“I happen to know that God is alive and well and living in Gary, Indiana. He’s a black steelworker with seven kids who works the night shift pouring o“I happen to know that God is alive and well and living in Gary, Indiana. He’s a black steelworker with seven kids who works the night shift pouring off slag.�
Mean, caustic, hilarious. Eric Bogosian wrote some delicious, DELICIOUS monologues. You can just chew on those words. Truly so many awesome, vicious monologues.
“Lemme put it this way, Barry Champlain is a nice place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there.�
Inspired to read because my friend and old roommate Steve took an acting class after I started � he was also inspired by my decision and wanted to give it a gander. He told me he prepared a monologue from this play; I wasn’t familiar, but with a gift card to the Drama Book Shop that he gave me for Christmas, I picked up a Bogosian collection as a sort-of homage.
“I’ll bet you’re really an actor or something, right? I’m always fascinated by people with goals.�
Enjoyed reading this. Distinct characters who are ju“I’ll bet you’re really an actor or something, right? I’m always fascinated by people with goals.�
Enjoyed reading this. Distinct characters who are just bored enough to try and do something a little reckless. My goodness, the fallout from this is kinda messy.
I'm reading some plays that my classmates were casted in for rehearsal projects. Wow, it’d be a lot of fun to be Matty. Insane dialogue from his character, and I can’t wait to watch Camillo get into it.
“Tell me you’re not really going to be a priest.� “I promise to not be a good one.�
The non-linear progression of the story � a choice! And yeah, pretty interesting. Feels quite conducive to be filmed; does this exist as a film? Could be excellent for a film.
The dialogue is the best part. It’s actually quite funny.
“I’m not going to settle for some mindless drudgery just to be comfortable.� “So you’ll go on letting mommy pay the bills?� “Artists have always been supported.� “You’re not an artist.� “I have the temperament.�...more
“Being a playwright, darling? A playwright? Acting isn’t demoralizing enough, you choose playwriting?�
Read this play twice this weekend. Jumping from “Being a playwright, darling? A playwright? Acting isn’t demoralizing enough, you choose playwriting?�
Read this play twice this weekend. Jumping from being nineteen years old in This is Our Youth in my Scene Study class to being sixty-six years old with a bum knee in this play for my spring rehearsal project. First time we’ll be working on a full-length production at Stella, and I’m very excited to get to work with my cast and director! Think we have a good group, genuinely.
At my core, I relate the most to Elliot. He has this air of bitterness and sadness to him that’s me on my worst days (but I won’t lie, there’s at least a moment every day where I embody Elliot, lmao). But he’s such a great character and you want to give him a hug. Of course, Anna, is such a marvelous character.
“Do you think it’s easy telling your child the truth? Do you? Shall I pretend your play was a work of genius? Is that what you want? Lies? I can lie; I pretend for a living. Marvelous! Absolutely brilliant! All it was, was a childish attempt to get back at me! To embarrass me!�
Frankly, all of the characters in this play are much older than us actors playing them. We’re all in our 20s (I’m the oldest actor at the senior-citizen age of 29 years old), but we’re playing 70, 66, three of us are in our 40s, and then of course Juliana gets to play 21.
You can tell the Chekhov influence right off the jump! The arc and the yearning and the fact that everyone’s an artist (or related to one). All the jokes on actors. It’s inside baseball, this play, but it’s fun. There’s much to mine, and I'm excited to approach as an actor.
Desire is the root of all suffering. This play supports this 100% valid claim. These strange happenings that we have no control over, and the ways we’re inextricably attached to each other, no matter how disjointed and dysfunctional. Family will disappoint you time and time again. And love shows and reveals itself in the weirdest of ways sometimes.
But we gotta keep going.
I’m gonna read this a few more times, obviously, and then I’ll be acting in it for four performances in May. God, I hope I can be convincing as Walter. But like Walter’s resolve in the third act when he tells Elliot “what he really thinks,� I believe I’ll have to just decide to be Walter, and choose to believe that my choices are the right ones. It's taken him 66+ years to get somewhere near this resolve; maybe driving the Porsche softens the blow of whatever emptiness he feels inside. But he found Nell. We choose what we want to believe, sometimes. The pain doesn't leave you.
