Theatrical Visionary Richard Foreman Talks <em>Old Fashioned Prostitutes (A True Romance)</em>

Why now? Why have you returned to the theater at this point? Well, you know, I was working on films for like five years, four years. And it took me a long time. I finished, like, pretty well finished I think, three films that I decided weren't any good. And then I finally did one that a lot of people didn't like, but some people did, and it was both in the NY Film Festival and the Berlin Film Festival. And I intend to make more. But I realized that it wasn't the healthiest thing in the world, the way I work. Most of the work is done on the editing, so to sit there for six, nine months, 10 months, 12 months even—all alone, editing, ten hours a day... [laughs] That became, you know, such that I thought, "Well, after all, I do miss some interaction with people."

Though maybe I feel ambiguous about it, I got re-interested in the theater for that reason. I said, "Maybe I should go back and do another play." Also, I was just realizing a couple of weeks ago, as we're working on this play, the other thing that I think I missed in the theater was the ability to speak, to use rhetoric. Because one of the reasons I threw out the earlier films was there was a lot of a kind of speaking, both by the actors and by me—because my voice is often present in my shows—that the more I listened to it, just seemed dreadful and pretentious and wrong. So it's in the theater that I can use rhetoric. And I say rhetoric as opposed to language, as opposed to words, because that's the way that I think of it.

What does that mean to you, then? Basically what it means to me is I've always been interested in a kind of speech that maybe I inherited from my father, because he was a trial lawyer. Every night, around the dinner table, he used to say something that he knew would provoke me. So we would have long, very strong arguments. But you know, lawyers often speak so they give out little chunks of information that are supposed to get the jury starting to think in one way, then a new chunk of information. They may pause in the middle of sentences, they may redirect the attention in different, strategic ways. And I like using that way of using language in the theater. Which I think is something that a lot of playwrights don't do, because they're only interested in sort of naturalistic speech of everyday people talking to each other. And that never interested in me.

And why did you find that wasn't working with the film? Well, as I say, the language seemed—I mean, finally I made one that I think worked. The language seemed stilted. And also I don't... You know, it's very hard to say. They just weren't working. What finally released me, I guess, was I realized that I film very fast. I'm only filming a total of maybe four days. But in those four days I shoot enough materia; it's sort of like the way Chaplin used to work. I'm telling the actors what to do as we're filming. And then the other films, I wanted to eliminate all that stuff, all the mistakes and so forth, to get a pure, crystalline project. And I realized after a couple of years, you know, it's interesting, all the false starts, and all the people talking on the set, and talking to the actors, and maybe I just couldn't incorporate a lot of that messiness into the film. So I tried doing that, and that made a big difference, I think.

(Joseph Moran)

So how long has it been since your last theatrical production of this nature? Oh, well, it was the last one was at the Public. It was Idiot Savant at the Public. I don't remember what year that was.

That was with Willem Dafoe? Yeah. It was seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven…maybe it was 2007? I don't know.

So how long have you been rehearsing the new piece? So far, we're in our fifth week.

Is the text new material? Yeah, but you know, none of my material is ever really new, because I write material and then I just have stacks of material that is not written to be a play, but it's all written to be pages from a play, scenes from a play. And then I go through and find sections that I like, and then I look for other sections that might go with it. And so I sort of collage plays. I've been doing that for, you know, 25 years. So this material, most of it isn't that old. I would say some of it may be as old as ten or 12 years, I don't really remember. You know?

Do you care to say anything about what the title Old Fashioned Prostitutes (A True Romance) is intended to evoke? Frankly, what it means to me, is the play was—it is not an adaptation. But it was inspired by a film of a very great director, the Portuguese director Manoel de Oliveira, who is I think 102 now [Editor's note: 104!] and still making films. And he made a film back I think in the '80s, a three-part film called Inquietude which I can't really spell, but in French it means uneasiness or anxiety. And that film included, in one of its three sections, these Portuguese guys in the '30s or the '20s being infatuated with this famous courtesan in Lisbon. Or maybe it was in Porto, I don't remember.

And there was something about the the woman, Susie, and the basic setting that has just haunted me. And I thought well, I want to treat that milieu, the atmosphere of that milieu. So as I say, it's certainly not an adaptation, but it is inspired by that, and they were, in this film, courtesans. And that's why it's 'old fashioned prostitutes,' and it is a sad love story. In a way. I mean you know my work; it's not directly sad. But I think that's all I can say about it, that I was just so enamored of the basic image that I perceived from that film.

