Gary Arms’ first play, The Duchess of Spiders was produced by the Black Swan Theatre Company in Asheville, NC. His second play, Emily Dickinson’s Birthday Party, was a finalist in the Mill Mountain Annual Play Contest. His third play, The Arranged Marriage, was published by the Eldridge Publishing Company and has been performed many times. It was recently translated into Dutch. His play The Porn King’s Daughter was one of the winners of the Iowa Play Contest and was performed at the Civic Center in Des Moines. The Princeton Review has published two of his books; the last one won a Parents Guide Award. For ten years, Gary Arms was the president of the Dubuque Fine Arts Players Annual One-Act Play Contest. He is a professor at Clarke College in the Language and Literature department.
Wednesday. The opening night of my play Naomi is an Ocean in Nigeria is Friday. I am excited, occasionally very excited, not to mention anxious. In the middle of something else, I suddenly feel my stomach contract. I
experience waves of nausea and my kidneys ache. I run to the bathroom and discover I have diarrhea (my idea of happiness?).The Fly By Night production of Naomi will be the first time I have been closely involved with the director and actors during rehearsals, the first time a play of mine has been produced in Dubuque where my friends can come see it. I got to help with the casting. The director is my best friend, Sunil Malapati. He let me attend several rehearsals and afterward took me out for drinks. I am absurdly hopeful that everyone will love the play. And this will accomplish what? Everyone will love me, and I will wallow in joy for the rest of my days. I indulge in this fantasy and then think of my long list of disappointments. And then run to the bathroom.
This morning my excitement is stronger than my despair. Already, Naomi is the most exciting production I have ever been involved with. The script is well written, and the actors are doing a fine job. Everyone involved with the production believes the play will amuse a lot of the audience and then make them weep. The actors keep telling me they love the script. They hug me or shake my hand and tell me it is a beautiful play; they feel honored to be involved.
I have seen a few of the rehearsals, but Friday at opening night, I will finally see everyone in their costumes. They will be using the lights and music. There will be an audience. For us, for the actors and director and for me, the play has few surprises any more, but for the audience the play will be full of humor and drama. We hope.
I am dying to know who will come. Will we sell out?
Friday morning. Opening night is tonight. I am ridiculously excited and unable to do anything useful. I went for a long walk just to burn off energy and am trying to limit my coffee consumption; it multiplies my anxiety.
Saturday. Opening night was disappointing. Only 35 or 40 people came. My expectations were so absurdly high that I felt crushed and wanted to run out of the theatre. Because the audience was so small, the laughs were few and nervous. The first scenes were grueling. Naomi seemed so angry that she terrified me and reminded me of my mother; I suddenly realized that so many of my plays contain angry emotional women – and all of them are my mother. The nursing home scenes made me recall the death of my father – all those strong exhausting emotions.
The play seemed to improve when we got to the party scene. That was the first time I actually enjoyed myself. I was afraid to look at anyone in the audience, but later Sunil told me some of them were weeping. The audience clapped at the end of the party scene, imagining it was time for intermission. Then there is the very grim dying scene and finally the river scene. I thought that scene was beautifully staged by Sunil: Ruth and Russ dancing to Luke’s music. But when the men arrived and dragged Ruth off-stage, the audience seemed stunned – or perhaps they were just waiting for another scene. They just sat there for several seconds even after the lights came up.
I remained in my chair all through intermission, and no one attempted to speak to me. I wanted to sink beneath the floor. The second act played well, especially the opening scene when Ruth is being interviewed by the newspaper editor. It is touching when the boy shows up; he doesn’t want his gramma to die. The scene when Ruth talks about Gandhi’s funeral was beautifully blocked by Sunil; as Ruth delivers her speech, the boy walks slowly to a couch and curls up on it, almost in the fetal position; it is heartbreaking to watch him. For some reason, in the later scene when Naomi is fighting with Ruth, the young man decided the way to display grief is to stagger around the stage as if drunk. Hopefully Sunil will tell him never to do that again. The struggle between Ruth and Naomi when Ruth convinces Naomi to drive her back to the river is heart-wrenching. Lenore is very good, finally breaking down and begging Naomi to help her. The final scene, Naomi and Ruth holding one another in the spot light as Russ sings “Good night, Irene” – terribly touching. Sometimes, watching the play, when I escaped my disappointment about the size of our audience, I felt that maybe Naomi is a real work of art after all.
Lenore dragged me out of my chair for the bow. I must have looked like a rabbit caught in the headlights. Lenore gave me a bundle of flowers. I retreated to where Susie was sitting while the audience departed. I have very little idea what they thought of the play. A guy with a shock of hair came up to me, shook my hand, told me the play was good but – he grinned mercilessly – “about an hour too long.”
