theresa rebeck ; writer

"As a writer, I have always considered it my job to describe the world as I know it; to struggle toward whatever portion of the truth is available to me."

INTRODUCTION

First, a confession: I was late to the Theresa Rebeck party. In 1992, when Spike Heelspremiered in New York and Rebeck’s name was on everybody’slips, I had just moved to Tokyo where I was busy re-learning how to speak, searching the grocery store shelves for a product I could recognize as floorcleaner, and desperately trying to figure out how to work on Western plays with Japanese actors. In short, I was far far away from the hot new writing in American theater. When I got back to the U.S. a few years later, though, Ifound out what the celebration was all about.

Reading my way through a giant stack of scripts in the literary office at Seattle Repertory Theatre, I encountered an early draft of a new TheresaRebeck play then titled The Assistant. It was a revelation. Characters leapt to life, vivid and recognizable, their dialogue crisp and truthful, their struggles messy and painful and human. Best of all, in a world of contemporary playswith quick little black-out scenes that avoided any real conflict, here was sus-tained dramatic action. I hadn’t realized how hungry I was for it until I’d tasted it again.

The Assistant became The Butterfly Collection, Rebeck’s combustible drama about family and the capacity of human beings to both hurt and heal one another. The action takes place in the upstate Connecticut home of a Nobel Prize–winning author and his family, during the summer that everything changes. People go too far, say too much, cut too deep, and pride, stub-bornness, family baggage, ambition, and desire swirl together in a nasty brew that nearly poisons all concerned. Yet in the wake of all that pain, something beautiful emerges: A young writer is born. Is the beauty worth the pain?

In The Butterfly Collection — indeed in all the plays in this anthology— Theresa Rebeck asks big questions: What does it mean to be human? How do we hold onto our humanity? What’s it like on the dark side? What are the limits? What do we risk? What are the consequences? What endures? In mar riage? Family? Art? The world? Her questions are epic in scope, but rooted inspecific people, places, and events, all with the tang of lived history.

In Rebeck’s 1998 drama Abstract Expression,a woman supports her agingfather by toiling as a cater-waiter at wealthy people’s dinner parties. Thoughtless remarks and unwanted scrutiny are the price Jenny pays to putfood on the table (even if it is rich folks’ leftovers), but her labor helps pro tect something precious. Her father, a once-famous Abstract Expressionistpainter, hasn’t shown his work in years but has steadfastly continued to pur sue his vision, creating works that are seen by no one but Jenny. With bitinghumor and a deep undercurrent of love and sorrow, father and daughter are forced to face what happens when art and the marketplace collide. It’s a clas sic Theresa Rebeck play: life as we know it, but heightened, deepened, andsharpened to a knife edge.

Her characters are human beings with all that makes them human. Whether it’s a character whose wit and charm we’d all like to possess (like Haley in Bad Dates),someone who forces us to face our own dark potential(like Helen in The Water’s Edge),or one who actively courts self-destruction(like Charlie in The Scene),Rebeck’s characters get under the skin. Their pas sions, their tenderness, their rage, their weaknesses, their joys become our own.

I met Rebeck in 2001, when she was invited to the Women PlaywrightsFestival to work on The Bells, her epic play about the Alaskan Gold Rush.
With her ready laugh, fierce clarity of vision, and joyous embrace of actors’ability to bring the work to life, Theresa made missionaries of us all in theservice of her story. The project began as an adaptation of Leopold Lewis’sclassic nineteenth-century melodrama about haunting guilt (made famous byHenry Irving), but Rebeck’s reflections on the harsh Alaska wilderness andthe extremes human beings will venture in pursuit of wealth gave her playits own momentum and identity. She listened intently to the public reading at Seattle’s ACT Theatre, then traveled with a small group of playwrights and dramaturgs to Hedgebrook, a Whidbey Island writers’ retreat, where she went for long walks on the beach, silently watched the eagles, joined in live ly conversation over dinner, and took refuge in the solitude of her forest cot tage to contemplate and rewrite. Each morning I awoke to the sound of newpages being slipped beneath my door.

That’s Theresa Rebeck: attuned to her heart, dedicated to her craft. Readthese plays and, if you can, get them on the stage where they belong.

