Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee (review)

The “Sorites paradox,” also known as the “paradox of the heap” (sorites is the Greek word for “heap”), enumerates the following philosophical problem: Given a heap of sand, at what point, if one grain of sand is removed one at a time, is the heap no longer a heap? Who could argue that the remaining grains of sand no longer constitute a heap if only a single grain is removed? However, at some point, only one grain of sand will be left, and who could call a single grain a heap? The Sorites paradox is, arguably, one of the most philosophically important concepts that informs both the enactment and rewriting of dramatic texts. Steppenwolf Theatre’s production of Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? provided no better example of how the Sorites paradox plays out in the theatre. With nothing added and only a few grains of sand (that is, spoken lines) removed by Albee, this Broadway production of a modern classic was decidedly and simultaneously both Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and not Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Carrie Coon (Honey), Madison Dirks (Nick), Tracy Letts (George), and Amy Morton (Martha) in Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

(Photo: Michael Brosilow.)

This production of Albee’s edited version, particularly his decision to exclude George’s warning not mention the “kid,” had profound implications for the meaning of the play. The focus no longer centered on Martha breaking the apparent pact the two had made together, but instead it was George’s own decision to “kill” their “son” that subsequently breaks Martha. By excluding the scene when Honey thinks she hears the doorbell ring—the moment in the original when George figures out how to kill the son—the act of killing appeared premeditated. Rather than something that George is almost forced to do in response to Martha, his quiet and spineless demeanor in the Steppenwolf version was an attempt to suppress his own long-held desires to kill their son, and perhaps also the woman who birthed him.

Although Albee claims that he cut only unnecessary scenes, his edits recast the play and the dynamics between George and Martha in an entirely new light, one in which—in light of these exclusionary edits—director Pam MacKinnon astutely portrayed George and Nick as victimizers and Martha and Honey as their undeserving victims. Acting choices by Tracy Letts (George) and Amy Morton (Martha) strongly supported this interpretation: Letts portrayed George as generally meek and lacking vertebra while at the same time paradoxically exploding with words and anger from the seeming weight of George’s own inner demons. For her part, Morton enacted a Martha who clearly did not “bray.” Rather than hostile and antagonistic enemies, Letts and Morton conveyed a dynamic between George and Martha that was for the most part playful and loving. The fact that George eventually lashes out and brings down Martha thus made him appear even more of a monster, since he ultimately attacked both Martha and their marriage, neither of which seemed to deserve his abuse. By allowing George and Martha to be genuinely affectionate with each other and thus indicating at least the possibility of happiness between then, MacKinnon and Letts effectively turned George into a predator who preys on an undeserving victim and attacks the moment that his emotions overtake his otherwise logical mind. Here, he became the male body, mind, and soul out of control.

Letts’s George was not the George “who keeps learning the games [that George and Martha] play as quickly as [Martha] can change the rules,” and perhaps even more importantly, “who understands, which is beyond comprehension.” In this production, George spoke quietly, almost living in his own world, sounding and moving much like Nick’s (played by Madison Dirks) assessment when he observes: “I don...