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MONA MANSOUR THE WAY WEST
HAPPY NEW YEAR – HOPING THAT 2013 FINDS you surrounded by no less than 25 extraordinary playwrights! Our 2012-13 Ruth Easton New Play Series continues with extraordinary Core Writer Mona Monsour, and her newest play THE WAY WEST. As with so many of the others in the series this year, Mona’s play was first developed last year in the Lab during its infancy and returns back home to the Center for its final stage of development. Last month, it also received a beautiful Barebones workshop at our sister company, The Lark Development Center (NYC). We had the privilege of developing Mona’s stunning last play THE HOUR OF FEELING, which then went on to receive its World Premiere at the Humana Festival this spring – I’m on pins and needles to see that play launched into the field, given the barrage of requests asking me to read more of Mona’s incredible voice. This new play is something of a content departure for her, as she delves more deeply into her California roots – and, as you’ll see, she does it with no less precision, gripping dialogue and grace than any of her previous work. We look forward to having you join us in ushering in the new year with this exquisite play, performed by a sensational cast (including the divine Sally Wingert)! Amidst all your reading for planning next Season, and a busy January theatre-going calendar, we invite you into the new world of Mona Mansour; a beautiful chamber piece, full of laughter and light -- and a few haunting prairie songs -- ready for audiences across the country. Join us January 7 for the second Ruth Easton reading of the season!
JEREMY B. COHEN PRODUCING ARTISTIC DIRECTOR
THE WAY WEST
BY MONA MANSOUR
In a crumbling modern-day California town, Mom shares death-defying tales of pioneer crossings with her two squabbling daughters as she waits for her bankruptcy to come through. Stories are stretched, songs are broken into, and checks are forged as Mom and her grown girls scrape for survival.
PART OF THE
2012-13 RUTH EASTON NEW PLAY SERIES JANUARY 7, 2013 • 7 PM • FREE • AT THE CENTER RESERVE SEATS: INFO@PWCENTER.ORG • (612) 332-7481
PROJECT JOURNEY JUNE 2012 CORE WRITER WORKSHOP AT THE PLAYWRIGHTS’ CENTER NOVEMBER 2012 BAREBONES WORKSHOP AT THE LARK JANUARY 2013 WORKSHOP AND READING IN THE PLAYWRIGHTS’ CENTER’S RUTH EASTON NEW PLAY SERIES
AN INTERVIEW WITH
:
MONA MANSOUR in your words, what is The Way West about? A daughter who’s been living away comes back home to help her mother out of the financial mess in which she’s found herself – and her sister who never left. The story takes place in California, in a town like Stockton, that’s seen better days. Within all this family history, the mother shares with her daughters (and the audience) these tales of Western crossings that are sort of true and outrageous all at the same time, and she and her girls sing prairie songs as interludes between the naturalistic scenes. And as the play progresses, these songs and stories get unpacked – in ways both funny and not. When I first started to write it, I wanted to explore writing about my mother and some of her friends, and there are things in the play that are literally right from her life. I had to keep putting this play on the back burner because I had other work going on, but then I became a fellow at the Lark and you have to bring new pages in every day! It’s good and terrifying, and as I started to really get down to it, all the things going on with the economy started to filter into the play. And California itself – I can’t give you all of the financial stats right now, but suffice it to say; it’s just a big mess. At one point, I think just as I was getting that first draft done, Stockton became the first large municipality to declare bankruptcy. Is there a character that represents you, in a way? I think I should be vague about that one. Let’s just say I’m definitely in there. And the mother is very much drawn from my mom. And then some of the outlying characters are drawn from life and then some just from my own head. how does the music – these prairie songs that Mom and the two daughters sing – play an important role? As a writer I’m always looking to have these pop-out moments within each of my plays – parts that are theatrical but intercut with realistic dialogue. I don’t really know when the idea of the songs came to me; they just seemed to really want to be there from the inception. And now the interesting thing has been to really delve into the phenomenon of that kind of music. When I was in the Lark workshop for the play, we were listening to some of the music from the Carter Family, a Virginia family that started singing and performing
in the 1920s, sort of a precursor to country-western. I think the deeper I go into learning more about that kind of American roots music, the fuller my own understanding will be of the songs I wrote into the play. Definitely part of the irony of the play is that the mom glorifies the time on the trail and the people who made it across the country, all the while swirling in her own financial despair. Have you noticed that the topic of financial trouble and the resultant emotions resonates with people as you’ve been developing the piece? What I’ve observed is that it opens up discussions about money, or assumptions family members make about money. The way people think about money. We talked a great deal about that in the workshops at the Playwrights’ Center and the Lark. Last month in rehearsal in NYC, we were talking and someone in the cast said, “I do spend money like I have a lot of it – but actually, I’m rather broke.” I find all of it is so deep – it cuts so deep, and it’s also so absurd. Our perception of money ... and our relationship to it. I was recently talking to a
“As a writer I’m always looking to have these pop-out moments within each of my plays – parts that are theatrical but intercut with realistic dialogue.”
group of people who all are from Germany who now live and work in New York, and they were saying, “We don’t understand the Americans and credit cards.” Of course Europe has its own problems right now, but they just didn’t have that mentality that we do here, that somehow you’re supposed to get a credit card. And then they found it doubly astounding that a lot of Americans—and this includes me!—once one credit card fills up, simply
get another one. So, it was so funny to encounter it from people who just weren’t taught that. In rehearsal we were also talking about the concept of saving money. I remember, when I was a kid, saving was a real goal! You’d get a little book, and they would stamp what your deposit was each time, and it was sort of thrilling. Now, it just doesn’t seem like the financial sector, or the financial-services sector, really wants people to save. I don’t really hear people talk about that anymore.
