Talley's Folly at Portland Stage: It's...LIVE. And it moved me to tears

Once upon a time, sitting in a dark theater close upon others and watching even more other humans interact on stage -- making music, making art, making drama, making beauty -- was a regular part of my life: of many of our most privileged lives. Recently, thanks to an unchecked/unmanaged pandemic in this country, we've had to settle for the performances made available to us in our private homes, on our screens.

Until you are back in the room with an audience and artists, it is difficult to describe the layers of humanity we are missing in these electronic interactions.

Kudos to Portland Stage for having the courage to lead us back together with its current production of Talley's Folly by Lanford Wilson.

As a fellow arts administrator who has worked with the actors' and stage unions, as well as with the public, I know Executive and Artistic Director Anita Stewart had to move mountains to make this happen.

Lucky for us, she did. In old fashioned reviewer terms: run, do not walk, to see this production. 

Not only will you get to see a wonderfully acted and staged live performance, you'll get to feel safe as part of an audience with others. Because everything Portland Stage does around this production is geared toward keeping us safe so we can carry on together in this new normal.

For carry on we must. It is not only grocery store and health care workers that are essential to our health. It's artists. And theaters. And musicians. And the big hearted, generous, earth shaking humanity of sharing live performance. We are not creatures of social isolation. We ARE creatures of INNOVATION -- especially artists. It is our job to figure this thing out. And figure it out we are -- with Portland Stage and Talley's Folly helping to lead the way.

Thank you.

In terms of the performance itself, I'll admit to some prejudices. I'm lucky to be friends and colleagues with the actors and director, Dave Mason, Kathy McCafferty, and Sally Wood. And they all do a wonderful job bringing forward a classic from set in the Ozarks in the mid-20th century to our modern New England ears. And Anita, doubling down as she often does as scenic designer, knocked herself out by giving us a set with...water. 

How magic is that? -- Answer: it always is, to see a river replicated live on stage.

Dave does an incredible job with a big role -- lots of language, lots of trickiness, PLUS some great physical acting (ice skates!) all wrapped up in a unique Lanford Wilson character that belongs so much to the WWII era. Ostensibly a romantic comedy, Talley's Folly tackles capitalism and anti-Semitism as it goes.

But the killer for me was much more personal. In the climactic scene, Sally Talley's secret is revealed. It is a secret my own adopted mother shared [SPOILER ALERT]: not being able to have children and, at that time, being thereby considered un-marriageable. 

It's a different world today, with so many options for women to have children, so I don't mind giving up that spoiler. But seeing Kathy/Sally wracked with pain, doubled over live before me on that stage -- brought home to me, with a stab to my gut, what my own adopted mother must have felt like and endured. Until, like Sally Talley, she met my Dad: her prince for nearly 50 years, precisely because he said, "No problem. We'll adopt."

Thank you, Dave, Kathy, Anita, Sally, and the rest of the Portland Stage crew. For giving me that and other moments of emotion, of our shared humanity, safely in our new normal.

Sunday Morning Observances: On Voting, Faith, and Compassion

The synchronicity of Election Day with All Saints/All Souls/Day of the Dead...

For many of us, we know and feel these times to be especially sacred: a moment when the boundaries "thin" between the living and our beloved dead...we remember them, we pay them tribute, we give them thanks, we call their names. We place marigolds around their photos.

It is this same faith in the love of the world that drives me and many others to vote. As the Franciscan father Richard Rohr has written, "voting is a deeply moral act—a decisive statement of Christian faith that I matter, that justice matters, and that other people matter."

It's the "other people matter" part of his statement from which many seemingly religious people have become disconnected. As Rohr goes on to note, many "Christians" do not connect their inner, "heaven focused" world with our collective economic, social, or political life.

There are, all too obviously and amost recently with our Supreme Court hearings, many strains of Catholicism. I was lucky enough to have been raised in the type that understand's Jesus's teachings as a message of social justice for all. Like Rohr, I ask myself: "how can I be good for the sake of my neighborhood, my city, my church, my community, and the world? It really is a different starting place. It’s not seeking my own ego enhancement, but the spiritual and physical well-being of others, as Jesus did."

As feminists we learned: the personal is the political. "There really is no such thing as being non-political. Everything we say or do either affirms or critiques the status quo. Even to say nothing is to say something. If we say nothing, we communicate that the status quo—even if it is massively unjust and deceitful—is apparently okay."

My faith means that public virtue is about solidarity with others -- not just about my own ego, well-being, greed, or "private sense of 'holiness.'"

Today, on All Souls' Day and in loving memory of my grandmothers, mother, and god mother, I challenge my fellow Christians who consider themselves to be "pro life" and are single issue, anti-abortion voters: what can you DO to improve the lives of women and children so that safe, legal abortion continues on the decreasing path on which it has been? How can YOU hold men accountable for their sexuality and violence? How can YOU ensure we as women have control over our bodies through full access for all to effective birth control? How can YOU vote for a compassionate world, in which poor and starving and abandoned and separated children are well cared for once they enter this world?

