A Review of "Thirtysomethings": A Collection of Women's Monologues

The International Center for Women Playwrights recently asked me to review thirty monologues that were published together under the title Thirtysomethings, and I graciously accepted this rare opportunity. I want to thank Coni Koepfinger and Margaret McSeveny for introducing me to these wonderful works and for trusting in my words and thoughts to review such poignant and challenging pieces of literature. Readers will find my review located below.

The book is available as a downloadable e-book or a bound paperback via the ICWP Press online shop at http://stores.lulu.com/womenplaywrights, and also from Amazon.com.

Thirtysomethings is one of four Mother / Daughter Monologues collections that cover the mother /daughter perspective and experiences from teens to women in their eighties. The series also includes these other titles: Babes and Beginnings, Mid-life Catharsis, and Urgent Maturity.

REVIEW OF THIRTYSOMETHINGS

The title for the International Centre for Women Playwrights 2nd volume of mother/daughter monologues registers as being ironic because it smacks of something while being dubbed “Thirtysomethings.” Or, rather, it does not smack, but whispers. It whispers of something calm and elegant – how fitting considering the subject matter is about relationships between mothers and daughters. Yet, where else does the fine balancing act between two such rivals, cohorts, confidantes, extremists, enemies, soulmates of kinship (dare we say friends, even sisters?), exist, other than in that even finer division between a smack and whisper?

Upon first reading the volume, one is impressed by the sheer raw quality of life that comes from the page through means no more complex than the monologue. The beauty of such a delivery piece rests in its simplicity when presented to an audience – sometimes bold, often flashy, always to the point. Precise, a monologue reads as if it is extemporaneous, as fresh as the playwright’s first thoughts. However, as any writer knows, writing is not that easy. The monologue is a culmination of one-sided conversations we never had the chance to utter; it is the things we always want (or wanted) to say but never had the chance. In writing for this format, we find ourselves becoming the meticulous writer that is cliché itself –pouring over every syllable, testing every nuance of language, trying just so to get it just so. We tell ourselves, “It has to work! If only I could parse this or elaborate that without harming such or adding depth to thus.” It drives us mad.

When the writing is fluid and concise and reserved, it allows the actress the chance to study each word as it builds into each sentence and it builds each sentence into the testament that is the monologue.

Thus, what we read in Thirtysomethings is a compendium of the women we have known, loved, desired, detested, wanted to be and wanted to be with; found within is the secret desires for what we wish our wives and partners and friends to be and the mothers that we sometimes wish did not have.

The complex relationships that men cannot understand and many women have difficulty explaining shine through with reverence and dedication – much like the commitment a mother should have to her daughter. At the same time, we feel the strain and the wanting and the attitude and the adoration that each daughter should and often does have toward the mother. Thirtysomethings fits together nicely as a summation of all the women we might encounter.

Each play is reviewed below as a commentary unto itself and should not be taken to include the collection, but rather a glimpse of each tiny piece of glass within the mosaic.

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Living on Nothing by Hope McIntyre, Canada
If the true evil of poverty is the cycle from which no one can escape without a lot more luck than hard work, then this story takes us inside the door of that house we cross the street to avoid, the house we tell our kids not to visit. But, as sure as poverty is real, Miss McIntyre introduces us to the reality for thousands of people trying to get their lives back who are against a system with a long memory. Who’s to blame? It seems both the protagonist and the system, yet we are likely to find ourselves siding with the mother in this play.

Shifting Demographics by Elizabeth Whitney, USA
A nice honest piece about family and regret, but, really, why do we need to learn this lesson? Chances are, anyone who doesn’t already know the stupidity of bigotry (yet alone the hypocrisy of bad parenting) wouldn’t go to the theatre anyway. Mostly everyone else already knows this. It is disappointing in its predictability.

Excerpt from: The Box by Kimberly delBusto, Cuban-American, USA
An interesting view into the mind of a child trapped somewhere between innocence and the loss thereof, a mind spanning all the years of growing up. But, gee, what ever happened to faith, the fact that some good people are truly happy?

Stout Heart by Katelyn Gendelev, USA
In the subtle heritage that makes each family – the stories that never make the headlines or are never made into a movie – there lies sincerity, depth, warmth, and this lady shares it with us in intricate, private detail. So touching the remembrance of a relationship that all families should be gifted with, even the loss is palpably sweet.

If You’ll Have Me by Meryl Cohn, USA
Like a short note that reads, “You were wrong, I forgive you and I want to be friends” (but really meaning it), this play takes us out of ourselves. The hint of humor is refreshing and the investment into one woman’s confused and somewhat tortured past reminds us – no, warns us – to not make the mistakes of past generations. Yet, it echoes of the quiet reminder that while it is never too late to say certain words, it can in fact be too late to have them be heard. This setting offers the director a chance to make even the smallest black box come to life with the serene outdoors that are resting places.