Christine Sumption

Christine Sumption is a freelance dramaturg who makes her home in Seattle,

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	"As a writer, I have always considered it my job to describe the world as I know it; to struggle toward whatever portion of the truth is available to me." current one acts full length INTRODUCTION First, a confession: I was late to the Theresa Rebeck party. In 1992, when Spike Heelspremiered in New York and Rebeck’s name was on everybody’slips, I had just moved to Tokyo where I was busy re-learning how to speak, searching the grocery store shelves for a product I could recognize as floorcleaner, and desperately trying to figure out how to work on Western plays with Japanese actors. In short, I was far far away from the hot new writing in American theater. When I got back to the U.S. a few years later, though, Ifound out what the celebration was all about. Reading my way through a giant stack of scripts in the literary office at Seattle Repertory Theatre, I encountered an early draft of a new TheresaRebeck play then titled The Assistant. It was a revelation. Characters leapt to life, vivid and recognizable, their dialogue crisp and truthful, their struggles messy and painful and human. Best of all, in a world of contemporary playswith quick little black-out scenes that avoided any real conflict, here was sus-tained dramatic action. I hadn’t realized how hungry I was for it until I’d tasted it again. The Assistant became The Butterfly Collection, Rebeck’s combustible drama about family and the capacity of human beings to both hurt and heal one another. The action takes place in the upstate Connecticut home of a Nobel Prize–winning author and his family, during the summer that everything changes. People go too far, say too much, cut too deep, and pride, stub-bornness, family baggage, ambition, and desire swirl together in a nasty brew that nearly poisons all concerned. Yet in the wake of all that pain, something beautiful emerges: A young writer is born. Is the beauty worth the pain? In The Butterfly Collection — indeed in all the plays in this anthology— Theresa Rebeck asks big questions: What does it mean to be human? How do we hold onto our humanity? What’s it like on the dark side? What are the limits? What do we risk? What are the consequences? What endures? In mar riage? Family? Art? The world? Her questions are epic in scope, but rooted inspecific people, places, and events, all with the tang of lived history. In Rebeck’s 1998 drama Abstract Expression,a woman supports her agingfather by toiling as a cater-waiter at wealthy people’s dinner parties. Thoughtless remarks and unwanted scrutiny are the price Jenny pays to putfood on the table (even if it is rich folks’ leftovers), but her labor helps pro tect something precious. Her father, a once-famous Abstract Expressionistpainter, hasn’t shown his work in years but has steadfastly continued to pur sue his vision, creating works that are seen by no one but Jenny. With bitinghumor and a deep undercurrent of love and sorrow, father and daughter are forced to face what happens when art and the marketplace collide. It’s a clas sic Theresa Rebeck play: life as we know it, but heightened, deepened, andsharpened to a knife edge. Her characters are human beings with all that makes them human. Whether it’s a character whose wit and charm we’d all like to possess (like Haley in Bad Dates),someone who forces us to face our own dark potential(like Helen in The Water’s Edge),or one who actively courts self-destruction(like Charlie in The Scene),Rebeck’s characters get under the skin. Their pas sions, their tenderness, their rage, their weaknesses, their joys become our own. I met Rebeck in 2001, when she was invited to the Women PlaywrightsFestival to work on The Bells, her epic play about the Alaskan Gold Rush. With her ready laugh, fierce clarity of vision, and joyous embrace of actors’ability to bring the work to life, Theresa made missionaries of us all in theservice of her story. The project began as an adaptation of Leopold Lewis’sclassic nineteenth-century melodrama about haunting guilt (made famous byHenry Irving), but Rebeck’s reflections on the harsh Alaska wilderness andthe extremes human beings will venture in pursuit of wealth gave her playits own momentum and identity. She listened intently to the public reading at Seattle’s ACT Theatre, then traveled with a small group of playwrights and dramaturgs to Hedgebrook, a Whidbey Island writers’ retreat, where she went for long walks on the beach, silently watched the eagles, joined in live ly conversation over dinner, and took refuge in the solitude of her forest cot tage to contemplate and rewrite. Each morning I awoke to the sound of newpages being slipped beneath my door. That’s Theresa Rebeck: attuned to her heart, dedicated to her craft. Readthese plays and, if you can, get them on the stage where they belong. Christine Sumption Christine Sumption is a freelance dramaturg who makes her home in Seattle,
	© 2007 Theresa Rebeck — info@theresarebeck.com Site designed and maintained by SQUARE ONE INTERNET