Has your approach to working in rehearsal changed at all, or been influenced by your work in film? Not very much, really. I mean I still do control a lot of it; everything is carefully choreographed. I mean this play perhaps has less theatrical razzle-dazzle. The text is much heavier than anything I've done in a long time. By heavier I mean more talking. And also, I should emphasize that the way I described it, it was about Susie, this courtesan, but really the leading character of the play is this almost Dostoyevskyian figure who's obsessed with this woman and can't quite bring himself to be openly approaching her. And it's really he that dominates the evening, in a way.

(Joseph Moran)

Is that the Michelin Man [one of the characters listed in the press release]? No, no. The Michelin Man is just—you know, I always used to use a lot of people who brought props and did different things, and the Michelin Man is just that non-speaking role. Where I got that idea I don't really know, but as I was working on the play the image just popped into my head. No, the leading character is named Samuel.

Did the rehearsals begin with full costumes and settings like always? Yep. Everything gets changed, but I have the actors in costumes, I have the sets, I have the lights, the sounds, you know, I have all the sound material that we try out different musics and effects immediately. So it's like, you know, having this big electric train set that I can play with for the total amount of the rehearsal period.

And how long is the total rehearsal period for this? I hate to say, because people will then come to Oskar [Eustis, the Public Theater's Artistic Director] and say, "Hey, you gave Foreman 8 weeks!" [laughs] But I've always worked that way, and I've always told people for at least 30 years now, that, you know, if I'm going to do a play, I need a very long rehearsal period. Because that's the way I work. I mean, so much is determined by the look of each moment. I couldn't possibly—well look, occasionally I've done plays where I've had to do just a tech week like everybody else. But very rarely, and it's been years since I've had to do one of my plays that way because my plays do depend on this total composition, moment-by-moment.

I really have such fond memories now of going into that little theater at St. Marks Church, and that world you created there. Do you ever miss that space? Not at all. You know, I was happy to be there, lucky to be there, but actually I began to find the space very constricting. So I was perfectly happy to give it up. If I hadn't given it up, and said I was never going to make theater again, I wouldn't have gotten far as I've gotten in making film. So no, I don't miss it.

(Joseph Moran)

You don't think that there's any intimacy lost when you go into a theater with a lot more seats? I absolutely do. But you know, life is full of contingent circumstances. And as a matter of fact, we—you know, I did the last play in the same space, at the Public. And because it's important that everybody see everything in my theater, we built the stage up much higher than it normally is. And also, the side walls of the set continue out 2/3 of the way into the audience. So the audience hopefully still feels that they're part of the world a little more, making it a little more intimate, than perhaps other shows in the same space might feel. That was my intention.

Sort of a trivial question, but will we be seeing those iconic posters around town that used to surface every year for your plays? I'm afraid not. You know, the Public have—first let me say the Public has someone who does their whole series of posters, and they want to maintain a certain style. Also, it's sort of a relief to me, because, you know, I really killed myself making those posters. I can't tell you how long I used to work over them.

They're worth it! That is a slight regret, that I can't have my normal kind of poster, yeah. Because I know a lot of people who never even saw the shows used to say, 'Oh, I never saw a show of his, but those posters of his, wow! They're great!"

I have one in my apartment. It's 'Wake Up Mr. Sleepy! Your Unconscious Mind Is Dead!' Well, I'm afraid there may never be anymore Foreman posters. I don't know. There were a lot of them. [laughing]

I guess my last question would be for somebody for who's never seen one of your plays and isn't familiar with your work. What would you say to that person who's curious and who's decided to go experience this? You know, I'm the worst person to ask, because, you know, people have asked me questions like that for 40 years. And I never know what to say. I try to make something that thrills me. And that makes me think it's not too stupid. And I know that a certain number of people don't like my work at all. But they will see something I dare to suggest that's not like anything they've seen before, and they have to be prepared for that. They'll see a play by somebody who's deeply serious, who reads everything, especially in philosophy, and who tries to make the theater an arena where cerebral, by which I mean sensual—sensual, cerebral, continual sparks of surprise. No story of course, but variations on a theme. You know, what more can I say? You can probably say better than I.

No, I doubt it. But I think that articulates it quite well actually. Okay, thank you for your time and I'm looking forward to this.Okay, see you, thanks. Hope they'll be another one. Because you know, I'm 75, and I feel pretty old.

You don't sound old. Well, people say that, but still, believe me, things start to happen to you at 75. And this play reflects that a little bit also.