Dear Balanchine:

Kudos and tossed roses are due you.  An important kudo comes from our 
foremost crafter of the monologue, Fred ("Massive Envy") Pollack.  You 
entered his domain---in a different mood and tone, naturally.  Having 
entered it, now you force my playcrafterself to comment on this work and 
then to philosophize.

I may be referring to the same part that Joanna just did---don't know---but 
I feel that your "asshole writing" lines say far less well what your last 5 
lines say with quiet intensity.  I tremble to say this, but I suggest you 
delete your "asshole."

Further, "invulnerability" oughta be struck back to "vulnerability."  All 
Power and Authority are undermined by the sexual expression Lynndie "chose."

You've given the woman tentative voice about her choice.  That's a good 
thing.

And now, bcuz you and Fred are skirting dangerously close to My Territory, 
playwrighting, I'll give you some quotes relevant to the highest spoken art 
form, poetic drama, from this month's PERFORMINK, Chicago's theatre trade 
newspaper.

Seven marvelously talented directors responded to the question:  "What makes 
good theatre?"

Joyce Piven:  "Most of all, it is working close to the bone, diving deep, 
finding the essential metaphor in the essence of a beat and expressing it 
with blood, song, dance, whatever risk it takes.  All good theatre comes 
with a reverence for the ephemeral live presence of an actor, communing and 
reaching out to an audience, placing them in thrall.  In open admission to 
his or her own sacred talent, the actor is a trusted and magical guide, 
leading an audience deep into the heart of the play.  ................... 
Great theatre can change our lives."

BJ Jones, actor, director, artistic director of Northlight Theatre:  "It is 
not a one-way street coming off the stage; it is the interaction in the 
room, the fission of feeling, and the thermal heat of thoughts connecting 
and catching fire.  Actors know it when they hit the stage.  'Are they 
there, do they care, are they with us?'  It is truly a Byzantine chemistry 
set, impossible to predict, slippery, and yes, spiritual."

Michael Halberstam, artistic director of Writers' Theatre in Glencoe: 
"Could it be said that a good play does not seek answers but offers 
questions?  I am personally happiest when a play seduces me with its craft, 
encourages me to open my heart, gains access, and then, almost viral in its 
intent, begins its work...its magic, pushing buttons and encouraging flights 
of thought and feeling which resonate for hours, days, weeks, even years 
after the curtain has fallen."

You usually manage this magic, and that's nice, very nice.

Judy




----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ken Wolman" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, September 29, 2005 9:25 AM
Subject: Version 2: Lynndie England to her Baby Son


>I don't even know if this got out during the great Yesterday Malaise, not 
>much matter whether it inspires response, just a thing I needed to do for 
>myself.  A few changes beyond correcting the spelling of Pvt. English's 
>first name.  As noted in what probably did not make it out, the earlier 
>version of this poem (some time during the early summer) horrified someone 
>who refused to even consider it.  It is remarkable to me that when a 
>subject is as intense as Pvt. England's conduct, all presumed "objectivity" 
>vanishes and the dancer becomes the dance.  I'm not the dancer, I'm 
>Balanchine:-).
>
> ken
>
> LYNNDIE ENGLAND TO HER BABY SON
> (after a New York Times photograph)
>
> I can't quite look    I have to
> shift my eyes
> everyone will think it's
> because I don't give a shit
>
> how about guilt?  That do you?
>
> But what have I done to this child
> what have I done to this child
> made him
>   without a second thought
> without a thought could believe
>
> that coming even for a few seconds
> was invulnerability
> even inside this goddamned prison
>
> I wanted Graner        lying married bastard
> I should have settled
> for a gag-gift vibrator    or a cucumber
>
> I was bored
> he talked to me like I was
> pretty instead of a Cabbage Patch doll
>
> only thing we did in that place
> was screw with military precision
> "C'mere Lynndie we have three minutes!"
>
> precise        double-time
> child that should not have been born
> to grow up with grandparents
> live to hate his father
>
> hate me
>
> hawk phlegm: Happy Mother's Day every year
>
> "Where's your mom and dad?"
> "Doing time in Federal prison
> for torturing towelheads."
> Am I smart enough to say
> "I vas honlee vollowing orderz!"
> and do the Sieg Heil salute?
>
> No, the asshole writing this is putting words
> in my mouth but he's teaching me
> something.
>
> When I look at the child maybe I dream
> of the Ft. Bragg vet
> a phenobarbital overdose        spare my son
> the misery    of carelessness
> the misery    made by this goddamn boredom
> the misery    made of this fear fear fear
>
> spare him my and his father's names
>
> Go ahead, shits.  Think me a monster
> for holding the fleeting thought        that our son
> might be    a doggie sacrifice
> no future but as    Lynndie England's whelp
> on PTS day at the dog pound.
>
> No.
>
> Maybe there is a forgetting.
> Perhaps a forgiving.
> You will look into the plainness of my face
> deadness of my eyes
> I will not tell you.
>
> KTW/9-28-05
>
> -- 
> Kenneth Wolman
> Proposal Development Department
> Room SW334
> Sarnoff Corporation
> 609-734-2538
>