Susie and I took the boys home, and then we went to the bar where the cast was having a little party. They were arranged around two long tables, end to end. Lenore made me sit in the middle, so I felt as if I was at the Last Supper and might soon be crucified. I gulped down two large glasses of bourbon and began to feel better. The actors seemed happy. The men told me that it is a beautifully written play. Lenore and Michele hugged me. Bill, the man who plays the reporter, said he has loved the play ever since Sunil sent him the script. Lenore asked me if I was happy, and I said, “I have complicated feelings.”
On Facebook, a woman wrote “it all sounded pretty familiar” and that she and her husband thought it was over at the intermission and were ready to leave, but were told there was another act, so stayed. She said it “kinda dragged on for two hours.” This sort of negative reaction affects me to a ridiculous degree. I can see why famous playwrights and actors sometimes refuse to read their reviews. I was going to go to tonight’s show but think I won’t. I am too disheartened. For a long time I imagined it a good play. I love to tell myself that at long last I have written something really good. It is painful to spend so much of one’s life writing and meet so regularly with failure. The people who read the script said such nice things. That encouraged me. But last night’s experience was grueling – like being tortured for two hours, people staring at my open wounds.
It is impossible for me to be objective about any of this. If someone says anything critical to me, the comment plunges deeply into me; the negative comments penetrate much more deeply than the compliments. I now fear the play is too long; that it is tedious, repetitious, and unoriginal; that parts are sentimental and preachy. I have fallen out of love with the play. I sustained a love affair with the play for four years, and now – in one night – have fallen out of love.
My usual bipolar cycle.
There is a scene in the play when Naomi says she hates being the way she is; she speaks for me when she says such things. She declares she is “the unlovable type.” Susie talked on the phone to Becky this morning; Becky wanted to know all about opening night. She said she tends to get depressed AFTER a show ends, not during it, so if I am depressed now, I am ahead of the game. It didn’t help that I got drunk afterward. I have been hung over all day. I get too up, and then too down. I want to crawl into a hole and not come out for a couple weeks. I have been thinking about Lenore – for 25 years she has been putting on shows she likes, knowing that most of the time very few people will come see them. When I think of all the work they do -- reading plays, selecting the ones they like, finding directors and actors who will work for nothing, memorizing, planning, and rehearsing – hours and hours and hours. And then at the end of it, a few people trickle in. Why do they do it? I deeply admire them. They are my real family – the unsuccessful artists who just keep doing it, going from failure to failure. Maybe to them it does not feel like failure. Maybe in its way it is success.
Later – I just got an email from an audience member whose mother died of Alzheimer’s. She said she loves it that I made the case for the right to die but also showed the complexity of that decision. Any suicide affects many other people. She says her mother died after a miserable slow decline; she knows what it means to live in fear of dying that way. She says I wrote a fine play. God, that message cheered me up immensely.
Sunday morning. Sunil emailed and said we got a standing ovation Saturday night. Vici emailed to say great show. A guy named Dan left a message on the Facebook Naomi page recommending the show and complimenting the actors.
Monday. Sunil said, at the Sunday matinee, half the audience stood up at the end and the other half remained seated, “possibly stunned.” He considers it a success when they DON’T clap, believing it means they are very moved emotionally. He said he watched the audience, and they were riveted during the play. He said some people leave the theatre the moment the show is over, but a surprising number stay to talk to one another. He says that is a very good reaction.
Sara came to the matinee and told him that the character Russ was her father; her dad died of Alzheimer’s. Sunil said Michele (Naomi) “lost it” at the matinee, began to weep during the final scene, and had to compose herself. Doug and Donna were there, and concluded Michele is a fabulous actress. Doug said he was wiping away tears all through the last ten minutes of the play.
Sunil says that Susie should forbid me to read Facebook because if I find one negative comment I go crazy. I admitted it may be true that I fixate on negative remarks. “Negative remarks? You mean, one? That one stupid couple said it is too long, and you go nuts. How many people have told you they loved it, that it was great, made them cry, moved them, that it is universal, powerful?”
Michele is hosting the cast party at her house after the show on Friday, so I will have to go that night. Lisa, Lori and Deb say they are coming Friday; they want me to meet them before the show for dinner. Craig and Jennifer say they are coming too, probably for the Saturday show.
I am terrified of having to sit there with another audience and watch the play again. I imagine someone saying the show wasn’t so bad except for the fact that this bearded geek having a nervous breakdown (me) was sitting beside them.
Paula emailed to say that she and Alice are going to see the play this weekend; she says “the buzz has been super positive.”
