited a slew of productions of Julius Caesar, which has been an obvious go-to for those who would warn against tyranny in all it forms, for centuries. In New York this summer you can see a modern-dress production for free at the Delacorte in Central Park, or an Off-Broadway production by Access Theatre featuring an all-female cast and set in an independent, girls’ school.

Orson Welles' "Julius Caesar" (1937)

It is facile to swap out one political leader for another. Arguably when Orson Welles presented this work during the reign of Mussolini, that strongman must have appeared to be a literal incarnation of almighty Caesar. But Donald J. Trump more closely inhabits the strengths and failings of Caesar -- as conceived of by William Shakespeare -- especially in those scenes where he loudly protests his immutability even as he agrees with who ever spoke with him most recently.

But a military genius with an extensive record of victories on the battle-field? Darn that ankle spur.

The question remains whether or not political commentary on stage has any relevance at all. To those of us who are theater practitioners, of course it does. But most people do not see plays, are unaware of plays, are entirely unaffected by plays.

However, the extremity of the actions of and declarations from the Trump Administration have emboldened commercial entities, which would normally avoid controversy and offense. We live in a golden era of men in suits sitting at desks (and one woman standing in slacks) taking the piss out of the president every night of the week.

In fact, the word and actions of the young Trump Administration have been so extreme, and transparently anti-democratic, that any creative expression in regards to totalitarianism and propaganda in the service of such ends can appear to be intentional commentary on the current president.

Yes, sales of George Orwell’s 1984 spiked after the inauguration, but when Audible produced a television ad featuring Zachary Quinto performing an audiobook version, it created controversy. Reading passages from a seventy year-old book is commentary on Donald Trump? Whose fault is that, Audible’s, Orwell’s or Trump’s?

Hulu’s production of The Handmaid’s Tale includes scenes that appear to emulate the January 21, 2017 Women’s March, but production started last year, long before the election. How might this program have been received during a Hillary Clinton Administration? How significant is it a big screen Wonder Woman came out this past weekend and has broken all kinds of records including biggest opening for a female director. Has the disappointment and disillusionment of the past six months actually fed interest in such a vehicle?

Last week I started watching the Netflix series The Crown, which debuted four days before this past election. I like Peter Morgan, loved The Queen, The Audience. I’m an Anglophile, and my interest in the monarchy reaches beyond what is necessary to comprehend Shakespeare’s history plays.

With this series, dramatising the first months of the reign of Elizabeth II, Morgan seems to be a bit more heavy-handed with the exposition than with other treatises on Elizabeth Windsor, as though he assumes most of his audience will be American - or at the very least, not British. The idea of having to explain to the new queen that she chooses her royal name (her father George VI was born Albert, for example) is ridiculous, she knows that.

I’m loving John Lithgow as Winston Churchill, the first time I have seen any actor embody the character without doing a Churchill impression. Episode four, "Act of God," felt as though it too were mocking the new American President for his behavior, even though that episode, like the entire season, were all released on the same date, November 4, 2016.

The Great Smog of 1952

The Great Smog of 1952 was a bizarre weather event, an “anticyclone” which trapped air pollution - mostly the result of the use of coal for electricity and heat - over the Greater London area for several days. It was catastrophic, resulting in thousands or by some estimates over one hundred thousand deaths, due to either accidents due to low visibility or illness due to inhalation. These facts are a matter of historical record.

"Act of God" suggests Churchill, the Prime Minister, intentionally ignored scientific studies which made plain the health risks related to the coal-based power infrastructure and even reports that such a freak weather event were possible.

That I watched this episode on the very day President Trump announced the United States was withdrawing from the Paris Agreement wasn’t even the most alarmingly prescient element of this episode. That came when, in the midst of a national calamity, the Prime Minister was determined, during a cabinet meeting, on ranting about whether the Queen’s consort, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, should be allowed to train for a pilot’s license.

The comparison is ponderously obvious.