“What should I regret? The work on stage I didn’t do? Not a chance. Starvation is not a virtue.�...more
“Spend a lifetime with them and you might get a moment of insight into their pain� until then, allow them their grandeur in silence.�
A genius play. Th“Spend a lifetime with them and you might get a moment of insight into their pain� until then, allow them their grandeur in silence.�
A genius play. Thank you to Fran, who told me I should read this and said, “you’d be a good Ken.� And I’m flattered, but also, the role does seem suited for me, if I may say so myself: I’m definitely going to add his last monologue to my arsenal � it’s so dang good!
“You know, not everything has to be so goddamn IMPORTANT all the time! Not every painting has to rip your guts out and expose your soul! Not everyone wants art that actually HURTS! Sometimes you just want a fucking still life or landscape or soup can or comic book! Which you might learn if you ever actually left your goddamn hermetically-sealed submarine here with all the windows closed and no natural light � BECAUSE NATURAL LIGHT ISN’T GOOD ENOUGH FOR YOU!�
Never have I stopped to write down more lines or quotes than this play, I think. The dialogue is so good, and the sentiments so profound. Rothko is such an interesting man; a true “artist� for all the good and the bad that entails.
“I AM HERE TO STOP YOUR HEART, YOU UNDERSTAND THAT?! I AM HERE TO MAKE YOU THINK! I AM NOT HERE TO MAKE PRETTY PICTURES!�
Like the ideas they discuss from Nietzsche’s The Birth of Tragedy, two things can be true, and opposing ideas and practices can still be inextricably linked. I agreed with Rothko, I agreed with Ken. Both are usually right, in a way.
“All my life I wanted just this, my friend: to create a place� A place where the viewer could live in contemplation with the work and give it some of the same attention and care I gave it. Like a chapel� A place of communion.� “But� it’s a restaurant.� “No� I will make it a temple.�
Ugh. So good! There's so much to say, but all I'll tell you is: read the play. I'd love to watch a staging of it -- can only imagine how beautiful the lighting design can be; and the whole conceit of watching the actors stare right into the audience (where we suspend our disbelief that they are looking at whatever current painting that Rothko is working on) would be so tremendous. Seeing how they're stirred looking at these paintings, but we get to see it. We're the painting -- the audience. I'd love to see that, and I'd also love to help that creation.
“How do you know when it’s done?� “There’s tragedy in every brush stroke.�...more
“Doubt requires more courage than conviction does, and more energy; because conviction is a resting place and doubt is infinite—it is a passionate exe“Doubt requires more courage than conviction does, and more energy; because conviction is a resting place and doubt is infinite—it is a passionate exercise.�
I knew from reading John Patrick Shanley’s introduction to the play, which I included an excerpt of above, that I was in for a real treat. Had been meaning to watch the film for a long time now, but in a way, I’m glad this was my introduction to the work. The ideas are right there, and just READING the play, and creating voices in my head � it adds to this layer of doubt.
“If I could, Sister James, I would certainly choose to live in innocence. But innocence can only be wisdom in a world without evil. Situations arise and we are confronted with wrongdoing and the need to act.�
If I heard Father Flynn explain his side, or if I heard the conviction from Sister Aloysius, maybe I’d be like Sister James and be so easily swayed. I’m left with this interesting layer of doubt � this Catholic guilt and doubt that I already possess.
Wonderfully-written. As a bonus, this play is actually quite funny. I read this entire play at a coffeeshop earlier today and let out a few good chuckles. Some satisfying bits with bloody noses, blindness, and coworker nonsense (even if they’re all nuns � we’re all only human and not divine nor immaculate).
The last couple scenes � the Mrs. Muller meeting� wow. I gasped at a reveal, which I guess is how we’re supposed to react. You think you know, you think you know. There’s layers and nuance to all of this. A lot to chew on, genuinely.
“When you take a step to address wrongdoing, you are taking a step away from God, but in His service.�
Loved reading that the original cast of the show said in interviews that the second act starts when the audience leaves the theater. This was so quick to read, and I saw that it translates to about 90 minutes of theater. Makes a lot of sense! Father Flynn’s sermons can take awhile; and boy, I’m sure there are a lot of meaningful pregnant pauses. Wow. Great stuff.