On one hand, I desperately desire to know what people think, especially people I like and respect. On the other hand, I am terrified even to be in the same room with people who are watching the play. When anyone approaches me to make a comment, my eyes get big, my heart races, and I begin to edge backwards. There they are, my intimate dreams, on display for anyone who has fifteen bucks.
Friday, the fourth performance. I have fallen in love with the play again. This time I went out to eat with Lisa, Deb, and Lorie. Wisely, I downed two big glasses of bourbon before the show. The audience was fabulous, very responsive, open to everything that happened. They laughed numerous times as if they were at a comedy, and then settled down for the more serious stuff. I noticed women crying on both sides of me. The cast was wonderful, much more relaxed than they were opening night. Their timing, pacing, the blocking – again and again, they hit the right note, a true ensemble piece. Lenore was completely at home in her character, and Michele was restrained and seemed much more sympathetic than opening night. The three guys were perfect. For the first time ever, Michele did the bird speech properly. When Ron does his “dying breathing,” it is so real that it is nearly unbearable. Michele’s huge speech at the end of the party scene was perfect; sometimes she is so good it is scary. I got out of my seat at intermission and spoke to a few people; they were very complimentary. I thought act two dragged a bit, but the rest of the audience was riveted. Lots of women were dabbing their eyes. Sunil felt act one was a bit “loosey-goosey,” and act two was “nearly perfect.” He claims last Sunday’s matinee was the best performance so far. The cast got a standing ovation at the end. Sunil says of the first four performances, they have received three standing ovations. Afterward, Louise, Graciela and Jessie seemed much moved, surprised I think. I don’t know exactly what they expected it would be – a play about an old lady committing suicide – but they obviously thought it ten times better than they had expected. For some reason, they all reached out to touch me, shake my hand. I have known Louise and Graciela for nearly 20 years, and I don’t think they have ever wanted to shake my hand before. Jessie and Louise are artists and teachers; everything in the play about art, about making art in Dubuque really hits them where they live. Lisa, Deb and Lori hugged me; they didn’t want to leave the theatre. It was just as Sunil said; half the audience remains in the theatre. They want to talk to one another.
Afterward we went to the cast party. The whole cast seems high after the performance. They all took turns talking about how much they love being in the play. This is one of the most wonderful things about theatre, collaboration, when the director and the cast, the tech people, the composer – when the whole group adds things, and the show comes alive, and everyone owns it. Wow. At the party, the cast gave Sunil a gift. The cast kept telling me how much they love certain scenes. I floated home on a cloud.
I went Saturday night for the last time (we have to be out of town Sunday). My brother Craig and his daughter Jennifer were with me. I have grown used to the darkness and anger in the play. Michele has settled into her part. She still has the anger, but it is controlled; her grief and sadness come through, her vulnerability. She was very good with the long speeches, the one at the end of the party scene and the one about the dying bird. Lenore is outstanding in the main role, a real tour de force. A lot of people I know were in the audience. A guy I don’t know shook my hand after the show and said, “Bravo.” Diane came up to me at intermission and was effusive with her praise; she loves the play. Kay came up to me at intermission. Craig was returning from the bathroom; she pushed him aside so that she could get to me, which of course startled him since he had no idea who she was. She lurched at me, hugged me, and then made an entire speech about how good the play is, how it is controversial, how some are probably telling me it is wrong to mix real people into a fictional play, but she feels this is exactly what we should be doing, how inspired she is by the play. So many people approached me during or after the play that I began to feel like Marlon Brando in The Godfather, the scene where men kiss his ring. They kept touching me and shaking my hand and saying effusive things. I don’t know what Craig thought of all that.
We got another standing ovation. It is interesting to watch the process. The very best kind of standing ovation must be when the audience simply leaps en masse to its feet. I have never seen one like that. Instead, what happens is that the lights come up and the audience claps; the cast begin to take their individual bows. Someone in the audience stands up. Saturday night, it was a tall elderly man. He was a bit rickety, especially his knees; with difficulty he unfolded himself and stood at full attention, clapping hard. His wife joined him. Everyone else in the theatre became aware of them. A couple more people in his section stood, and half a dozen in another section. At such moments, everyone has to decide – do we want to stand? Everyone in my section stood – except me. I was embarrassed, thrilled and honored, but uncertain what to do. Across from our section was a section in which eight or nine never stood up. They clapped but resolutely remained seated. I calculate two thirds of the audience gave us a standing ovation.
On the long drive to Missouri, I couldn’t stop talking about the play. I am happy to report that I did not obsessively discuss it and the audiences and the actors for ALL the hours we were in the car, but I am sure I talked about it for an hour on the way to Waterloo, and then another hour on the way back to DBQ after we dropped off Kay.
All things considered, this has been the most exciting, emotional, and enriching experience with playwriting and theatre that I have ever had.
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