This is the work to be done: to VOTE FOR A COMPASSIONATE WORLD in which all are called to serve, and all are called to care. Not about your own self interest: rather, about those who struggle the most and are the most vulnerable. If you think of your vote from this perspective, your choice will be absolutely clear.

Vote like OUR LIVES depend on it: because they do.

#allsaintsday #AllSoulsDay #dayofthedead #GOTV #yourvoicematters #EveryVoteCounts

Sunday Morning Observances: On Single Issue Voting and What an Ethics of Support for All Life Really Means

I had the terrible experience, this week, of hitting a wild turkey on route from work to my island home.

As always when one hits an animal on the road, the thud of the live body against the weaponized tons of steel of my vehicle moving through its home was sickening. The soft flesh and feathers were no match, and when I stopped to remove the turkey from the road and say a prayer of apology and goodbye to it there were feathers and blood everywhere.

All of life IS sacred. Many humans, however, seem to have a difficult job discerning how to act in regard to the sacred nature of ourselves and the world around us.

Of the many contradictions around this issue, the one that makes me the most sad are "single issue voters:" those who will tolerate many abuses of life while voting only on a “no abortion” platform.

These single issue anti-abortion voters -- I can't call them pro-life because of all the other anti-life issues they not only tolerate, but perpetuate -- encompass a range of so-called Christians. These voters overlook immigration issues, the treatment of the poor, the amassing of unjust wealth, the abuse of workers, mass incarceration and the death penalty as long as a candidate espouses to be anti-abortion.

As the Pope himself has said in regard to the lives of the unborn and the issue of abortion: "Equally sacred, however, are the lives of the poor, those already born, the destitute, the abandoned and the underprivileged, the vulnerable infirm and elderly exposed to covert euthanasia, the victims of human trafficking, new forms of slavery and every form of rejection." We all have a role in achieving social justice, in working toward truly common goods rather than our own individual well being alone.

I am adopted, pre-Roe vs. Wade. You’d think I would be strongly anti-abortion.

Here’s why I’m not.

I was placed by Catholic Charities into a family whose faith stated that the primary commandment is to love our neighbors. This seemingly simple dictate translated into support for John F. Kennedy, whose photo bore a place of honor on our walls; Lyndon Johnson and ultimately Jimmy Carter for their support for voting rights and a social safety net (Medicare) and the rights of laborers to be protected by unions.

Unfortunately, this broad view of what it means to love our neighbors has been damagingly overshadowed by those who like to have their faith in more black and white terms.

It is one thing to loudly proclaim one is “pro life” and quite another to act as if one really is.

You can’t be “pro life” in America without acknowledging and examining our history as a nation whose economic wealth is built on exterminating the native populations to steal their land and on enslaving African labor through centuries long campaigns of terror and torture. These are historic facts about which too many white Americans are in denial.

We have, as a nation, systematically dehumanized this continent’s native peoples and the Africans we brought here: and this dehumanization continues to result today in unexamined inequities including mass incarceration, the death penalty, housing, and possible remedies for poverty.

Loving one’s neighbors, and the planet, makes seeing all life as worthy of consideration. So-called religious voters can be anti-abortion because they don’t see women as fully human and with our own set of rights. These same voters can be supportive of racist policing and justice policies that have resulted in the mass incarceration of our African-American population: because after centuries of dehumanization, they don’t see Black people as fully human.

Believing that women who need abortions and Black people convicted of misdemeanors for which no white person would be imprisoned are criminals allows these voters not to understand how “anti life” their single issue voting actually is.

The first step, always, acknowledgement: in this case, to study and to admit to the brutality against certain groups of people that has built tremendous wealth for some at the expense of others. Truth. The second step is to ask for forgiveness for our ancestors’ and our own roles in this terrible history in which life is not treated as sacred. Reconciliation. And the third step is to publicly reframe our policies to heal and to begin repairing these centuries of oppression and damage, by shifting funding from racist enforcement to education and programs that make up for the years of discrimination and enforced poverty of so many. Reparations.

Truth. Reconciliation. Reparations. The heart of a multi-issue, pro-life stance.

#nomoresingleissuevoting #lovethyneighbor #reallyvoteyourfaith #truthandreconciliation #reparationsnow

Sunday Morning Observances: On Privilege, Entitlement, and the Extended Damage it Does to Our Communities

If you're like me, you've got some anger to burn off these days.

I've started to spend Sunday mornings in my basement gym, whaling on my heavy bag while listening to something inspirational. This appears to be an excellent combination for allowing me to respond to and engage with the rest of the world in a nonviolent manner. 