Source:
Freedom Rings With An Edge in “American Revolution” by Tony Brown, The Plain Dealer, 6/23/2004
Great Smog of London, Wikipedia

Summer of 2004

Any given year can be packed with exciting events, personal and professional. The right song can send me spiraling into memory of summers where nothing significant happened at all.

However, the summer of 2004 went from strength to strength, each successive event more startling than the last.  

Grandfathers

Late spring, we visited my grandfather Henrik in Florida, for his 100th birthday. He'd made it, mind intact. Counting down, he had previously announced he was five! (when he was 95.) He was two! (when he was 98.) Now he was zero. As the man said, second childishness. But not oblivion. Not yet. Never oblivion. He also had all his teeth.

At around the same time, we lost Toni's grandfather Calvin, our first child's namesake. Diagnosed with cancer, he was gearing up to fight it, but that fight never came. Awaiting chemo, a blood clot lodged in his heart and he was gone.

We had prepared for a long good-bye, and were stunned by no good-bye at all. We were grateful he had the chance to meet our child, who delighted him. No funeral, not a religious man, a memorial was planned for the end of the summer.

Spencer Tunick in Cleveland

This was also the summer experimental artist Spencer Tunick came to Cleveland and encouraged us all to get naked in public. Having tried and failed to find an indoor site for  a January shoot, they bumped the date to late June after securing the assistance of the city of Cleveland to stage what was (at that time) the largest mass-nude photo shoot in North America.

The photograph itself is almost beside the point, Tunick was at that time bringing with him a lot of attention, often raising interesting social questions simply by arranging these unusual events. The experience itself was an artistic event, with euphoric highs and irritating lows. Listen to this audio diary my wife and I created with the folks at WCPN, documenting the event for Around Noon, and you will understand what I mean.

This event fell neatly on our fifth wedding anniversary, June 26th.

Radio K

There are moments in time when I become suddenly very interested in new music. Obsessed, really. This year two things came into play which made it urgent to discover the hot new dance music. 1) This is the year I became a fanatically dedicated runner because of 2) The iPod.

Receiving an iPod for my birthday meant successfully being able to take music with me on runs, without requiring a cassette player, which is like running holding a brick that is tethered to your hand.

My brother introduced me to the University of Minnesota’s Radio K back in 1999, but using the “radio” feature on iTunes I was able to play it in my house all the time, and with the music store could spontaneously purchase whatever it was I heard that I never knew I lived without. Music by The Streets, Felix da Housecat, and of course, I Am The World Trade Center.


In a good and decent universe, this is the number one pop song of all time.

Mr. Shakespeare

This summer, and for only two seasons, my employer experimented with resuming a summer season (as opposed to fall-through-spring). One effort in raising awareness was imagined by Andrew May, who was impressed by a serendipitous promotional event that occurred when he was a young man in Chicago.

A performer on break from a Shakespeare festival downtown was reading a newspaper on a park bench in his compete, Elizabethan costume. A photographer happened to catch a passerby in the very second of an expressive double-take, and the picture made the front page of the Trib.

This is how I came to be Mr. Shakespeare, he wanted to recreate that moment but in Cleveland, and my job was to be seen all summer, at a variety of arts festivals and public events. The Rib Burn-Off, a Cleveland baseball game, the Cain Park Arts Festival -- I wasn’t handing out advertisements, I wasn’t putting on an act, I was just this guy who claimed to be William Shakespeare.

One day in early summer (and unfortunately before our costume shop had finished tailoring my beautiful, GLT-branded “plum” outfit) Andrew took me around Cleveland for a few preliminary, promotional shots.

The American Revolution

During its final year, Bad Epitaph Theater presented and I directed the Midwestern premiere of Kirk Wood Bromley’s The American Revolution.

Written entirely in verse, Mr. B. cast the story of the War for American Independence in the style of a Shakespearean tragedy along the lines of Henry V or Othello.

