Content area
Full Text
The key to his plays is emotional connecton
When Romulus Linney's Silver River opens in Portland, Ore., later this month, this passionate one-character show-about a turn-of-the-century woman's search for her own voice through writing-will be the second world premiere production of a Linney play the city's Profile Theatre Project has hosted this year. The first, the two-character Klonsky and Schwartz, which debuted in January, was a kaleidoscopic evocation of the close relationship between celebrated poet Delmore Schwartz and the lesser-known writer Milton Klonsky during Schwartz's descent into mental illness in New York in the 1960s. Though set in different times and circumstances, both plays address a subject Linney knows well: the struggle to be true to one's self and one's own pursuits no matter the difficulties or consequences.
In 2003, Linney received both the William Inge Theatre Festival distinguished achievement in American theatre award and the Edward Albee Last Frontier Playwright Award. he holds an Obie for sustained achievement in playwriting and has been honored by the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the state of North Carolina and three universities. James Houghton founded New York's Signature Theatre in 1991 in part to give Linney's plays greater exposure. But, at 73, Linney remains far less known to theatregoers than any other similarly honored playwright. In many ways, he is that figure we often hold up as a paragon: the artist dedicated to his art who continues to grow and take risks despite a lack of widespread recognition.
I interviewed Linney when he was in Portland to co-direct Klonsky and Schwartz with Profile artistic director Jane Unger. We sat on the set of 2, his play about Hermann Goering, the first Linney work that Profile presented in its season-long celebration of his work.
MICHAEL McGREGOR: Let's start by talking about your current play, Klonsky and Schwartz.
ROMULUS LINNEY: Well, my friend, the actor Chris Noth, who is a poet himself and loves the poetry of Delmore Schwartz, thought it would be a great idea for me to write a play about Schwartz. I told him you can't just write a play-it has to be something you care about. Then I found out that Schwartz and Milton Klonsky were friends. Schwartz I never met, but Milton...