“the reality for a playwright is ... how the actors do [on stage] in that moment has nothing to do with you anymore. And that’s such a funny and strange feeling.”
your play the hour of feeling had a workshop here at the Center last July, and then it premiered at Humana this spring. How was your experience with that production? It’s almost indescribable for me, still – one of those things I haven’t quite got my mind around yet. The whole experience. I had Mark Wing-Davey at the helm, who is just a phenomenal director and who was himself an English Romantic scholar at Cambridge in the ‘60s (mirroring some of the characters in the play). He gave the cast loads of insight into what was happening during that whole time and place. I also had fellow playwright Ismail Khalidi come to some rehearsals – he’s not really a dramaturg, but he did serve as one to help me explain to the cast the Palestinian world and what’s going on there. He was phenomenal, as was Sarah Lunnie, who’s the Literary Manager at Actors Theatre of Louisville. I really felt very taken care of. Seeing it up on the stage ... every time it happens, I still can’t get my mind around it. I mean, having your work produced is so much bigger than you’d ever imagine. And, in a way, you have nothing to do with it. Having been an
actor for so long, I think I still have this notion that, if I show up opening night and I have really good energy, I can affect the outcome. And the reality for a playwright is, at that point, how the actors do up there in that moment has nothing to do with you anymore. And that’s just such a funny and strange feeling. Not an altogether great feeling, I might add. why did you make the transition from acting to playwriting? I didn’t have the desire to act anymore, and I had already been writing. So it was a transition that made total sense. I started off writing, doing the Groundlings in L.A., and started to write on my feet. I learned about comedy, but I was always writing stuff that didn’t fit into that form. The first play I ever wrote was a solo play, Me and the SLA, about my own fascination with Patricia Hearst. The second play I wrote, Girl Scouts of America, was with another writer, Andrea Berloff, and at the end of that process it was so clear that I wanted other people to play our roles. A natural transition, I think. What other plays are you have working on right now? Kamal’s Letter is a play that premiered at the ReOrient Festival in San Francisco this November. I co-wrote it with Tala Manassah, and it’s her first play. What happened was: Tony Kushner was blocked from an honorary degree at CUNY by a trustee, Jeffrey Weisenfeld, because Kushner had said some things that were critical of Israel’s policies. Weisenfeld, in the process of telling the New York Times why he blocked this degree, was asked about both sides of the conflict – Palestinian and Israeli. And he essentially said (I’m paraphrasing), You can’t even ask that question, because that would imply that both sides of this conflict are human. Essentially, he was saying, Palestinians are not human. In the wake of that, Tala’s father, Jamal – a physicist who teaches at CUNY and an amazing person all around – wrote this very satirical letter to the CUNY board saying, “I just wanted to address this recent brouhaha, and if there’s any question about Palestinians being human, I would certainly like to offer myself up as a specimen to be studied.” Hilarious. She showed me this letter, and I was like, “That would be a phenomenal short play.” So we wrote it (which was a great deal of fun), and they’re rehearsing it right now. Beyond the Tony Kushner thing, it’s about this father and daughter, love, and memory. And then the other play I’m working on is a third play to go with The Hour of Feeling and Urge for Going. What do you respond to when you go to see a play? I guess I love when I’m surprised by something. A couple of years ago Christopher Durang had his brilliant play Why Torture is Wrong and the
People Who Love Them produced at the Public. Really he was responding to what was going on about extradition and Guantánamo, and the play was so funny, painfully funny at times. I love that. I also like when playwrights decide that they’re going to be really ambitious and take on really epic ideas. There’s this notion that if you want to get produced, because of the economic situation of the theater, you should write plays with three characters and one set. So I love when people think big. I just saw a play by a fellow Public Theatre/Emerging Writers Group playwright Javierantonio Gonzalez that was set in Ancient Rome, and it was this massive play. I’m never sorry when I see something where someone has gone big and tackled large themes but found human moments within.
“There’s this notion that if you want to get produced ... you should write plays with three characters and one set. So I love when people think big.”
What are you most looking forward to about the playwrights’ center workshop? I’ve said this before, but I have just loved coming out to Minneapolis these past few years as a Core Writer. Both times I’ve worked with Hayley Finn, and I feel like you guys really mean it when you say it’s all about the true development of the play; about each of us as playwrights being the artistic leaders of our workshop. Each time I’ve been blown-away by the caliber of actors there. In talking to other writers that are from New York, we really know the value of getting out of this fantastic but exhausting city and going somewhere to recharge and work for various periods of time. So I love it, I really love coming out there.
The Playwrights’ Center champions playwrights and plays to build upon a living theater that demands new and innovative works. The Playwrights’ Center fuels the theatrical ecosystem with new ideas, new talents, and new work—the future of the American theater. One of the nation’s most generous and wellrespected artistic organizations, the Playwrights’ Center focuses on both supporting playwrights and bringing new plays to production. Work developed at the Playwrights’ Center has been seen on stages nationwide. The Playwrights’ Center is a fiscal year 2011 recipient of an Institutional Support grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board. This activity is
funded, in part, by the arts and cultural heritage fund as appropriated by the Minnesota State Legislature with money from the Legacy
Amendment vote of the people of Minnesota on November 4, 2008.
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