Free – A playwright’s journey

From “unendurable” to New York Drama League Playwriting Award winner

The second play in the [Inside] the Ford winter season, Neo Ensemble Theatre’s production of Free by Barbara Lindsay, opens January 22.  Ms. Lindsay, who lives in Seattle, took time over the holiday break to answer a few of our burning questions about the West Coast premiere of this fanciful tale.

This was your first play, can you talk a little bit about that?

I was fortunate that, just as I was becoming engaged in playwriting, I met UCLA professor Dr. Jerome (Jerry) Fey, who was putting together a group of new young playwrights.  He taught us the basic elements of effective theatrical storytelling.  I worked on Free with guidance from Jerry and this group [which ultimately became the Golden West Playwrights]  I went through draft after draft, learning as I went, until finally I had a one-act play version that I showed to a friend who was a member of Company of Angels.  He included the play in an evening of short plays he was producing. I still remember that the first review of the first production of my first play called the play "unendurable" (LA Weekly).  Clearly I still had a lot to learn.  Sometimes I would take time away from my work on Free but I was always drawn back to it.  It had a kind of magnetism for me that I couldn't escape.  I worked on it until it was full length and strong enough that I dared to submit it to theaters and contests.  In 1989 it won the New York Drama League's Playwriting Award.  Because of that, it was noticed by the London New Play Festival, and given its premiere production in 1991.  So Free is my firstborn, the play that taught me how to be a playwright.

Free is a play about testing the bonds of friendship and gravity.  Marshall "Free" Gunther is a floater. He has to work at keeping himself tethered to the ground. His best friend Stoney thinks his gift is a miracle that everyone should see.  Their friendship nearly comes to an end when Stoney’s big dreams of a levitating stage show conflict with Marshall’s desire to just be normal.

Can you talk a bit about the relationship between Marshall and Stoney?

I don't - or can't - impose a story on my characters.  I have to listen to them and discover what story they have to tell.  What I discovered about Marshall and Stoney is how much they love one another, how much they need one another.  Marshall needs Stoney to help guide and protect him in the world.  Stoney needs Marshall because Marshall is the only place in the world Stoney can find real magic.  And he loves Marshall's authenticity, because Stoney himself has always been such a faker. 

What does the metaphor of Marshall’s gift mean to you?  Why a floater? 

Really, Marshall's gift doesn't have to be floating.  It could be anything magical.  The metaphor, I guess, is that each of us has something special in us, something unique to us.  And the sad part is that we often try to kill off that unique quality in order to fit into the world more comfortably.  But it can't be killed.  Whatever that part of us is, it will find expression and we can surrender and honor it or spend our lives trying to suppress it. 

Who is your favorite character in Free and why?

Oh boy, that's a tough one.  I love each character so deeply.  Even Dennis Wheatley, who doesn't have a large role, is a favorite of mine because he is so true and loving and patient.  Even Patsy Bean, with her limited world view and her small minded judgments, because she is doing her best to live well within difficult circumstances and because she will champion someone she sees as an underdog. I write with and through my characters. They tell the stories. I can only listen to the characters until I hear them clearly enough to know what has to happen, to understand what each of them wants and what they will do to get it.  These characters are full bodied for me, and I hope will be for the actors and audiences as well. 

How does it feel to revisit the play after almost 20 years since its first production?

The first production was in London in 1991.  After its premiere, the play was produced again by a small company in N.Y. in 1992 and at a college in West Virginia in 1994.  But it has not been produced again until now.  Each of the productions that followed the premiere has come from someone taking the play to a theater company. I have submitted it cold 176 times with no success. That speaks to the power of connections and also to one of the major frustrations a playwright faces.  So, in answer to your question, how it feels to see my first play, a play I love with all my heart, being produced again?   Wonderful and almost miraculous, given the odds.

How has it been, so far, working with director Wendy Worthington and Neo Ensemble Theatre?

So far it has been completely amazing.  Wendy sees the characters, sees the dynamics between them and has a clear vision for the production.  I feel the play is being treated with respect and seriousness, and I can hardly wait to see it.

Barbara Lindsay’s plays and monologues have received more than 170 national and international productions, including a Los Angeles Times Critic’s Choice production of The Walkers by the Road Theatre Co. in North Hollywood. Her full length play I-2195 won the Women’s Playwriting Award at UM St. Louis and was produced there in November 2005. Her short play Here to Serve You won the Peace Play Prize awarded by Goshen College in Indiana. Lindsay’s adaptation of Euripides’ Medea, called Jason and Medea, will premiere at Theatre 9/12 in Seattle on January 22, 2011.

Click here for more info and tickets to Free and the [Inside] the Ford season.