The Politics of Representation New York Theatre Season 1990–91: A Discussion with Bonnie Marranca, Elinor Fuchs, Gerald Rabkin

The Politicsof Representation New York TheatreSeason 1990-91 A Discussion with Bonnie Marranca, ElinorFuchs, GeraldRabkin In PAJ 28 we published a dialogue entitled "The Politicsof Reception" on the controversial 1985-86 New York theatre season. Over the years we have receivedencouragementtofeaturemore such discussionsamong PAJ editors and regularcontributors.In March 1991, Bonnie Marranca, PAJ contributingeditor GeraldRabkin, and theatre critic ElinorFuchs met to talk about recent theatrical events through early spring. The productionsselected for the discussion organized themselves around a few central themes-race,gender,class, and currentartisticpractice. RABKIN: When we did the last PAJ discussion on the controversial season of 85-86, we found a number of productions that addressed issues central to the condition of America in the mid-80s. Now, as we look at this rather impoverished past season, it's difficult to find the same degree of energy that we saw then. We began last time by discussing Wally Shawn's provocative play at the Public Theatre, Aunt Dan and Lemon, in which he did the unthinkable: refusing to condemn his pro-Nazi protagonist. It was a strategy deliberately intended to disturb the liberal audiences' moral complacency. Well, here we are in 1991, six years later, and another politically resonant Shawn play is at the Public. So perhaps a place for us to start is The Fever, and to speculate on the kind of journey that Wally Shawn has undergone in the interim. Let me just say this: If you look back at the very beginning of the 80s, at the Louis Malle film he made then-My Dinner with Andre-you'll notice that it was Andre Gregory, rather than Wally, who articulates the moral outrage which is at the heart of The Fever. When you get to Aunt 1 Dan and Lemon, there is movement toward Andre's engaged position, but it's not articulated nearly as intensely as in The Fever MARRANCA: You're right about that. Early on, Wally was concerned with waking up each day, getting out of his apartment, having the amenities of life; getting through a day in New York seemed to be enough for him. But if you look back, not at the play, but at his essay published at the end of the Aunt Dan andLemon text, there are many similarities between it and The Fever In fact, he even mentions having a fever in a similar context in that essay. A lot of the themes are quite the same: seeing himself in relation to a maid, and wondering what her life is in comparison to his; the desire for comfort and sensuality. In some sense, Wally is still grappling with existential crisis in the bildungsromangenre. Wally speaks so much about childhood in The Fever and in the appendix to Aunt Dan, that it seems he is having difficulty in giving up the world of childhood for the world of manhood, in which choices aren't so clear and neither are the securities. He can't deal with this loss of innocence. FUCHS: I think it's important that in both works we have a central character who is really ill and in a crisis, in a fever; or in some long-term illness as Aunt Dan andLemon. But I marked another kind of progress, in the sense of journey, which speaks to a lot of other things we've seen this season. In Aunt Dan and Lemon the most corrupt characters are all women. For all of the painful and ironic self-consciousness that Wally tried to bring to Aunt Dan and Lemon, I really think he missed the fact, while making it clear, somehow, to the audience that lesbian activity is a stage on the road to corruption. He has three female characters in this situation, maybe four. That kind of sexism he seems to be bending over backwards to avoid in The Fever. RABKIN: Yes, he does specify in the published text that the piece-as autobiographical as it seems when he performs it himself-is not meant to be gender or age-bound. The monologue is presented in novella form, without dramatic indication of character or setting. I believe that Shawn intends for it to...