If Ever It’s Served Me by Sera Weber-Striplin, USA
So in lies the confrontation of our mortality, as taught by those who never took a class in life’s most crucial lessons – how we live, how we die, how we connect generation to generation – those learned through experience. The imagery of an oxygen machine humming onward will remain with many theatre-goers, especially those who have lived those nights. In her capable hands, the “playwrightess” softly says farewell to her legacy and hello to the responsibility she carries to enshrine it in memory. An actress will simply love being this character for weeks of rehearsal and for minutes each night of performance.

Photos of Meg by Chris Lockheardt, USA
This play acts out like a Blackjack dealer flipping photo-cards to tell a story and lure the audience. Whose life is at stake? Whose goals? Whose decisions? Through destructive means, a mother laments these issues but she forgets to tell us the answers…or did the playwright just not know herself? While this is a solid piece, it leaves the audience with an incomplete feeling. It is a play-goers monologue but not quite a play yet.

From: Men and Boxes 1 & 2 by Jennie Webb, USA
Short companion pieces that offer a snapshot of family but leave us wanting the entire envelope from the proverbial photo-hut of writing; a story that needs to be finished before it will appeal to an audience.

From: Yard Sale Signs by Jennie Webb, USA
Compact without being arrogant, a painful reminder of the imbalance we strike between career and family, between goals and reality.

Mimosa’s Filly by Kiesa Kay, USA / France
As staggering in its honesty as it is disappointing in its abruptness, this play is full of the confused soul and the silent struggle of both womankind and motherhood, and like a good fight between girlfriends, it just stops for no apparent reason and with no apparent resolution.

A Mother to Tie Ribbons in my Hair by Rachel Barnett, UK
Touching, tragic, but true? Maybe, but a bit forced.

Dovie’s Romance (or Becoming Empress Menen) by Sybil R. Williams, USA
A complex piece that shows itself to be masterful but only in the palms of a gifted actress. Its flaw may be that it is overwritten. Sometimes getting to the point isn’t easy but freedom and liberation aren’t clean either. If under-acted or misdirected, this piece runs the risk of losing the audience.

Laney’s Lament by Barbara H. Macchia, USA
Finally, after forty-five pages we get to the kind of play that delivers to the soul the little beauteous snippets of life that theatre allows. This precise, perfect one-woman show hits the chord of wonderment, fascination, shock and disappointment – all the things (one could think) a man might expect that being a woman resembles.

A Pig in Mud by Barbara Lindsay, USA
Raw and honest, both in its truth-revealing consciousness and its vernacular – this reads as a lonely silhouette of one woman filled with hope and denial while lamenting her past.

The Mom by Barbara Lindsay, USA
A similar voice to be expected from similar formulas of two monologues (see “A Pig in Mud”), yet the differences resonate within the surprise element. An audience, not given the pre-notation of her biography, would be shocked and abhorred. (Actions that keep theatre alive!) If anything, while we gain a look inside the evils of denial in both pieces, we will find it difficult to deny that Miss Lindsay is a quick and gifted writer.

Us and Them by Catherine Frid, Canada
Well said, Miss Frid! Your perception of the over-anxious, over-confident, instantly-gratified mother who has read too many parenting magazines is dead on. Michelle possesses all the worst of what we see in a modern mother alive in the country of Prozac, e-mail, everything-has-an-answer-society. What she lacks is instinct, the maternal within that she desires to have but has neither a grasp nor a clue of.

Real Time by Elizabeth Whitney, USA
Okay…strike two? (See Shifting Demographics) Miss Whitney expects us to be surprised at her non-cliché mother when what we really get is the mother we all kind of want. What the author misses is the chance at humor. Maybe sitting in the library, the IM mistake of multi-tasking and chatting with a friend reveals to mom she is a lesbian. After all, the opening line sets us up to expect a comedy. While hardly tragic, this script doesn’t disappoint; it lets itself down.

The Guardian by Constance Koepfinger, USA
What smacks of Walter Mitty updated somehow touches us in the soft way we think of people who are institutionalized. As long as we don’t have to visit, we are comfortable with their predicament; our emotions tell us we are good while our deepest thoughts project that we don’t really care. Still, we hope this character of a writer gone mad is more real than creative, because the story is good. The notion of Tony the Guardian Angel gives the piece more meaning than the lost soul would allow. To create a short piece so layered is indeed an accomplishment.

Making a Community by Joan Lipkin, USA
Spectacular! Real in its air of Americana. Real in its truth of our flaws. Heartfelt, with the simple ambition of wanting a good life, yet brave in its demand for that which is right. The story is so true and complex that one can see an entire film made of it, or just hear it in passing while on the porch of a conversation-filled evening.