George Washington, traditionally depicted as an unknowable American god, is here a troubled and sympathetic general, finding his footing as general and becoming the man who would be First President. However, it is Benedict Arnold and his wife Peggy Shippen who provided an intimate dramatic tension, like Macbeth and Lady M., full of jealousy and scheming.

Our production was presented out-of-doors, on Wade Oval in University Circle, with bright costumes taking the place of any kind of set. Challenges included creating interesting stage combat with rifles and bayonets rather than swords, but interesting they were with swirling flags and the dramatic (though not frightening) sound of heavy wooden sticks beat against plastic garbage cans, which sound enough like guns and cannons without alarming the police.

Bromley’s clowns, the Rebel Mess (led by Ray McNiece as Appalachian beatnik Johnny Freeman) sang songs and hid from battle and lost limbs. It was awesome. Unfortunately, it was a very cool June that year which kept crowds low until the end of the run … and our final performance on Independence Day was washed out due to a sudden flash flood minutes after call time.

Highlight of the run was when the playwright and members of Inverse Theatre, who originated the work, made a trip to enjoy the performance. We feted them in grand Cleveland style at Nick’s place in Tremont.

As if we were not busy enough, there was a road trip to Maine.

I Hate This @ FringeNYC

That August was the first time I went solo at the New York International Fringe Festival, performing I Hate This (a play without the baby) in a 40-seat walkdown way out on Eighth Avenue.

While it was thrilling to share this work on a national stage, I learned some hard truths on that journey. I do not know how to handle being alone. Also, that a glowing review in The New York Times won’t do a thing for box office when no one wants to see a show about stillbirth.

However, it was that review which led a number of health and/or bereavement organizations across the Midwest to contact me and created the opportunity to carry Calvin's story far and wide and eventually across the Atlantic.

AIDSWALK/RUN

This year I became a runner. I had been an itinerant runner since I was an adolescent. Sometimes I would make a serious effort to maintain some kind of regimen -- ten years earlier, in 1994, I kept it up for several months.

But with one technological advance, I became a committed runner and have never stopped. As previously stated, that device would be The iPod.

For the first time, AIDSWALK included a 5K run, starting at Edgewater Beach. Running a race using the iPod (which I no longer do) gave me some kind of superhuman burst of energy and I broke twenty minutes for the first and possibly last time ever. That included that hill, by the way.

The kid was only a year and half, this was their first race. At first they were excited by all of the runners, starting all at the same time. But when we just kept going, running, running away and not coming back, and me with them, they started crying.

However, in 19 minutes and so many seconds I was back and when they saw me they smiled and shouted, DADDY RUNS FAST!

Summer's End

This epic summer closed with Calvin G.'s memorial, a glorious event where the extended family came together for a beautiful celebration of memory and music ... and someone ripped off our diaper bag, and with it two pair prescription sunglasses, my camera and her wallet. Instead of enjoying the celebration, I was choking down anger, on the phone with the Athens Police Department.

Coupled with a different theft in NYC a month earlier, I fell into a prolonged period of anxiety and fear. How can I care for a little person when I cannot look after myself?

Double Heart: In Verse

Our lively company.

Lisa had us on our feet last night. Two days of table work and now we're blocking. Yes! Welcome to the outreach tour. We open in seventeen days.

Verse is a game. I don't know much about poetry, and am hardly any kind of Shakepearean scholar, I just know what comes naturally to someone who like Shakespeare, reads it, reads about it, directs it and has occasionally performed it over the course of two decades. But that doesn't make me a scholar, those people are nuts.

When Stephen Sondheim released the first part of his two-volume work on his work, Finishing the Hat, I heard and saw him on Terri Gross and Stephen Colbert to talk up the book. When asked how he writes lyrics, the first thing he said -- before getting into how he thinks, or what he feels, or what it means -- he said he uses a thesaurus and a rhyming dictionary. 

This was a revelation to me! Even now, knowing what I do about writing, I assume that it's all supposed to spring fully-formed from your forehead. Using a dictionary? That's like cheating or something, you're supposed to already have all those words in your head already.