Father Flynn would be a difficult character to play� but I’d love to do it. I know it takes place in the 1960s, but hey, the next Pope might be Filipino! And I was born in the Bronx. Maybe we can manifest this for a revival in 20-25 years....more
“This morning I watched one of my patients die before my eyes.� “But you’re not a doctor, Ivan.� “Then I am all the guiltier. Oh, Alyosha, how can you l“This morning I watched one of my patients die before my eyes.� “But you’re not a doctor, Ivan.� “Then I am all the guiltier. Oh, Alyosha, how can you look at this barren untranslatable Russian idiom around us, and still believe in God?�
With my fairly pedestrian and elementary knowledge of Russian Drama and literature (and let’s face it, it’s really just purely Russian Drama at this point), I can say I thoroughly enjoyed this irreverent, nonsensical play spoofing so much from Russian art as well as just contemporary Western art as well.
Laughed a lot while reading. Would imagine a lot of great bits are visual � Constance during her long, strange translations of scenes from Russian to English, and the ‘yes, and� that seems to play out with the characters she’s telling stories of but changing circumstances (from “whorehouse� to “warehouse�).
Mary Tyrone Karamazov killed me. Mary’s already ‘not there� at times in Long Day’s Journey Into Night, but how she’s used in this play, just deliriously referring to her sons as characters from a completely different play� a wonderful bit. Got me every time.
“Mama, I’m going to be a pop star!� “Edmund, stop saying that! It’s just a summer cold!�
My first Durang. He won the Tony for Best Play with Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, and I feel like I’ll visit the play quite soon. Beyond Therapy I’d love to read next and will do it soon. He’s from New Jersey! I can hear it with the dialogue. Feels so New Jerseyan....more
“Well, you see, there are some people whom one loves, and others whom it’s almost more fun to be with.�
Torvald is not John Proctor. Torvald is in fact“Well, you see, there are some people whom one loves, and others whom it’s almost more fun to be with.�
Torvald is not John Proctor. Torvald is in fact Reverend Parris.
Urgent and all-encompassing; I can imagine the immense ripples this play had when it originally premiered in the late 1800s. The sacredness of marriage held under a microscope; the agency of women, or at the very least, an examination of how their voices are silenced by the men in their lives.
“I know what despair can drive a man like you to.�
Some wonderful exchanges of dialogue and some iconic monologues. Nora is one of the best characters of the form.
The secondary plot of Mrs. Linde and Krogstad had some of my favorite sentiments and wonderfully counterbalances the suffocation of Nora and Torvald’s dollhouse relationship.
“I must work if I’m to find life worth living. I’ve always worked, for as long as I can remember. It’s been the greatest joy of my life � my only joy. But now I’m alone in the world, and I feel so dreadfully lost and empty. There’s no joy in working just for oneself. Oh, Nils, give me something � someone � to work for.�
I got a used copy from the Strand Book Store. But I didn’t even consider that maybe I should’ve held out for the Amy Herzog version. Alas, I can always visit that one later.
Wonderful, essential text. Torvald’s bipolar and honor-driven monologues in Act III are quite great; his character is ‘justified� because of his flawed worldviews and societal expectations; can absolutely imagine Arian Moayed KILLING this role. And it goes without saying that Jessica Chastain was undoubtedly marvelous as Nora....more
“Do you like being� an actor?� “No, sir.�
Reading this right after Waiting for Godot, lord. Waiting for the end to come�
“Don’t you see?! We’re actors - “Do you like being� an actor?� “No, sir.�
Reading this right after Waiting for Godot, lord. Waiting for the end to come�
“Don’t you see?! We’re actors - we’re the opposite of people!�
This one I found funnier than Waiting for Godot, and I do appreciate how it extends the life (but in a way, offering zero new information about them) of Hamlet’s “friends� Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.
Their quest is nonsensical and devoid of meaning without Hamlet himself. Their entire purpose is for Hamlet. And the way they get written off by Shakespeare in the original text, well� we need to know what could have been going through their heads on that boat ride to England.
Absurd, funny, and quite sad. Its musings on life, on art, on the futile exercise of acting, on what’s “real� and what’s “not,� and of course, on death, really fired off my imagination.