Angel by Kathleen Warnock, USA
Whether stream-of-conscious or slice-of-life, we never fully know, but for a play that doesn’t really need its first six or seven lines, it builds nice character and then abruptly ends. Is it confession? Is it realization? Confrontation? Is it proselytizing to a small degree? Once the playwright decides, we will have a nice audition piece.

Delilah by Kathleen Warnock, USA
And part two (see “Angel” as part of Grieving for Genevieve) doesn’t give us much more. A bit of attitude, perhaps, but not much more than cliché frustration and surface level anxiety.

Susan by Lisa Stephenson, USA
A small piece with a serious heart that with a stronger storytelling needle in perhaps a more confident seamstress-hand would have us weeping for more. As is, we are moved with memory but only until the lights come up and we resume our conversations. Serious potential that has “re-write” applied to it like the fabled stickers on Sophie’s luggage.

Pat by Lisa Stephenson, USA
To address the resolute conviction of having decided upon abortion is brave – another branch on the complex tree of life that we all share and to some extent assume. (No one knows how they would feel until confronted with the decision.) That the modern A stands as a scarlet taboo is real; that Miss Stephenson shows us a reality of the decision is both frightening and refreshing. A good play told in a real voice, and isn’t that what we want playwriting to be?

Fairbanks, 1959 by Debbie L. Feldman, USA
A strong woman with resolve sets out to redefine herself (or, perhaps, rather, to find the true self she had lost or let slip away) but, so…are we in 1972 again? These women are out there, finding their way, plodding their mud-slide road, climbing their Everest, but now (today in 2010) a supportive husband is as common as a Pennsylvania summer storm. Behind every modern woman is a man with great ideals – didn’t the author read that? Sorry, the point is just too forced. The metaphor of Alaska is trite and the independence outdated. What marks the post-twentieth century as important is that men and women, wife and husband, are figuring out how to make society better by staying married to create family units that work, by not giving in. This mini- adventure spits in the face of all that those who are product of divorced selfishness of the post-sixties have worked to reverse. Or, is that little tag-line after the comma in the title saying the exact same thing?

The People by Vicki Cheatwood, USA
A fine and stellar piece – deep and thoughtful; touching and alarming. However, it has all the workings to not be a monologue. Add the characters we meet through the telling of the story, and write a play. Show, don’t tell! Also, one wonders if, like Peter Shaffer, the writer has ever been on stage. All that for one actor? Too much! And, let’s not forget the audience. A good playwright knows when to introduce a new character – often it is instinctual, not planned – and this piece needs not one but several to finish the play. The story is good, the play is misplaced.

The Hope by Koorosh Angali, Inranian-USA
A poem, a monologue, a tiny triumph! So much can be said in the fewest words, and for Mister Angali to see a soliloquy within the verse is both creative and insightful. But it is more than a poem-play; it is a testament to its own title, for hope is both metaphor and personification, and all that we write for.

Of Mother and Men by Lylanne Musselman, USA
Intriguing. It possesses the fundamental power of storytelling – a kernel of truth that keeps us listening, and a powerful “Ahhh!” of a good surprise ending. Not unnecessarily layered with subtext and symbolism, this straight-forward piece reveals one of those inner monologues that countless women have undoubtedly had with themselves. And the title is clever and pointed.

Unspoken Fears by Karen Jeynes, South Africa
Alive and sincere with the fond truth of our most complex happenstance, this work reflects all that is good and pure and honest and instinctive in a mother-to-be. Its doubts are not fool-hearty and its hopes not sophomoric. It is quite simply a tender smile.

House by Judith Pratt, USA
She conjures so much of what we long for in this short play, yet she grasps regret and decision with such clarity one cannot help but like the character. It’s the kind of conversation we walk into in the middle of and know that our friend will need a long chat afterwards, and we cherish the opportunity to share the moment together.

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So, there we have thirty glimpses into the lives and wonderment of women, no simple task indeed.

I walk away wondering just one thing. After Erica Glyn-Jones has written such a touching and true foreword, should the collection of thirty monologues not be called Dancing with Rainbows? For as much as thirty-somethings affect us all and we grow in that time frame, what more colorful of substance does the mother-daughter relationship possess than the warmth of yellow, the crossover sexiness and antagonism of red, the subtle charm of blue, the deep passion of green, the bounce and spry of orange, the royal lushness of purple. The colored metaphors could continue and still not capture the essence of moms and daughters and wives and lovers, nor any of the women we adore and loathe, much like monologues can and will be written onward until the mystery of woman is unfurled and solved, which, thankfully, it never will be.