Sondheim said he also uses alcohol, but that doesn't work for me, it makes me go to sleep.

And so, for three weeks last April, I had my thesaurus, my rhyming dictionary, the history of human endeavor, and ten fingers to which to count da-DUM-da-DUM-da-DUM-da-DUM-da-DUM.

Of course, I would never have thought I could even attempt to write a play, even a short one, entirely in imabic pentameter if it were not for the work of Kirk Wood Bromley. During the 1990s and early 21st Century he and his company Inverse Theater created acclaimed modern verse plays with such awesome titles as Lost Labors' Loved, The Bangers Flopera, Want's Unwisht Work and The Death of Don Flagrante Delicto. 

Ray McNiece is Johnny Freeman.

Bad Epitaph produced his great history play The American Revolution in 2004, a work which takes the towering figure of George Washington off his pedestal to show him as a real person. References in this work alone include nods to Henry V, Othello, Macbeth, and every clown in Shakespeare crossed with Zonker Harris in the character of Johnny Freeman; coward, super-patriot.

I am not saying my work compares with Bromley's, because it does not. What I am saying is, his audacious example said to me, Please proceed, Gov'nor.

It Was A Setup

When I was last in New York I had the unique opportunity to drop in on the rehearsal of a new work written by a playwright I admire. In 2004 I directed The American Revolution by Kirk Wood Bromley, artistic director and playwright-in-residence for Inverse Theater. He specializes in modern verse plays, often creating five-act compositions in iambic pentameter. This most recent piece, It Was A Setup is a brief, personal piece of work, and one I have made plans to see when it debuts next month.

I contacted Bromley earlier in the year — I hadn’t spoken with him since our production of AM REV. At that time, I was delighted when he and a number of his crew journeyed to Cleveland to witness the production. A few months ago I asked if he had anything in the works, and he let me in on this new work. I read the script a few days before visiting in late June, and joined him and the company at his place in the Gowanus neighborhood of Brooklyn for the rehearsal.

It Was a Setup is a three-person play, inspired in part by the work of Bromley’s collaborator in this project, Leah Schraeger. She creates “phoems” — or photograph poems. She is also the choreographer for this piece. The script does not consist of realistic dialogue, but the rather the honest, emotional expression of a relationship is crisis. It is poetic, satiric, acidic, forlorn, angry, hilarious … but upon first read I have to admit I had no idea how one could stage it.

The night in question I was privileged to witness the most challenging scene of the piece, the least “obvious” of the scenes, where it was not clear to me, reading the script, exactly what was happening. It was fascinating, having this opportunity to watch and listen as the director-playwright explained, negotiated, and shaped the intentions and action of these three performers. Having the chance to watch a rehearsal as an entirely disconnected observer, with nothing at stake as writer, director, performer or designer was truly a unique opportunity, and I am extremely grateful all of the artists involved allowed me to be there.

It was, I felt, a very successful night. There appeared to be a great deal at stake, and after an extremely swift three-hours, these disjointed thoughts had the semblance of a through-line that could be carried forward into the next rehearsal. In brief, Charise and Tim have a relationship which has stalled, and is put into crisis by the appearance of a third character, Juliet. In this scene she is not actually there, but she is, if you follow. This is a sensation which is not unfamiliar to me.

The performance is scheduled to take place in an equally intimate space, identical to the one in which they rehearsed (location to be announced only when you purchase tickets — sweet.) The close proximity of the performers gives the piece an uncomfortable intensity. I cannot imagine how it will feel with twenty other audience members present — for that is all the space will hold.

Today we finalized my plans to return to NYC two weeks from tomorrow, in addition to attending this production I hope to revisit the Performing Arts Library, and maybe even check out the shows at the New York Fringe Festival.

UPDATE: BorderLight Theater Festival presents The Right Room, a new play by David Hansen and directed by Jasmine Renee, July 16 - 19, 2025. Help support our production by dropping a donation on our GoFundMe campaign!