I suppose I’d have found this play on my own at some point, but reading it so close to my birthday got me confronting my mortality once again. ...more
“Yes, now I remember, yesterday evening we spent blathering about nothing in particular. That's been going on now for half a century.�
I had a very viv“Yes, now I remember, yesterday evening we spent blathering about nothing in particular. That's been going on now for half a century.�
I had a very vivid dream about school after reading this (helps when you finish reading Waiting for Godot at 2:30am, and you drift away while thinking about absurdism and the meaning of life), and this dream I think enhanced my opinion of this play. The play CONTINUED, so to speak. And I woke up loving this play � kinda crazy.
Which, I must say, Waiting for Godot MUST be enhanced by reading with another person; especially the playfulness, silliness, and speediness of some of the dialogue between Didi and Gogo. That being said, I did enjoy reading this a lot � this play about “nothing� and “everything.� There were moments that were giving me pause; or I realized it was a little boring to read, because a lot of the magic comes from the intentional, meaningful silences (can imagine audiences howling with laughter at the brutal mundanity of Didi and Gogo's predicament and pleasant suicidal ideation).
“Let us not waste our time in idle discourse! (Pause. Vehemently.) Let us do something, while we have the chance! It is not every day that we are needed. Not indeed that we personally are needed. Others would meet the case equally well, if not better. To all mankind they were addressed, those cries for help still ringing in our ears! But at this place, at this moment of time, all mankind is us, whether we like it or not. Let us make the most of it, before it is too late! Let us represent worthily for once the foul brood to which a cruel fate consigned us! What do you say?� (Estrogon says nothing)
If The Myth of Sisyphus was a pure absurdist comedy, and you had to endure (suffer) with a friend, you get Waiting for Godot. Trying to get ideas for plays and scenes to perform with one partner, and this one for many reasons has a few really good moments....more
“But listen � Would you be morally offended if I kissed you for just a second?� “Well, I mean, what’s the rush?� “No rush. I’d just like to get rid of t“But listen � Would you be morally offended if I kissed you for just a second?� “Well, I mean, what’s the rush?� “No rush. I’d just like to get rid of this knot in my stomach.� “Oh � Sure, I mean � Whatever’s expedient.�
Lonergan knows how to write some dialogue. This was a lot of fun to read, and it was a delight to follow these three horny, conflicted, emotional young adults. My classmate Aidan suggested this play to potentially use for our next scene in Scene Study, so I had to do my homework.
And we may do something from this! We have some time to read more and decide, but I do think we’d have some fun as Dennis and Warren (he being Dennis; I being Warren). Kinda works out, because both have this coked-up energy, but Dennis is taller/stronger (albeit unambitious), and Warren is the shorter/anxious/grieving one. They’re both kinda stuck with each other.
"I'm like the basis of your personality... I'm like a one-man youth culture for you pathetic assholes. You're gonna remember your youth as like a gray stoned haze punctuated by a series of beatings from your fuckin' Dad, and like,ÌýmyÌýjokes."
There’s only three characters here. And Warren is really the only connective tissue of the three, but all are so fun to follow and experience their world views. Warren perhaps because of inaction and a certain lack of agency he finds himself thrust (stuck) with these characters, but his arrested development is wondrous to unpack, or at least learn from.
“Not much happens,� but so much happens. Hubris, modernity, and grief are the main motivators and obstacles of this story; these are experiences that shape our youth (I mean, that title, ba dum tsssss) and it’s never easy.
Lonergan’s monologues always sound / seem so out-of-breath; but they’re frequently very funny, even if they come from a pained place. No wonder his plays have a lot of repeat actors (Michael Cera, Kieran Culkin)....more
"Hear my soul speak: The very instant that I saw you did My heart fly to your service, there resides To make me slave to it, and for your sake Am I th"Hear my soul speak: The very instant that I saw you did My heart fly to your service, there resides To make me slave to it, and for your sake Am I this patient log-man."
I'm playing Ferdinand in the Ferdinand/Miranda scene (Act 3, Scene 1) for my Shakespeare class with my classmate Piti. This scene is definitely my favorite scene of the play, and it's a lot of fun to play with. Ferdinand is Grade-A simp-of-the-year.
“When the sea is. Hence! What cares these roarers for the name of king? To cabin! Silence! Trouble us not.�
Not my favorite Shakespeare to read. Definitely would be aided by WATCHING it. That Act 1 set piece would be crazy as well; seeing the actual tempest (storm) happening on the boat. And then all the ensuing fallout of that.
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