There are a few human behaviors in this miraculous, beautiful world I actively despise, and they are all so prevalent at this moment, actively roaming around in our lives like zombies, that it is difficult not to feel embattled and aggressive.

These include but are not limited to:

• White Privilege, male privilege, entitlement, and their everyday, negative impacts on our communities large and small: racial, social, economic and cultural oppression and inequity at every level, rural and urban.
• Unauthorized uses of armed force, the next steps onto the slippery slope of authoritarianism; 
• Presidential Lying -- 'nuff said; 
• Mismanagement, such as the federal government's response to COVID that is going to extend the community health and economic suffering far longer than necessary;

Having done my rounds of jabs and power punches at the bag this morning, let's think about this first set of behaviors -- unacknowledged privilege -- and how they relate to the last -- mismanagement.

And let's take this away from the federal government, as that is just too easy and obvious. Let's acknowledge instead that the patterns that exist in our families, small organizations, towns, businesses -- nonprofits and otherwise -- and communities are amplified at the national level.

Using my experiences with rural nonprofit boards as a consultant and a board member, here's how this works. (Truthfully, its underpinnings can be found in the white Calvinist Protestantism on which our nation is founded: the idea that American "exceptionalism," success, and wealth are signs of God's providence. Go with me here.)

a. People who have been materially successful, due to birth (including but not limited to historic land theft and enslavement), education, work, or a combination of any of these believe this success makes them uniquely qualified to do anything. This is ENTITLEMENT.

b. These "uniquely qualified" people are sought after for nonprofit boards or community service in the hope that they will share their wealth and bring their friends along with them. They immediately vie for leadership roles because their privilege is evidence that they know best. Thus, people with no experience in leadership roles believe they should be leaders. People with no experience in event production believe they should be producers. Etc.

c. In meetings and during decision making, such people--feeling themselves uniquely qualified by their wealth (or maybe even chosen by God, who knows?)--take up a lot of air space with their opinions. So much so that others often can't get a word in. White/male privilege is terrible at listening as the nature of these complexes lead individuals to believe, mistakenly, that they don't have much to learn: rather, they believe others need to learn FROM them. They promote themselves and their own opinions over others, even when said opinions lack the foundation of any expertise.

The sad truth is that there are many, many organizations -- and whole communities -- whose mission-based work is hampered by dysfunctional boards and committees weighed down by the entitled behaviors of privileged white people.

I've been a reporter, silently observing, in many of those meetings. I've been a consultant, hired to observe and to counsel. I've watched local rural people talked over, talked down, and otherwise silenced by newly arrived retired residents from the city. As a board member I've had to endure people with no expertise taking up so much space that decisions never get made. I've watched as people unconscious of their privilege assume their rightness, speechifying without ever asking questions. I've watched good programs get sunk by the obstructionist behaviors of those who feel they are more right than those they are there to serve.

White privilege and entitlement is a CULTURE. It is a set of habits and behaviors that are the root of racial and economic and gender inequities. Its behaviors--characterized by an unconscious inability to put one's own needs and beliefs to the side, TO STEP OUT OF THE CENTER--are also the enemy of the good in many other situations.

This is why a heavy bag and a pair of boxing gloves come in handy during Sunday morning observances.

Portrait of a Lady on Fire: Ovations at Home

Here we all are: at home, respecting the need for social distancing in the era of COVID-19, the "novel" coronavirus, and all feeling vaguely...on fire. With a passion for the arts.

The last public event I attended before hunkering down was a new French movie: Portrait of a Lady on Fire, written and directed by Celine Schiamma. It's informed my consumption of art at home over the last week. Because not only is this an 18th century love story between women, it is also a portrait of an artist -- and the movie's passion for arts at the center of our lives is inspiring.

It reminded me that the way I initially knew who I was in the world was, in fact, via these three creative forms: by drawing. By reading. By playing and listening to music. And it lit a fire in me to once again fill my days with art, coronavirus or no.

The film is built around the creation of a painting: i.e., seeing and being seen. One of the two lead characters, having recently departed a cloistered life, mourns the lack of music outside the monastery. We are then treated to an exploration of Vivaldi's "The Four Seasons" as well as some incredible vocal harmonic singing by a group of women around a bonfire. And finally, the film includes and uses as metaphor a vibrant discussion of Ovid's literary version of the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice.

Within this magical context, which I wish also for you, here's a few things I've enjoyed at home this past week: I've been listening to everything from the the complex musical stories of Vivaldi to those on Esperanza Spaulding's newest recording, 12 Little Spells. I've finished reading Tommy Orange's debut novel, There There, and moved on to Becoming Ms. Burton, hailed here by the NYTimes Nicholas Kristof. I'm trying to draw a little bit every day. And oh yeah: even though I'm a bit of an anglophobe, I've been watching the British Netflix series Sex Education -- and being glad I don't have to re-do those high school years.

How about you? Tell us what is working / not working in your household during COVID-19 social distancing.